I spent a good part of this past Wednesday in downtown Cincinnati. The Hallidays had blessed me with tickets to the Reds game versus the Braves. I had asked for two of their four tickets and I called up our congregation's former youth pastor, Brian Mitchell, who has lived and worked in Cincinnati for the last six years or so. The plan was for us to meet outside the stadium and spend the afternoon at the ballpark together. I decided to head to Cincinnati a little earlier so I could visit the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center which sits just a block from the Great American Ball Park. I’d been wanting to visit the Freedom Center ever since we moved here. I knew I didn’t have much time (just an hour or so) but I wanted to make a quick run through of the museum to see if it was worth returning to for an entire day at a later time. Let me tell you, it is most certainly worth coming back to on another day! It took me an hour just to walk through all of the galleries and exhibits. Of course, I did not have any time to watch any of the numerous films that are shown in theaters throughout the building.
The most powerful experience for me, as I would assume is the case with most visitors, is when I stood inside an actual slave “pen” that had been recovered from Mason County, Kentucky. It is the size of a small barn. I walked inside the pen and saw the chains hanging from the rafters and I was transfixed by this nearly empty room where only 150 years ago or so human beings were chained up, beaten, whipped, raped, bought and sold. I couldn’t move. I just stood there and my chest was heavy. My eyes welled up and I felt the guilt of sin, the guilt of what human beings are willing to do to other human beings in the name of greed. As I walked through the various galleries, viewing artifacts and old photographs, it struck me that I was seeing evidence of one of the worst things humanity has ever done, one of the worst things my nation that I love had done to people. My beloved nation, whose founders wrote, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," kept human beings in “pens” and it was totally legal. I plan to return to the Freedom Center as soon as I can to read every placard. For similar reasons I plan to visit the Museum of the American Indian and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum while I am in Washington D.C. this July.
In a huge shift in mood, I hurried out of the Freedom Center, grabbed a quick plate of healthy food (I’m actually enjoying eating healthy these days) at the Freedom Center Café, and headed over to the ball park. I met up with Brian and I realized that the Hallidays had given me all four tickets. I just couldn’t live with myself having two tickets for great seats just sitting in my pocket going unused. I enlisted Brian to help me find a dad and a kid. We searched the long ticket line and we both spotted a dad and his daughter. She was about nine years old or so and she had a backwards Reds cap on and a Reds jersey. I walked up to them, introduced myself to them and told them that I had two tickets for great seats that I was willing to give them. They couldn’t believe it. He tried to pay me something for them but that would have cheapened the whole thing. I told the dad, “They were given to me for free, so I’m giving them to you for free” (see Matthew 10:8). So, thanks to the Hallidays and their generosity this dad and daughter saved some money and had much better seats than they could have gotten! Brian and I enjoyed chatting with the grateful dad who had surprised his daughter by picking her up early from school to go see her beloved Reds.
It was a beautiful warm spring afternoon. A color guard from a local high school ROTC program presented the colors. A high school choir did a wonderful job singing the National Anthem. We all stood and cheered for a Vietnam War Veteran and then later again for a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan. We ate peanuts and we saw a total of five home runs during the game. Unfortunately only two of them were by Reds and both were solo shots. The Braves hit a solo homer, a two-run homer, and a grand-slam. Obviously, the Reds didn’t win, but I’ve always believed that the worst day at the ball park beats the best day at work (although I do love my work!). At the end of the game the dad and daughter said thanks again and Brian and I parted ways. I hopped in the car and headed back toward home.
Wednesday was a day of contrasts. I viewed evidence of the African slave trade, which is the absolute worst that the United States of America has ever had to offer (along with the genocide and removal of Native peoples). I spent time thinking about how when those actions were taking place, our constitution was really a sham. You cannot say “all men [human beings] are created equal” out of one side of your mouth and with the other side support the buying, selling, and brutalization of human beings. Actions speak louder than words. On the other hand, I experienced a quintessentially American afternoon filled with much of the best things we have to offer—generosity, freedom, baseball, and a healthy and grateful patriotism. Wednesday afternoon is what everyone should be offered; Wednesday morning was what has been forced upon others sometimes instead (and continues to be forced on the 25 Million people who currently live in some form of slavery around the world today). What an interesting day!
In conclusion, while it is important to many of us to cheer on the Redlegs in hopes that they’ll start hitting better with runners in scoring position, it is much more important that we learn what the Freedom Center has to teach. Please consider going to Cincinnati to visit the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center if you haven’t. Actually, if there is anyone who would like to organize a group trip from our church please feel free to start working toward that. I think it would be not only a powerful experience for all of us who went but it would also be at least a small statement about the priorities of this congregation to gather together for a visit to such an important place and to see what can happen when we put our Christian faith into action on behalf of those in desperate need. If I asked someone to organize a trip to the Reds game, that would probably happen quickly. However, would you consider organizing a trip to the Freedom Center?
