On this Day:  April 6, the trial of Scottsboro Boys started. The case of the Scottsboro Boys, which lasted more than 80 years, helped to spur the Civil Rights Movement, according to the National Museum of African American History and Culture (https://nmaahc.si.edu/blog/scottsboro-boys) 

The perseverance of the Scottsboro Boys and the attorneys and community leaders who supported their case helped to inspire several prominent activists and organizers. To Kill a Mockingbird, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by white author Harper Lee, is also loosely based on this case.

Why I'm going to church for Easter (Guthrie Graves-Fitzsimmons, Sat April 3, https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/03/opinions/easter-jesus-gallup-poll-church-decline-graves-fitzsimmons/index.html)

As a gay man who advocates for social justice, I get why some people look askance when I mention what my Sunday plans entail. 

While prominent progressive Christian voices exist, too often the loudest voices in American Christianity often sound nothing like Jesus — the radical healer and teacher who taught his followers to love their neighbor and free the oppressed. 

This Sunday past was not only Easter, but marked 53 years since MLK was killed. His fight for Black voting rights has yet to be won (Dean Obeidallah, CNN, April 4, https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/04/opinions/martin-luther-king-assassination-voting-rights-obeidallah/index.html) 

On April 4, 1968, a White gunman shot and killed Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. More than 50 years later, the fight he waged to ensure Black Americans had equal access to vote is still very much alive.

Alcee Hastings, pioneering civil rights activist, judge and politician, dies at 84 (from today’s Miami Herald https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article248269530.html) 

Alcee Hastings, crusading civil rights lawyer, the first Black federal judge in Florida and dean of Florida’s U.S. congressional delegation during a tumultuous career that took him from the segregated lunch counters of the Deep South to Capitol Hill, has died after a long battle with pancreatic cancer. He was84.

Children Now Playing Big Role In Spread of COVID-19
https://abc7chicago.com/covid-chidlren-variant-coroanvirus-coronavirus-vaccine/10486843/