Why I joined the Pilgrimage
from "Inside Space" of Hampshire Life Magazine
©1998 Daniel A. Brown

Once I made my commitment to join the Interfaith Pilgrimage of the Middle Passage, I began to have some doubts. For one thing, the prospect of walking 15-20 miles a day through the mid-summer heat of the American South seemed a daunting challenge. My friends and family weren't much help with their good-natured cries of, "What! Are you crazy!?" or wishing me "Good Luck" with mournful looks. An associate who had walked on the 1995 pilgrimage from Auschwitz to Hiroshima through southeast Asia, warned me that it would be just like Cambodia. On that leg of the walk, the midday temperature peaked at 120° and pilgrims got sunburned through their umbrellas. Beyond the physical demands, the social dimension of the walk seemed formidable as well. Any pilgrimage is a walking community with all the irritations and quirky behavior that people in close quarters can inflict on each other. But walking within a multi-racial community - deliberately retracing slavery and confronting racism - would be like crossing a psychic landmine. What sort of uneasy emotions would we be unleashing both in ourselves and in those we met en route? It promised to be an uncomfortable experience. But my spiritual practice has taught me over the years that uncomfortable situations contain vital lessons for me to learn. Therefore, that is where I choose to be. A month before I participated, I crossed paths with the Pilgrimage in New York City as I was about to fly out west for a short vacation. I drove into Harlem looking for the host church and contemplated the fact that as a white New Yorker, I had always been conditioned to regard this neighborhood as off-limits. I parked my car and entered the church just as the Pilgrimage stumbled in after a 20 mile stretch in 100° heat with traffic fumes adding misery to the already extreme pollution index. Most of the pilgrims collapsed in the pews as the pastor of the church gave a little welcoming speech. They looked completely drained and scared me as a portent of how the walk might unfold for me. But another dimension of the Pilgrimage experience revealed itself later that evening at a dinner and ceremony within the majestic St. John the Divine cathedral. We had a pre-supper prayer circle where the benediction was offered by none other than the wife of Babatunde Olatunji, the legendary drum master from west Africa. Suddenly, the emotional spirits of the walkers began to rise and we all found ourselves encircled by an uplifting feeling of mutual fellowship. The walkers were re-charged for the next day's trial. My worries were momentarily superseded by thoughts of wondrous things that might happen to me when I finally joined them. What actually did happen to me is the purpose of this article. It is a highly personal telling of my own interactions and transformation. It is not the definitive history of the Interfaith Pilgrimage of the Middle Passage. There is no such thing. Each participant will have their own unique story to tell, based on their own experiences, encounters and revelations. Nor is it a blanket treatise on racism in America, that festering wound that has plagued our culture for centuries. African-Americans I encountered in the South expressed opinions on their status ranging from effusive optimism to bleak despair. What I do report are observations and conversations, both of which opened my eyes a little wider and helped me look a little deeper into myself. Not as breast-beating white guilt, but as a way to purify my heart and, thus, transform into a better person. Since returning to the Valley, I have attempted to internalize the lessons I learned over the summer. I have written and given radio interviews about my personal confrontation with racism. In my classroom, I have divided my students into three families who experience American History from the vantage point of being English, Native Americans and Africans in the so-called "New World". Beginning in 1620, the African family experienced in graphic role-playing the horrors of the Middle Passage and the abuses of slavery. But as balance, they are also learning about the strength and richness of African-American culture which, (to paraphrase one of my Pilgrimage mentors) has given far more to America than it could ever possibly take. Return to Daniel A. Brown
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