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Re: National Nigger Cathedral unveils racial justice-themed windows, replacing Confederate ones

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More Black Lies

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Sep 24, 2023, 12:25:03 AM9/24/23
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In article <ueiubp$3pbnq$5...@dont-email.me>

Six years after two stained-glass windows that honored Confederate
Gens. Robert E. Lee and Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson were taken down,
the Washington National Cathedral has unveiled the pair of windows
that are taking their place.

The windows, titled "Now and Forever," were created by artist Kerry
James Marshall and center around racial justice. The images show a
group of protesters marching in different directions and holding up
large signs that read "Fairness" and "No Foul Play."

The new windows "lift up the values of justice and fairness and the
ongoing struggle for equality among all God's great children," the
Very Rev. Randolph Marshall Hollerith, the cathedral's dean, said on
Saturday at the unveiling.

He said the previous windows "were offensive and they were a barrier
to the ministry of this cathedral and they were antithetical to our
call to be a house of prayer for all people."

"They told a false narrative extolling two individuals who fought to
keep the institution of slavery alive in this country," he added.

The earlier windows had been a fixture at the house of worship in
Washington, D.C., for more than 60 years. Created in 1953, the
windows pay tribute to Lee and Jackson, showcasing scenes from their
lives as well as the Confederate battle flag.

After nine Black worshippers at Mother Emanuel AME Church in South
Carolina were killed by a white supremacist in 2015, the cathedral's
dean at the time, Gary Hall, called for the Confederate tribute
windows to be removed.

The Confederate flags were removed in 2016 and the windows were
taken down in 2017. The cathedral also launched the search for its
replacement. In 2021, the cathedral selected Kerry James Marshall as
the artist tasked with creating racial justice-themed windows.
Marshall, whose paintings have been at the Met, the National Gallery
and the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, has devoted his career
illustrating Black lives and Black culture on canvas.

On Saturday, the Washington National Cathedral debuted the new
windows, as well as a poem inscribed in stone tablets near the
windows titled "American Song" by Elizabeth Alexander. The poem was
specifically composed for the occasion.

It's not a poem and not worth reading or hearing, therefore it is
omitted.

https://www.npr.org/2023/09/23/1201350129/national-cathedral-
racial-justice-stained-glass-windows

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