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Rev. Creech was on trial becaue he committed a true act of civil disobedience. He performed a holy union ceremony for gay couples after being specifically forbidden to do so by church officials. Rev. Creech defied the ban, his stance being that we are all equally-worthy of God's love, and equally-worthy of having our relationships recognized and celebrated in God's house if we so desire. The ecclesiastic trial was a controversy which gave White yet another opportunity for publicity. Never mind that Rev. Creech knew exactly what he was doing when he defied his superiors, was perfectly capable of making his own case to the tribunal, and declined to dignify the proceedings by entering any defense whatsoever.
Media are invited to be present at any or all of the following Soulforce events: Tuesday, November 16, 1999 Midtown Holiday Inn, Grand Island, NE (2503 South Locust, Grand Island, NE. 4-6PM Advanced training in nonviolent response for Soulforce delegates. 6 PM Deli buffet for delegates & media. Good time for media to interview Soulforce delegates from their areas. 7 PM The Holy Union & Vow Rededication Celebration with Jimmy Creech. The Holy Union that Jimmy Creech is on trial for conducting. Gay and lesbian couples from around the country renewing their vows. 8 PM The Press Conference with Jimmy Creech and Guests. 9 PM The 24 hour Soulforce candlelight vigil begins at the trial site. (Trinity United Methodist 511 N. Elm Street Ph: 308 382-1952) 10PM All night vigil continues at Trinity Church in one hour shifts. Wednesday, November 17, 1999 Trinity United Methodist Church (Trial Site) (Trinity United Methodist 511 N. Elm Street, Grand Island 6 AM Soulforce delegates assemble at trial site for civil disobedience 7 AM Soulforce Intervention begins at Jury Entrance Door We anticipate an arrest every 2-4 minutes for those two hours. 7-9 AM Civil Disobedience continues until the trial is convened at 9AM. 9 AM Vigil continues throughout the day in shifts Gee, inviting the media to "any or all" of the Soulfarce events wasn't too self-promoting, now was it? BuckcuB especially likes White's nice touch of providing a buffet for "delegates and media." So very much in the spirit of Martin Luther King and Gandhi -- let me see, now, what was it King served as an avant protestation? High tea? Champagne and canapes? Rev. White disregarded the certainty that his presence would ratchet the level of controversy (and media presence) up considerably. Creech had enough problems to deal with already, without the added onus of a tribunal angered by the interference of high-profile outsiders. If White's intent was to shame the judges into exonerating Creech, he was barking up the wrong tree. The tribunal unanimously found Rev. Creech guilty, and stripped him of his credentials as a United Methodist minister. And Jimmy Creech may just have Rev. White and his Mel-ites to thank for that unanimous conviction. As usual, White and the Mel-ites seem to have produced exactly the opposite of their alleged intent. One of the jurors, the Rev. Jeff Kelley of Nebrask City, declined to answer any questions from the horde of reporters. "It's a difficult time for us," Kelley commented.
Quaintly, Rev. Mel announced with callow bravado that he and the Mel-ites would stand on the steps of Grand Island, Nebraska's Trinity United Methodist Church and be arrested if need be, after the fashion of racial-discrimination protestors in the Fifties and Sixties. We are expected to ignore the fact, BuckcuB supposes, that the arrests were carried out with kid- glove daintiness, and -- get this -- the charges were negotiated with Grand Island, Nebraska law enforcement in advance. The local police also kindly set up a processing center in a high school directly opposite the church, so the Mel-ites needed only to skip across the street, pay their $48 fine, and be instantly released. Rev. Mel might have been a bit less likely to take such a falsely-courageous stand if he knew he and his retinue were going to get the living crap beaten out of them in the paddy wagon, as happened to such protestors forty years ago. White's hilarious chutzpah in calling his group's burlesque "civil disobedience" is beyond absurdity. Can you imagine M.L. King sitting down with some Mississippi sheriff: "Now, sheriff, here's the deal; your men can use dogs or they can use fire-hoses, but not both, okay? And make sure there's fresh coffee at the jail when we get there, or the marchers will be real miffed."? We are also, apparently, expected to ignore the fact that the world has changed vastly since Martin Luther King Jr. and Mohandas Gandhi practiced civil disobedience. England was still an empire on which the sun never set in Gandhi's day; and while the British finally gave Gandhi India, may BuckcuB point out a bit dryly that they did not give him back any of the vast riches and treasures they had looted from the subcontinent over a century's span? Rather a Pyrrhic victory – India was a free and independent nation at last, all right. Free to starve in the dirt. Martin Luther King, Jr., practiced civil disobedience against the backdrop of an unpopular war in Southeast Asia; open and regionally-accepted racial prejudice; the beginning of America's technological transition; and the dawning of a new age of sexual freedom, challenges to traditional authority, and social revolution. It was a time when change was considered not merely good but necessary. A time when people from Peoria to Park Avenue were questioning "traditional values." The Sixties were a decade the ultraconservative right-wing would like to wipe from the history books – people thinking for themselves, coming to their own conclusions, questioning authority, being comfortable with nontraditional ideas. Horrors! King's style of civil disobedience fit the times, and was therefore effective. Not quite as effective, perhaps, as black folks burning down rather substantial portions of several large American cities, but effective nonetheless. The America of 1999 is emphatically not the America of 1962. The world is largely at peace, with the exception of a few long-standing hot spots, and some wacky Islamic terrorists. Schoolchildren no longer practice "duck-and-cover" drills for the imminent arrival of Soviet ICBM nuclear missiles. The American economy is at a record peacetime high. Two-income families and "soccer moms" have replaced Pop down at the mill and Mom in the kitchen all day. We've grown accustomed to our security, our wealth, our peace.
But Rev. White ignored this change utterly. He is
not, dear reader, merely imitating the tactics of
Ghandi and King – Mel White wants to BE Gandhi or King. To be revered and remembered as those giants of civil
liberties are revered and remembered. So White ignores the changes time has wrought, and instead slavishly imitates his icons in the hope of becoming an icon himself. What a pity neither Gandhi nor King is around to give Rev. Mel the kick in the pants he so richly deserves!
The Creech protest, like White's other Soulfarce protests, changed nothing. It got White and the Mel-ites thirty seconds on the national news, on a slow news day. No one was outraged into action. No newspaper's "Letters To The Editor" page will suddenly fill with affronted epistles on behalf of Jimmy Creech. Frankly, give BuckcuB the full civil rights all American citizens are already entitled to, and he won't give a damn what the religious right thinks. They can all shut their narrow minds up in whited sepulchres and shout homophobia until Doomsday -- so long as it doesn't infringe on the civil rights of gays and lesbians. Again, BuckcuB asks: When is Mel White going to stop trying to stand on the shoulders of giants, and instead get down to the grassroots business of working toward equal civil rights for all gays and lesbians at the legislative and corporate level? Washington and Wall Street run this nation, not the church! |
The Rev. Jimmy Creech was the victim of a modern-day witch trial 
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