Marianne Williamson and the Message of the Powerful

Marianne Williamson's talk at the Sacred Activism conference last week was quite remarkable in a number of ways. Some of the things she said made many of us squirm. And perhaps I'll talk more about that later. But I think one of the most powerful things she talked about was the message that was sent to those activists in the 60's who were daring to stand up and speak truth to power. The message that was broadcast loud and clear through the shootings of the students at Kent State, and through the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy. The message that it was time to shut up and go home, and retreat into private life. She said that they took those messages to heart, and that many continued to try to fix the world in their own way, but that the collective energy was dispersed by the fear. The threat felt very real. She said that that time was the time of great leaders; that this time was the time of the chorus, a chorus so big that they wouldn't be able to shut us down or shut us up so easily.

I'm too young to remember those things happening in real time. But when I was little, my parents had a record that had the song "Abraham, Martin and John" on it, and I remember listening to that song over and over and being so moved by it. I don't remember learning about what the song was about; that knowledge must have come to me before memory. But I know it put its mark on me. I always felt that something should be done to fix all the injustice that seemed so evident in the world. But the message crept into my heart too. What will it cost you? What will you be willing to give? And I think it's been part of the answer to why I have held back; why I didn't pursue a career that would have been more meaningful to me; why I was afraid to put my skin in the game.

Dr. King said, "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." Maybe I haven't been totally silent. But in many ways I've lived to keep safe.

I saw a bumper sticker the other day on the way to work: "Your silence will not protect you."

Indeed.