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The Rainbow Flag
Presently, perhaps the primary use of the rainbow emblem is
with regard to LGBTQ people. The rainbow flag was created in 1978 by artist Gilbert
Baker. Upon Baker's death in 2017, a California state senator remarked that Baker
(b. 1951 in Kansas) “helped define the modern LGBT movement.”
In June 2015, the White House was illuminated in the rainbow
flag colors to commemorate the legalization of same-sex marriage in all 50
states, following the Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court decision.
The rainbow flag is now seen around the globe as a positive
representation of the LGBTQ community.
The Rainbow Coalition
Earlier, the rainbow was used in a different manner. In
April 1969, Fred Hampton of the Black Panther Party founded an antiracist,
anticlass movement called the Rainbow Coalition.
That original Rainbow Coalition was a multicultural political
organization that included the Black Panthers, Young Patriots (poor whites),
and the Young Lords (Hispanics), and an alliance of major Chicago street gangs to
help them end infighting and work for social change.
Hampton (b. 1948) was assassinated in December 1969—and that
is the climax of Judas and the Black Messiah, the 2021 American biographical
crime drama film about the betrayal of Hampton by an FBI informant.
Many years later, in Nov. 1983, Jesse Jackson launched his
campaign for the 1984 presidential election, claiming to be fighting for the
rights of a “Rainbow Coalition” of Americans—including Blacks, Whites, Latinos,
Native Americans and Asian Americans; men and women; straight and LGBTQ.
The Rainbow Division
As many of you know, for ten years now my wife and I have
been members of Rainbow Mennonite Church (RMC) in Kansas City, Kansas, (KCKS).
Before we attended there for the first time in 2011, I sent an email to the
pastor, asking, among other things, about the name.
We had heard that RMC was a church who welcomed and affirmed
LGBTQ people, so we wondered if the church’s name was related to that stance.
It turned out that there was no connection.
RMC is now located on Southwest Boulevard, but the church’s
first location was on Rainbow Boulevard, a KCKS roadway that was renamed that in
1919 in honor of the 42nd U.S. Infantry Division.
That 42nd Division was formed 105 years ago, in
August 1917, at the beginning of U.S. engagement in the First World War. It was
created by combining military units from 26 states and D.C.
Douglas MacArthur said that such an organization stretches
“over the whole country like a rainbow.” As a result, the 42nd came
to be known as the Rainbow Division.
Several of those who served in the 42nd Division
were from the small city of Rosedale (which was annexed by KCKS in 1922).
Rosedale welcomed local veterans home from the war with rainbow colored
bunting, and then Hudson Road, a major street in Rosedale, was renamed Rainbow
Boulevard.
In 1957 a Mennonite church was organized in Rosedale. When
it merged with another Mennonite congregation in 1964, the name was changed to
Rainbow Boulevard Mennonite Church. Then when the church moved to its present
location in 1969, “Boulevard” was dropped from its name.
Mennonites have mostly refused to serve in the military, and
during WWI many conscientious objectors were harshly treated and some were
jailed. Thus, it is somewhat ironic that our church’s name comes from the
“Rainbow Division,” the 42nd U.S. Infantry Division.
Nevertheless, we members at RMC are proud of our name and
the larger meaning of what “rainbow” signifies.
And most of us believe that “The moral arc of the universe
is long and bends toward justice.” Maybe that moral arc, which is shaped like a
rainbow, is also colored like a rainbow and is, indeed, bending toward justice and
equality for all the diverse people represented by the colors of the rainbow.
Thanks for a most interesting, informative, and colorful blog.
ReplyDeleteMy pleasure, Anton. Thanks for your comments.
DeleteLeroy, the photo reminded me of a magnificent double-rainbow I saw and photographed in West Texas, about forty years ago--wish I could find that picture. Cuing on the phenomenal prismatic effect of light refracted in water vapor or droplets, I must think of the various ways the Creator allows us to see the play of light in this planetary sphere.
ReplyDeleteFrom his Notebooks, May 24, 1869, an observation from Gerard Manley Hopkins (descriptions of meteorological and atmospheric phenomena dominate in his notes) from a longer passage about the clouds and light on Pendle Hill (East Lancashire, England):
"Now where a strong shadow lay in a slack between two brows of Pendle appeared above the hill the same phenomenon I had seen twice before (one near Brussels), a wedge of light faintly edged, green on the right side, red on the left, as a rainbow would be, leaning to the right and skirting the brow of the hill with a glowing edge. It lasted as long as I looked without change - I do not know how long but between five minutes and a quarter of an hour perhaps. It had clouds it seemed to me behind (ital.) it. Later when it was growing dark and the glow of the sunset was quite gone I noticed to the right of the spot a little - over Whalley - a rack of red cloud floating away, the red being I am persuaded a native colour, in fact it could not have been borrowed, the sun having long set and the higher clouds behind it not having it." (From the Everyman edition of poems, 1995)
Hopkins did not regard in what he saw a hint or premonition of a rainbow. What he saw was obvious in itself, however enchanting; an effect of multiple causes, I think, as varied as the greater and lesser flashes of contrast and colour. How many of us are so attentive as to perceive and distinguish such "everyday" things? Are they not present to us as among the many plumages of creation? (It reminds me of his description of the peacock's intricate and fantastic (n. p. i.) plumage.
I cannot fail to believe that such divinely-inspired creativity and displays should not encourage us to look more closely and appreciatively to our families, our neighbors, and our planetary neighbors with similar eyes. What is there to see in "the Others" is neither trivial nor banal, neither simply natural nor accidental.
Thanks for sharing this about Gerard Manly Hopkins (1844~89), whose poetry I have never read to the extent I would like to have. But just now I found that he also wrote this poem:
DeleteThe Rainbow
See on one hand
He drops his bright roots in the water'd sward,
And rosing part, on part dispenses green;
But with his other foot three miles beyond
He rises from the flocks of villages
That bead the plain; did ever Havering church-tower
Breathe in such ether? or the Quickly elms
Mask'd with such violet disallow their green?
"An interesting review of rainbow, Leroy. I had not known about the military usage" (from Thinking Friend Glenn Hinson in Kentucky).
ReplyDeleteDr. Hinson, here is a bit of what Wikipedia says about the Rainbow Division:
Delete"When the United States declared war on Germany in 1917, it federalized the National Guard and formed their units into divisions to quickly build up an Army. In addition, Douglas MacArthur, then a major, suggested to William A. Mann, the head of the Militia Bureau, that he form another division from the units of several states that were not assigned to divisions. Secretary of War Newton D. Baker approved the proposal, and recalled Douglas MacArthur saying that such an organization would 'stretch over the whole country like a rainbow.' On 1 August 1917, the War Department directed the formation of a composite National Guard division, using units from 26 states and the District of Columbia. As a result, the 42nd Division came to be known as the 'Rainbow Division.' The name stuck, and MacArthur was promoted to colonel as the division chief of staff."
It is still in existence as a division of the United States Army National Guard.
Yesterday I received the following comments from my Canadian Thinking Friend (and good personal friend) Glen Davis:
Delete"Thank you for this piece on the rainbow.
"My wife, Joyce, [now deceased] became an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church in Canada in 1996. She loved rainbows and butterflies, so she had a preaching stole made which featured those two colorful and meaningful wonders. Little did she know back then that the rainbow would become the well-known emblem of the LGBTQ movement, but when it did she wore her stole proudly as the grandmother of a gay grandson and a transgender granddaughter!
"In her new life in Christ’s presence, I suspect she is smiling at your focus on the rainbow, and so I pass her smile on to you!"
Thanks so much, Glen, for sharing these good words.
DeleteThanks for your positive reference to Rainbow Mennonite Church, a faith community that has been an important part of my life since I moved to Kansas City in 1968. The RMC experience has been much enriched by the contributions from members like you and June who have joined coming from other church denomination backgrounds.
ReplyDeleteOops, I didn't realize that my name was going to be Anonymous when I posted the above.
Delete