[Vision2020] The Ku Klux Klan Seeks Members From the Palouse

[keely emerinemix]

Tom, once again we're indebted to you and "Moscow Cares," as well as "Not On The Palouse," for your work in keeping us all posted about the hate-driven threats to freedom, civility, and decency that arise from the worst elements of society.   This is chilling -- not that Tom Trail, a decent man if ever there was one, received it (as opposed to, say, my hairdresser receiving it), but that such filth continues to propagate.  

I've said it before, I'll say it now, and I'll probably say it 'til the day I die:  The Christian Church, the Body of Christ in the United States, is largely responsible for the birth, growth, and continued presence of the Klan and other white supremacy groups.  Virtually every manifestation of the Klan, from its inception in the 1920s as an anti-Catholic, anti-Jewish "fraternity," was begun by white, male "Christians" who trumpeted their Baptist or Methodist or Holy Temple of Perpetual Glory membership -- and went unchallenged by the Gospel-loving disciples among them.  This cancer could have been excised early on if the Church had been committed to the truth of the Gospel and cast its lot with Christ rather than wallowing in waters of privilege, hate, ignorance, violence, and bigotry.   But it wasn't; in fact, it was "Christians" who helped in its spread, and its the Church now that is left with the uncomfortable reality that its silence then and its largely impotent reaction to hate now has left a stain on the Body of Christ that will last 'til the end.

This happened on our watch.  Versions of it that pop up here and there, particularly in the area we all live in, continue and flourish.  The growth of racial, sexual, classist bigotry is undeniable -- and where it's found in the "Church" that claims the name of Christ, it must be confronted by others who claim the Name.  

My Church -- not my individual congregation, but the Christian Church in the U.S. -- has been guilty of allowing what our Savior never would.  How odd it is that breaking from the silence and acquiescence to evil too often found in the institutional Church might well, for some of us, be a significant step in moving closer to Christ.  It's my duty and my privilege, then, as a Christ-disciple, to fight this 'til the very end.  I don't want to have to explain to Him on judgment day why I felt that "tolerance" or silence or rationalizing it all away was the path I chose.

Keely
www.keely-prevailingwinds.com


From: moscowcares at moscow.com
Date: Mon, 2 Apr 2012 11:54:13 -0700
To: vision2020 at moscow.com
CC: fritzknorr at gmail.com; wmsteed at ci.moscow.id.us; sscott at ci.moscow.id.us; marilynbeckett at gmail.com; nchaney at ci.moscow.id.us; helen.yost at vandals.uidaho.edu; dzeiger at uidaho.edu; aaronament at moscow.com; loisb at q.com; foc at friendsoftheclearwater.org; dcarscallen at ci.moscow.id.us; cpenni at gmail.com; emilypoor at gmail.com; tbrown at ci.moscow.id.us; ponysnpups at gmail.com; lin at wildblue.net; bhaverstick at yahoo.com; jbradish at roadrunner.com; wkrauss at ci.moscow.id.us; tlamar at ci.moscow.id.us; sperrine at potlatch.com; chicory at wildblue.net; jeannemchale at hotmail.com; alchidester at juno.com; basketmakeart at yahoo.com
Subject: [Vision2020] The Ku Klux Klan Seeks Members From the Palouse

Greetings -
On March 31, 2012, Idaho State Representative Tom Trail received the following introduction and membership application.  The envelope and its contents indicate that it had originated from an office of the Ku Klux Klan, an organization based on hate, in defiance of everything the people of Latah County know and believe of Representative Trail.

  
Downloadable copies of the flyer and envelope may be accessed within the "Not On The Palouse" website at:
http://www.notonthepalouse.com/Klan_Flyer_033112.htm
Seeya round town, Moscow, because . . ,
"Moscow Cares"http://www.MoscowCares.com
Tom HansenMoscow, Idaho
"If not us, who?If not now, when?"
- Unknown


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