On November 13, 2016, I attended a Christian church fellowship in Brooklyn, New York, at the Brown Memorial Baptist Church. Brown Memorial Baptist Church, that is celebrating 100 year-anniversary of its creation, has played a key role in the American Civil Rights movement. Along with other major African-American churches, such as the South Carolina Emmanuel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church (see here), the Church leaders and members rallied, comforted, and gave hope to millions of African-Americans and minorities and served as a pillar of strength to lean on during trying times.

    The message throughout the Civil Rights struggle, as recapped by Reverend Clinton M. Miller during the November 13, 2016 sermon, could be summarized as follows: "African-Americans overcame so many trials and tribulations over the ages, from their abduction from African shores and inlands to current moments. They faced so many disappointments, yet they are still standing!"

    In fact, Black Americans went through so much: abducted from their homelands in Africa, held in dungeons on the shores of Africa, chained and transported as a discardable cargo across the Atlantic Ocean, raped, sold as commodity items in auctions, starved, worked to death in fields, hanged, lynched, used in wars, segregated against, shot, assembled in ghettos, cramped in prisons, and the list goes on.