Patricia Simpson-Turner: In Memoriam

The Episcopal Diocese of Chicago has published an obituary for Patricia Simpson-Turner on its website . The Witness is honored to share the following special tributes to Pat's life and ministry, and invites additional responses from our readers who knew and were inspired by her.

The Rev. Dr. Richard L. Tolliver preached the following homily at St. Edmund's Episcopal Church, Chicago, Illinois on the occasion of the Burial Office and Requiem Mass being said for Patricia Simpson-Turner, January 29, 2005.

In the East African country of Uganda there resides a tribe known as the Acholi. On the occasion of the death of a family member the following funeral poem is sung at the final burial ceremony:

              Fire rages at Layima

              Fire rages in the Valley

              Of River Cumu,

              Everything is utterly utterly destroyed;

              If could reach

              The homestead of death's mother

              O! My daughter

              I would make a long grass torch

              If I could reach

              The homestead of death's mother

              I would destroy everything utterly utterly

              Like the fire that rages at               Layima

              Like the fire that rages

              In the valley of River Cumu

As we reflect upon the death of our beloved sister, Patricia Simpson-Turner, the immediate impulse of those who loved her most dearly is to appropriate as our own, the words of this Acholi funeral hymn. For indeed, fire rages here today, fire rages in the valley of our hearts. Everything is utterly utterly destroyed. If we could reach the homestead of death's mother, our first impulse would be to make a long grass torch. We would destroy everything utterly utterly, like the fire that rages here today, like the fire that rages in the valley of our hearts.

Death has come to our sister suddenly and as a thief. It was not looked for, nor was it expected. Not that death is ever easy or can ever be welcome, but coming like this, so quickly and so suddenly as to take us unaware, it brings with its pain an added dimension of shock and disbelief.

We cannot really accept the fact that one who so short a while ago was with us fully, sharing our life as we shared hers, is now gone. It is difficult to believe that one whose life was so full and free could now be ended. How can we make our peace with the fact of death, coming as it does in the midst of our hopes still being hoped and our dreams still being dreamed?

Death will come. We know this. While we are never fully prepared for it, we live with the reality of death as an ever-present fact of life. God has not promised us that we will not die. The question is not, “Shall we die?” or “How shall we die?” or “When shall we die?” or “Where” but rather, “How shall we live?” Life itself is the great question, and how we live it is ever before us.

To this question our sister, Pat, has given her answer. We have known her and loved her and shared her life with her. She has lived fully and completely and well. Life was for her, as it is for all of us, hard at times, and difficult. The questions of life are many and varied, and dealing with them is not easy. We succeed and we fail; we win a victory and we lose. But still we persevere. Amidst love and joy, mingled with grief and sorrow, we continue on our journey as best we are able.

So, too, has Pat lived among us. Standing straight and tall, she demonstrated that an individual is noble architecture, more than just an intricate design of nerves and sinews. Loving and being loved, sharing and serving, working and planning and hoping and dreaming, she lived her life among us. And she has won her battles and won her victories. Our tears attest to that. Our lives have met and they have touched. The emptiness we feel at her departure is witness to this.

And what more can we ask? So much more can we desire, of course, and this desire will always move men and women to fight the great battles of life. But these desires are of time, they are not of quality. A life rich and well lived is its own reward, a great victory unto itself, its own fulfillment. It is in the living of life that even death finds its meaning. So it has been for our sister, Pat.

If Pat had one wish for us, it would be that we live life to the fullest, not in a self-interested sense but in an others-interested manner. For example, everyone who knew Pat, had no doubt that she lived for her family. Her written obituary states, “An old time mother, Pat loved her family deeply and set a high standard of behavior. She was proud of her daughter and son's self-reliance and capacity to master difficult tasks. When her son got into trouble, she poured all of her resources into his defense and secured the custody and safety of his three children. With faith and resourcefulness, Pat worked to hold her family together, and often worked miracles.”

Seye, no more eloquent words than those penned by the African-American poet, Langston Hughes in his poem, “The Negro Mother,” can express the melody Pat will play upon the keyboard of time for you as you honor and gain strength from your mother's legacy. Listen again to those words:

              Children, I come back today

              To tell you a story of the long dark way

              That I had to climb, that I had to know

              In order that the race might live and grow.

              Look at my face—dark as the night—

              Yet shining like the sun with love's true light.

              I am the child they stole from the sand

              Three hundred years ago in Africa's land.

              I am the dark girl who crossed the wide sea

              Carrying in my body the seed of the free.

              I am the woman who worked in the field

              Bringing the cotton and the corn to yield.

              I am the one who labored as a slave,

              Beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave—

              Children sold away from me, husband sold, too.

              No safety, no love, no respect was I due.

              Three hundred years in the deepest South:

              But God put a dream like steel in my soul.

              Now, through my children, I'm reaching my goal.

              Now, through my children, young and free,

              I realize the blessings denied to me.

              I couldn't read then. I couldn't write.

              I had nothing, back there in the night.

              Sometimes, the valley was filled with tears,

              But I kept trudging on through the lonely years.

              Sometimes, the road was hot with sun,

              But I had to keep on till my work was done:

              I had to keep on! Not stopping for me—

              I was the seed of the coming Free.

              I nourished the dream that nothing could smother

              Deep in my breast—the Negro mother.

              I had only hope then, but now through you,

              Dark ones of today, my dreams must come true:

              All you dark children in the world out there,

              Remember my sweat, my pain, my despair.

              Remember my years, heavy with sorrow—

              And make of those years a torch for tomorrow.

              Make of my past a road to the light

              Out of the darkness, the ignorance, the night.

              Lift high my banner out of the dust.

              Stand like free men supporting my trust.

              Believe in the right, let none push you back.

              Remember the whip and the slaver's track.

              Remember how the strong in struggle and strive

              Still bar you the way, and deny you life—

              But march ever forward, breaking down bars.

              Look ever upward at the sun and the stars.

              Oh, my dark children, may my dreams and my prayers

              Impel you forever up the great stairs—

              For I will be with you till no white brother

              Dares keep down the children of the Negro mother.

Pat would challenge those of us who share some of the blood and soil of Africa as part of our heritage, to live an others-interested life as we seek the empowerment of persons of African descent throughout the world. It is clear from an examination of her life and witness that she appropriated as her mantra, the pledge that the late Dr. W.E.B. DuBois made to himself on the occasion of the celebration of his twenty-fifth birthday. He celebrated that birthday while studying in Berlin, Germany. He recalls the celebration in his Autobiography. He says, “The night before I had heard Schubert's beautiful ‘Unfinished Symphony,' planned my celebration and written to Grandma and Mable and had a curious little ceremony with candles, Greek wine, oil and song and prayer.”

With his characteristically poetic sensibility, race pride, intelligence, and self-confidence, DuBois then wrote:

Night – grand and wonderful. I am glad I am living. I rejoice as a strong man to win a race, and I am strong – is it egotism – is it assurance – or is it the silent call of the world spirit that makes me feel that I am and that beneath my scepter a world of kings shall bow. The hot dark blood of a black forefather is beating at my heart, and I know that I am either a genius or a fool. O I wonder what I am – I wonder what the world is – I wonder if life is worth the storm and stress. I do not know – perhaps I shall never know: But this I do know: be the truth what it may I will seek it on the pure assumption that it is worth seeking – and Heaven nor hell, God nor Devil shall turn me from my purpose till I die – I therefore take the world that the unknown lay in may hands and work for the rise of the Negro people, taking for granted that their best development means the best development for the world.

Where do we go from here? How do we who celebrate this magnificent life, and continue to honor her legacy? Very simply we do it by recommitting ourselves to protesting every act of social, political and economic discrimination wherever it exists.

The recommitment I am calling for is an individual one. It is a challenge to each and every one of us, and especially to those of us who have had an opportunity to win an education, to train for a profession, to make it in a world that has left too many or our brothers and sisters behind.

Let us be so committed to the cause of human empowerment that engagement in the struggle becomes like play. For as Robert Frost said years ago in his haunting poem, “Two Tramps in Mud Time”:

              Only where love and need are one,

              And the work is play for mortal stakes,

              Is the deed ever really done

              For heaven and future's sakes.

As we leave this place today, I imagine Patricia Simpson-Turner is looking down from Heaven saying something to us. It is best summarized in the parting words of Pearlie, in the renowned Broadway play, Pearlie Victorious:

Tonight my friends I find in being black a thing of beauty. A joy, a strength, a secret cup of gladness. A native land of neither time nor place. A native land in every Negro's face. Be loyal to yourself, your skin, your hair, your lips, your southern speech, your laugh and kindness. A Negro's Kingdom's vast as any other. Accepting full the sweetness of your blackness. Not wishing to be white, nor red, nor yellow, nor any other race or face but this. Farewell my deep and Africanic brothers and sisters. Be brave. Keep freedom in the family. Do what you can for the white folks and write me in care of the post office. Now may the Constitution of the United States go with you. The Declaration of Independence stand by you. The Bill of Rights protect you. And may your own dreams be your only boundaries. Henceforth now and forever.

AMEN.

The Rev. Richard L. Tolliver, rector of St. Edmund's Episcopal Church in Chicago, is a past president of the Union of Black Episcopalians.

Tribute to Pat Simpson-Turner

By Joe Barndt

It is very difficult to get my mind around the idea that Pat Simpson-Turner has died. I tried to dial her number the other day in the futile hope she would pick up the phone and greet me in her usual way: “This is Pat, how can I help you?”

She was a beautiful woman and sister who continues to live among us as a model of courage, honesty, and a spirit of determination that refuses to give up. Pat's commitment to exposing, resisting and dismantling racism was matched only by her dedication to her faith and the church, and her loving care for others in need.

Pat had leadership skills and courage and honesty and so many other qualities that made her such a valuable colleague and friend. She worked in so many areas of life – in her home parish – St. Edmund's – in Chicago; in the Episcopal Church nationwide and in the Diocese of Chicago; in the Union of Black Episcopalians; in the Episcopal urban network; in the ecumenical world; and in Crossroads Anti-Racism Ministry, where she worked with me and other colleagues as an organizer and trainer.

Perhaps above all, Pat was dedicated to her family, and especially to the three grandchildren she had taken on to raise. There was no mountain too steep, no challenge too difficult for Pat in the protecting and caring for her family. She was a woman whose financial resources were few, but whose personal creativity, determination and flat out stubbornness never stopped at any barrier in order to acquire what was need for her family.

Pat was tough and she was honest. She took on life. She would take on anyone or anything that contradicted her deeply-felt principles. She took on the clergy, she took on the laity, she took on colleagues, she took on bishops. And she did it with honesty, often with anger, always with love. I speak from personal experience; on numerous occasions – and to my everlasting benefit – she took me on, whether I felt I needed it or not.

The day of her funeral she was supposed to be co-training with me and another Crossroads colleague, Anne Stewart, at a Crossroads Ministry anti-racism workshop in High Point, North Carolina. We chose to do the training in her honor, rather than cancel it and go to her funeral. Sitting in High Point before the event, I could not accept her death. It took every bit of will power I had to keep from going to the airport to pick her up. Part of me still believes if I had done that she would have walked out of the arrivals door and climbed in the car. Maybe she is still waiting there for me and is mad at me for standing her up.

During the three days of the workshop, her photograph was displayed on a wall of history of resistance to racism, side-by-side with other saints and heroes such as Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Fannie Lou Hamer and Shirley Chisholm. We were surrounded by her spirit and she was very much present with us as a co-trainer.

She is present with me now as I write these words and try to hold back my tears. I thank God for the life of this incredibly strong, persistent, stubborn and beautiful black woman, Pat Simpson-Turner, who showed us how to “do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with our God.”

The Rev. Joe Barndt, a co-founder of Crossroads Anti-Racism Ministry, lives in California.

Tribute to Pat Simpson Turner

By Br. Reginald Crenshaw, OHC

INDENT AND CHANGE FONT

Steal away, steal away, steal away to Jesus! Steal away, steal away home. I ain't got long to stay here. My Lord he calls, calls me by the thunder. The trumpet sound within my soul. I ain't got long to stay here. My Lord calls me, calls me by the lightning. The trumpet sounds within my soul. I ain't got long to stay here.

How do you say farewell to a friend, a colleague a person who has been a significant presence in your life for so long? You say goodbye by remembering her spirit, her persistence, and her love of life.

The most important presence in Pat's life was God. It was her love of God that animated her spirit. Her spirit was so consumed with love of people and the belief that people could change for the better. It was her faith that allowed this incredible woman to achieve the things that she did. It was love that one saw actualized in Pat's involvement with people, in her anti-racism work, her ecumenical work, her commitment to the mission and goals of the Union of Black Episcopalians work in the larger church and most importantly in the love she had for her family. It was her love for family that enabled her to assumed guardianship of her grandchildren. She nurtured them, educated them, saw to their spiritual, physical, emotional needs. She took those kids with her everywhere she went. They went to all the meetings, Pat attended from General Convention, to antiracism meetings, ecumenical meetings, the children were along with their toys, their occasional squabbling with each other, and numerous ways they sought attention from “Grandma” during meetings particularly if she was the chair. But she dealt with the interruptions as if they were part of the meeting, and it was moving to see how the adults over time helped take care of the children during the meetings. They were not intruders just part of the meeting. It was important she use to say to me that her “babies” be present with her and learn in their own way the importance of the work that “grandma” was doing. They were as much a part of the struggle for liberation as she was. But most importantly she loved them and demonstrated that love to them over and over again. Oh! The trumpet sound in Pat's soul!

The trumpet sound in Pat Simpson-Turner's soul was her devotion to truth, honesty and justice. Pat told the truth. She believed that there could be no movement forward toward the solution of any issue if hidden motives and other inhibitors remain dormant in a process or conversation. At times she pressed strongly as she spoke her truth and that often set her at odds with people. While sometimes hurt at being misunderstood she nevertheless believed that being honest and true to one's sense of self and truth was important and non-negotiable.

I worked closely with Pat when I was on the staff of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago. We worked to develop the diocesan antiracism team; we worked together on the Illinois Council of Churches antiracism task force, and on many other projects. In all those situations her commitment to justice and liberation was a powerful example to the many people who worked with her. Her laughter at her own foibles, her uncanny and disarming ability to self-disclose her own struggles was an incredible witness to me and to all who struggled with Pat to build meaningful and effective community.

Thank you my sister for your life and for being such a significant part of mine.

Br. Reginald Crenshaw, OHC, lives at Holy Cross Monastery in West Park, N.Y.