Published February 21. 2021 12:01AM By
Lisa McGinley
I wish you could hear the Rev. Florence Clarke preach. She intones. I wish you could see her, tall and imposing in her clerical robes, but not prideful. Humble. She doesn t waste your time or attention; she composes her sermons with a journalist s economy of words and a dramatist s flair for the surprise turn of a thought. Why say elephant when you can say ant ? is a maxim with her.
Florence Clarke turns 80 today. It is a joyous day for a woman who grew up in Klan territory in South Carolina and joined the Jim Crow protests of the Civil Rights Movement. She has lived long enough and made enough of an impact to see the change and be the change. She is still preaching because she has a lot left to say. She did not always say it aloud.
The Day - New season for the Rev Florence Clarke - News from southeastern Connecticut theday.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from theday.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
New London Rev. Joyce Pollard, pastor at In His Presence Ministries, said Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed more than 50 years ago and yet what in the world happened that we are not further on with this being free?
In a powerful address Monday to a virtual audience during a community service remembering Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Pollard recognized the backdrop of political turmoil at the national level and a resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement inspired by the killing of George Floyd and other Black people at the hands of police. Take a minute to think. How far have we come and how far do we have to go? she asked, relaying a story about a grandson questioned by police for merely standing outside with a friend in New Jersey.