And Her Name was Lena… A Good Friday Reflection ~ Dr. Brian Clardy

Text: Isaiah 52:13-53:12

“By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth.”

May I speak to you tonight in the Blessed Name of the One True and Living God +Father, Son and Holy Spirit+ Amen

Lena Baker was a single mother of three children in 1940s Georgia. To support her struggling family, she worked at a gristmill where she came to the attention of her lecherous employer Ernest Knight. It was common in those days for Black women to be assaulted by their employers with impunity and without legal recourse, and Lena Baker was no exception to this horrible norm. Sexual abuse, being held against her will, and separated from her children became the basis of her relationship with Knight. If she had objected, she would most likely lose her job or possibly her life. There was no refuge or sanctuary for women of color in the Jim Crow South.

On April 29, 1944, Baker was held captive in Knight’s mill for what had been several days. An argument ensued and Knight threatened Baker with an iron bar; Knight also carried a pistol. They fought and struggled over the gun and the pistol discharged fatally wounding Knight. Lena promptly reported the killing to law enforcement but was arrested for murder.

Her trial that following August was a sideshow. Her lawyer did not put on a vigorous defense, despite the fact that Lena had claimed that she killed Knight in self-defense. The jury pool did not have one person of color, or a woman seated, The Judge kept two pistols on the bench as he sat in judgment of the case. Baker’s testimony was dismissed as fiction And it took less that a few hours for the jury to return a guilty verdict and for the Judge to pronounce a death sentence. By any reasonable standard, Lena Baker did not receive a fair trial due to the fact that she was a poor disenfranchised and marginalized Black woman who was considered “Less than.” Even Georgia’s progressive Governor, Ellis Arnall, recognized that this was a terrible miscarriage of justice and gave Baker a two month reprieve so that the state’s Board of Pardons and Parole could review her case. By January, 1945 her request was denied and her execution by the electric chair was set for the following March 5th .

By all accounts, Baker went to her death calmly, and when she was asked by her executioners if she had any last words, Baker said: ”What I done, I did in self-defense, or I would have been killed myself. Where I was I could not overcome it. God has forgiven me. I have nothing against anyone. I picked cotton for Mr. Pritchett, and he has been good to me. I am ready to go. I am one in the number. I am ready to meet my God. I have a very strong conscience.”

Lena Baker’s body received several shocks for about six minutes until she expired at 11:26am. She was the first woman to have been executed in the state of Georgia. Sixty years later…….sixty……years……later, she was granted a posthumous pardon by the state as it took an entire lifetime to correct an act of gross injustice.

Tonight we also commemorate the willful killing of another young person living under oppression, and whose execution by the Roman state was a result of a terrible miscarriage of justice. Nothing in Jesus’ background……nothing in His demeanor…..nothing in His Actions…..nothing in His Words merited death by crucifixion.

But somehow His declaration of a coming Kingdom of God (Malkuuth Shamiyim) was deemed treasonous. His Message and acts of love and compassion posed a threat to religious leaders who were bent on sanctimonious legalism and an accommodationist arrangement with their Roman oppressors. His socializing of the outcasts of society made him a convenient target for the “family values” crowd. He dared heal on the Sabbath. He had the brazen audacity to reclaim the Temple from the unethical money changers, and He had the temerity to give a listening ear to women.

Still His detractors held an illegal nighttime trial without corroborating witness, no due process (add to that violence during the “trial”) making it a total violation of the Mosaic Law. And the Romans, just savoring the opportunity to execute another marginalized subject made an example of this “troublemaker” by a barbarous public execution.

These two cases beg several questions….the answers to which we may never arrive.

Does cruelty always have to win???

Why do evil powers seem to persecute the poor and the discounted with seeming impunity?

Why does it take so long for true justice to manifest itself?

Was their any meaning to their sufferings? Did they die in vain?

This Good Friday night we are haunted with those questions as it seems as though evil people in positions of power are preparing to discount basic liberties and due process guarantees in an effort to beat back “the Other” and keep them in their “place.”

But even though evil THINKS that it has the upper hand……good somehow always manages to triumph. Lena Baker didn’t ask to be a martyr, but the travesty that was heaped upon her has never been forgotten. It is taught in schools (for now) and has been the subject of movies, documentaries and articles. That every citizen has the right to have their proper day in court. That neither socio economic status, race, gender, or identity should be a determinant in how a murder case is adjudicated. And it has made us question the efficacy, fairness, and even the use of capital punishment.

And in the case of Jesus? History was split in two. The barrier between Creator and Created was demolished forever and a bridge based upon love and forgiveness was put in its place. That God’s purposes were fulfilled and that because God was able to work good out of that evil, our lives have meaning, purpose and definition two thousand years later.

That the Cross made the empty tomb possible. And what the religious and political crowd meant for evil, God meant it for good……eternal good.

So let us go forward to Holy Saturday, the Great Vigil of Easter, and Festival Eucharist on Sunday with a confidence in knowing that in spite of the horrific and unjust things that are done in the end will NEVER triumph.

Knowing this, let us all the more give God thanks and praise that evil does not win……that from injustice something can be birthed that can be beautiful and that remains to the end of time and beyond.