Look through my eyes: Musings inspired by Sojourner Truth
March is Women’s History Month and this year’s theme is “Valiant Women of the Vote.” I invite you to look through my eyes and see four musings I see in the dramatization, “Life of Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I a Woman.”
Where you start need not be where you finish
Born into slavery in 1797 as Isabella “Belle” Baumfree, Sojourner Truth rose out of slavery and became known as one of many valiant woman who helped change people’s hearts and minds about slavery and women’s rights — in spite of the broken promise her slaveowner, John Dumont, made to set her free on July 4, 1826.
At the age of 30, Truth took her daughter, Sophia, and set out for an unknown future.
As I reflect upon the many broken promises children of this nation are born into some 200 years later, I wonder if we will teach them to be valiant people who help change people’s hearts and minds about modern-day oppression and voter suppression.
Who do you say you are?
Free of every vestige of bondage, Sojourner asked God for a new name. As the story goes, He gave her the name Sojourner because she was to travel up and down the land showing the people their sins, being a sign unto them. She said her last name was always the name of her master and, since the Lord was now her Master and His Name is Truth, she would be Sojourner Truth. Her “be” preceded her do.
Who be you? While this question is grammatically incorrect, it requires an answer. What we say about ourselves is more important than what others say about us.
Where are the 21st century abolitionists?
Sojourner Truth and Frances Dana Barker Gage were both abolitionists and champions of the women’s rights movement. Yet, not every suffragist fighting for women’s right to vote was pleased that Sojourner took up this issue. At the 1851 Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, some of the women cornered Frances Gage, the organizer, and pleaded with her not to allow Sojourner to speak, fearing that newspapers would combine the women’s rights issue with abolition and the colored people, thus denouncing the women’s right issue.
Ignoring their request, Gage called on Truth to answer a group of ministers who had come to heckle the women. Sojourner answered them with her infamous, “Ain’t I a Woman” speech, exposing the important intersection of gender and race.
From then on, requests poured in for Sojourner to speak all over the country.
Where are the modern-day abolitionists who are speaking, voting, and acting against the inequities that continue to exist in America two centuries later? Did Sojourner Truth and Francis Gage die in vain?
‘Is God dead?’ the inscription on Sojourner Truth’s headstone in Michigan
Truth used her spiritually influenced oratory skills to remind her audience that as long as God was alive, right would prevail. She was a powerful force for good. How are you using your spiritually influenced skills?
This Women’s History Month, I invite you to:
Vote by March 10
Register to vote, if you are not currently registered
Take 10 minutes to answer 10 questions that will affect funding the next 10 years: www.2020census.gov