Clergy Day - Moral Monday - a reason for going

     I was there among the hundreds, maybe a thousand, in Raleigh for Clergy Day-Moral Monday. It was billed as an interfaith gathering and there were Jewish people and potentially Muslim people.  But from what I could tell most of the speakers where Christian.

     I was there because I believe that this kind of action may have the power to awaken the average citizen to the issues and changes that are happening.  I believe that is necessary because I believe what Winston Churchill said, "The best and most effective argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter."  The average person is general unaware of what is happening in those areas of life that do not affect her immediately. If you can get a jury to try O.J. Simpson for murder, a jury who had not heard of the case and did not have an opinion on it, then you know that there are lots of people who do not pay attention to daily events.   A friend of mine said he even hated to listen to NPR because it was so depressing and things never got resolved.  The political news is such a "downer" that one can understand why most people do not listen to it.

     Such demonstrations as Moral Monday, in my view, may make enough noise to get the average voter to notice what is happening in the political scene. Because there are so many things that the Republican legislature in N.C. is doing to the public that negatively impact the quality of life for so many that the average voter needs to stop and pay attention.