“Strength, Hope, Resilience”

NC Poet Laureate, Jaki Shelton Green

By Karen Puckett

Performing artists from around the community will celebrate the strength and resilience of communities of color during an afternoon of music, dance, and spoken word in the Faith Center, Saturday, Aug. 7 at 11:30 am.

Featuring a performance by the NC Poet Laureate, Jaki Shelton Green, Strength, Hope, Resilience is part of a two-day series of events in downtown Salisbury surrounding the installation of a historical marker that commemorates the Salisbury lynchings of 1906. The marker will be located one block north of St. John’s, between the curb and sidewalk along North Church Street, adjacent to the Oak Grove Freedman’s Cemetery.

Other events that weekend include Historic Marker Dedication & Service of Remembrance at Soldiers Memorial AME Zion at 7 pm on Friday, Aug. 6 and Equal Justice Initiative Speaks! at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church at 10 am on Saturday, Aug. 7, ending just prior to the St. John’s event.

The historical marker and series of events is the product of a partnership between the local grassroots organization Actions in Faith and Justice and the Alabama-based Equal Justice Initiative which has placed similar markers in several states.  The Salisbury marker will be the first installed in NC.

The Conversations that Matter team is led by Geoffrey Hoy and meets regularly to plan events and activities that address today’s complex societal environment. The Conversations that Matter team echoes the sentiments of the church’s Vision for Racial Healing whereby our congregation pledges to oppose racism in all its forms, work for the healing and health of our community, and build relationships of trust and solidarity with people in and beyond our congregation so that we may grow together into the people God desires us to be.