Every now and then, something that’s a normal part of life suddenly shocks you by being controversial.
For me, the eye-opener was over a moving, powerful song I’ve sung in church – the kind of song that carries you on waves of inspiration and hope and love.
Yet, apparently, a lot of Super Bowl fans were insulted by the singing of “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”
They were complaining that “The Black National Anthem” should not have been sung at the Super Bowl. That it was divisive. That this nation only has one National Anthem, not two.
That song?
“Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us,
“Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us …”
Of course, those lines speak a lot to let us know what the song means.
And “We have come over a way that with tears has been watered.
“We have come, treading our path through the blood of the slaughtered,
“Out from the gloomy past,
“Till now we stand at last
“Where the white gleam of our bright star is cast.”
Yes, I think I’ve only heard this song in Black churches or by Black choirs. And certainly as I’ve heard it sung, and sang along, its meaning of coming through turmoil and the goal of fairness and betterment has sunk in. That’s something that Black people have had to worry about significantly more than white people have.
But that song has meaning for all of us.
Black people may have been liberated from slavery and institutional discrimination, but white people also have been freed — from having to be jerks and buttheads and rude and callous and irrational to carry out that racism, as well.
If my daughter and I had lived in the time of segregation, we’d either have to be really heartless, cruel cretins to go along with the terrible unfair treatments of discrimination, or we’d suffer shunning and disapproval and quite possibly violence for standing up for what’s right. So the message of that song applies to us as white people, too, on two levels: One, it speaks for a better society than what was in the past; and two, it frees us, as white people, from having to live on the inhumane and evil side of segregation.
However, I didn’t know until the Super Bowl controversy that that song is considered the “The Black National Anthem,” so I looked it up.
The lyrics were written 1900 as a poem by NAACP leader James Weldon Johnson and set to music by his brother, John Rosamond Johnson. Decades later it would be adopted by the NAACP and used to motivate during the Civil Rights Movement.
“Thou who hast by Thy might,
“Led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.”
Don’t those lines apply to all of us, no matter the race?
I don’t recall ever hearing it sung in my church (spoiler alert: Mostly white people go to my church), but my daughter and I have heard it and sung it often while visiting other churches and in gospel concerts.
“Lift every voice and sing,
“Till earth and heaven ring,
“Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;
“Let our rejoicing rise
“High as the list’ning skies,
“Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.”
That says life “every” voice, not just Black voices. It says “our” rejoicing.
I didn’t know the history of the song until now — just had a vague understanding that it is important. However, I have known the lyrics and can sing it from memory. I did not have to know the history to feel the worthwhile and godly message of the song.
My daughter has been singing it since she was a little girl. As she gets older, she’ll come to learn the history behind it as well. When she does, she’ll already have the power of the song built into her being.
“Shadowed beneath Thy hand,
“May we forever stand,
“True to our God,
“True to our native land.”
Truly, how can we object to that message?
