CONTACT: Joretta Purdue (Release # 274) June 3, 1996
The pageantry was done simply but stirringly.
Twenty-five children's choirs combined to make the 2,000-voice America Sings choir that stretched several rows deep across the east face of the Lincoln Memorial. The blue-and-white-clad young people ranging in age from 5 to 18 sang, gestured and danced in near perfect synchronization intermittently throughout the almost four-hour program.
National Park Service officials estimated the crowd size at 200,000 people.
At noon, 10,000 children and their adult companions sang and chanted as they paraded with banners flying across Memorial Bridge from Arlington Memorial Cemetery to the Lincoln Memorial grounds. It was an awesome sight.
Among them were 38 children and youth from Children and Family Urban Ministries in Des Moines, Iowa. They accompanied Donna Kay Campbell, a church and community worker of the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries, who arranged the trip to include a day for visiting such sights as the White House and Smithsonian Institution.
One boy from the group, Brion Perkins, accompanied Bishop Charles W. Jordan to the VIP seating area on the stage in a colorful procession of religious leaders that began the interfaith service.
Taking part in that service were Carolyn Johnson, president of United Methodist Women, who read Matthew 19:13-15. Her presentation represented Christianity among several readings from sacred texts.
The Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, general secretary of the National Council of Churches, offered the invocation in partnership with heads of the regional council of churches.
Johnson and Campbell, along with the other participants, each were escorted to the microphone by a child. In Campbell's case, that was her granddaughter, Catherine Joanna Campbell-Morrison, 6.
During the peppy musical numbers that preceded the service, the choir strutted in place, young dancers took over the stage and in the handicapped area some people joined in wheelchair dancing while one aide dog added a loud voice to the songs.
In the press area nearby, child journalists went about the task of covering the event along with their counterparts from adult-staffed media.
Large TV screens and speakers elevated above the crowd conveyed the stage events to the people massed along the Reflecting Pool and beyond.
For Leta Guild of Lansing, Mich., this was her first such demonstration. A retired kindergarten teacher and mother of two grown daughters, she said she made the trip "because I believe in standing up for children's rights." Guild is secretary of the Western Michigan Conference United Methodist Women.
The Rev. Theodore Loder and 120 people from the Germantown United Methodist Church in Philadelphia displayed a large banner naming their congregation, which long has been involved in social justice issues, he said, including Headstart for pre-schoolers and a job training program for school drop-outs.
"I think it's coalition building time," Loder said, suggesting that such organizations need to deal locally with the needs of victims of abuse and neglect and also address the structure issues related to the use of public budgets, the schools and job training.
He cautioned that although churches need to do more to address local problems, they cannot bring enough resources to bear without partnering with government and industry.
With Loder was John Riggan, who heads the National Association of Child Advocacy, a group of state and big city coalitions concerned with children. He warned that in this time of decentralization, child advocacy and action groups need to be organized at state and local levels or they, and the children, will lose out. The state of children is "worsening," he said.
The Philadelphia Citizens for Children and Youth had brought 400 busloads of people to the rally, the men said.
"I think it was wonderful. I think it was great," enthused the Rev. Carol Ann Parsons of Putnam (Mass.) United Methodist Church, who came with several members of a congregation already active in supporting and advocating for children.
"Wow!" was the reaction of Bobbie Griffin from Milwaukee, Wisc. She said she had never been to a rally but was excited by seeing people ranging from infants to the elderly all gathered for the same reason. She and several friends were continuing on a train safari that was to include an excursion to Wesley-related sites on St. Simon's Island, Ga.
"We rode all night and walked all day," said Christine Murphy, an Episcopalian laywoman who journeyed from Michigan on the same bus with her sister, Theresa Cochran, wife of clergyman, the Rev. James Cochran of Dixboro United Methodist Church.
Ila Hanson, 80, of Saginaw, Mich., said she was glad her granddaughter, Jenna Bailey, 13, had accompanied her as she was not quite up to all the walking in the sun. Jenna, who took off her socks and found water to convert them into cold compresses, applied them to her grandmother during strategic stops. Jenna was also delighted to walk through the nation's Capitol and to see the collection of First Lady's gowns in the Smithsonian, while her grandmother waited on a bench outside.
The United Methodist Building, although located two or three miles from the Lincoln Memorial, served as a hospitality area for some of the many United Methodists who attended the rally. Out- of-state buses dropped weary travelers in the morning hours and picked them up even more exhausted at the day's end.
The Women's Division and the Boards of Discipleship, Global Ministries and Church and Society -- provided beverages and snacks as well as white baseball caps that read "UMC 4 KIDS" to an estimated 2,000 to 2,500 United Methodists.
Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference United Methodist Women contributed leadership for hour worship services, 300 sack lunches for children, hug-me dolls and games so that every child who came to the building could have a souvenir.
In a pre-rally interfaith service May 31 at the National Cathedral, United Methodist Bishop Melvin G. Talbert, president of the National Council of Churches, gave the homily.
Produced by United Methodist News Service, official news agency of the United Methodist Church, with offices in Nashville, Tenn., New York, and Washington.
If you want to find out how to get more information about this story, call InfoServ at 1-800/251-8140.
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