211. The Prayer of a Child
In 1969 or 1970 I became a part of a group called the Martin Luther King Singers. It was established not too long after the death of King. And it began as a group that would do a concert on his birthday, and then it expanded to be a group that did concerts throughout the year. It was composed of persons who were black, who were white, old and young, persons skilled in music and persons who needed to learn their part by rote. It was conducted by John Anthony, a professional musician, African-American, who pulled together an exciting concert time after time.
Each rehearsal of the Martin Luther King Singers ended in prayer. Often John Anthony would start the group singing “We Shall Overcome,” sometimes just humming it and then would have one of the ministers in the group pray over the hum.
This particular time he started the group singing and then we went to a hum. But before he pointed to someone to pray, we all realized that the two year old who had come with her parents had not heard the direction to hum. Her clear little voice rose over the hum as she sang each word and each note with a belief system already deep inside of her.
The choir hummed even more softly as she sang, “We shall overcome. We shall overcome. We shall overcome some day. Oh deep in my heart, I do believe we shall overcome some day.”
The prayer had been prayed!
