wfn.org | UMNS - Queen Mother of Civil Rights Dies at 98

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@igc.org>]

> Queen Mother of Civil Rights Dies at 98

> A UMNS Report
> By Linda Bloom*

5:00 P.M. EST April 20, 2010

Dorothy Height was a leading voice for human and civil rights and an active 
member for many years at St. Mark?s United Methodist Church in New York.

When Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his historic
?I Have a Dream? speech in 1963, Dorothy Height was the only woman, besides 
Mrs. King, invited onto the platform.

When Barack Obama was sworn in as the nation?s first African-American president 
46 years later, she was invited onto the platform once again.

?This is real recognition that civil rights was not just what Dr. King 
dreamed,? she told The New York Times about Obama?s inauguration. ?But it took 
a lot of people a lot of work to make this happen, and they feel part of it.?

Height, a United Methodist who worked tirelessly on behalf of civil rights and 
equality for women, was one of those people. She died April 20 at Howard 
University Hospital in Washington at the age of 98.
Blazing the trail

Retired United Methodist Bishop Violet Fisher, 70, said Height was ?the queen 
mother of the civil rights movement,? someone who helped blaze the trail for 
women like herself.

?I celebrate her heart for justice and mercy and her ability to walk humbly 
with God,? Fisher declared. ?Thanks be to God that she opened the doors, 
especially to African-American women. I am so grateful that she did not leave 
the Methodist movement.?

A colleague of King, an adviser to presidents and a friend of Eleanor 
Roosevelt, Height spent 33 years on the national board of the YWCA and more 
than 40 years at the helm of the National Council of Negro Women.

She was honored by three U.S. presidents, receiving the Presidential 
Citizenship Medal from Ronald Reagan in 1989, the Presidential Medal of Freedom 
from Bill Clinton in 1994 and the Congressional Medal of Honor from George W. 
Bush in 2004.

She was so defined by her stylish hats that a dramatization of her life story, 
commissioned and performed at Howard University, was entitled ?If This Hat 
Could Talk.? She acquired 36 honorary doctorate degrees and countless awards.

But public recognition of her contribution to the civil rights movement was 
late in coming.

?As a woman, she was often unnamed, but she was always in the photographs when 
the civil rights leadership visited the White House,? recalled Peggy Billings. 
Billings was working for the Women?s Division, United Methodist Board of Global 
Ministries, when she first met Height in the 1960s.

Height was a brilliant strategist. ?She had an incredible capacity for finding 
solutions and consensus in a group,? Billings said. ?It was a great gift of 
hers.?
Commitment to church

Born on March 24, 1912, Dorothy Irene Height grew up in Rankin, Pa., where her 
parents were involved in the Baptist church. ?As a child I joined the church, 
and then I became very active in all of the children?s missions?the choir, the 
Sunday school, every aspect of the church?so that my earliest grounding came in 
the church,? she said during an interview with United Methodist Communications 
in 2005.

As a college student in New York, she began attending St. Mark?s Methodist 
Church, leading to her longtime affiliation with The United Methodist Church. 
That faith, which she attributed to helping her develop a strong sense of 
self-reliance, stayed with her throughout her life.

?I find through meditation and prayer that there are very few things that I do 
not find some way to deal with,? she said.

Her mentor in the Methodist Church was Mary McLeod Bethune, a Methodist 
laywoman who started United Methodist-related Bethune-Cookman College in 
Daytona Beach, Fla.

Bethune founded the National Council of Negro Women?an umbrella organization of 
civic, church, educational, labor, community and professional groups?and 
brought Height into the fold.

During the 1960s, as the council?s president, Height helped organize voter 
registration in the South, voter education in the North and scholarship 
programs for student civil rights workers. She also tackled issues of poverty 
as her organization supported free school breakfasts for children, promoted 
community gardens and advocated for improved housing.

Theressa Hoover, a friend and former top staff executive of the Women?s 
Division, remembered in an earlier interview how Height traveled throughout the 
South?especially Mississippi?to advocate for women?s  rights.

?Dorothy carried members of the (Women?s Division) nominating committee to 
meetings of the National Council of Negro Women so we would know what United 
Methodist Women were doing through social action,? Hoover  said.
Inspiration to younger women

Her passion for racial and gender equality inspired younger women. She helped 
organize the women?s caucus in the National Council of Churches in the 1970s.

Mia Adjali, a retired Women?s Division staff member, has never forgotten the 
first time she met Height during an assembly of the World Federation of 
Methodist and Uniting Church Women in Ireland a few decades  ago.

?Her presentation was about women and power,? Adjali recalled. ?I had probably 
never really dealt with that concept, of women actually not being afraid of 
acquiring power or discovering how important it might be to move women towards 
an equality with men.?

Lois Dauway, who has worked with both United Methodist and ecumenical 
organizations, said she has counted herself fortunate to ?sit at the feet? of 
the civil rights icon who displayed wisdom and courage in addressing both civil 
rights and gender justice.

United Methodist Bishop Melvin Talbert, who called her ?one of a kind,? 
remembered Height?s significant contributions as an advocate for women and her 
work as founder of the Black Family Union, which brings black families together 
for fellowship and empowerment.

?She was not afraid to speak truth to power, but she did it in a very gentle 
but persuasive fashion,? he said.
Champion of church unity

Height also was considered a champion of church unity.

"We in the church will never forget the essential role her faith played in motivating her lifelong quest on behalf of persons of all ages, races and ethnicities,? said the Rev. Michael Kinnamon, top executive of the National Council of Churches. 
?She knew that persons of faith can be an irresistible force for justice when we join hearts and hands, and she was a leader in that march throughout most of our lifetimes."

Advancing age did not seem to slow her quest for justice. ?I just keep feeling 
that social justice is not some kind of utopia, I think it?s a positive 
reality, and we have to work at it,? she said in 2005.

The United Methodist Commission on Religion and Race took note of her 
continuing contributions to American society, celebrating ?the indomitable, 
faith-filled spirit that led Miss Height to pursue the goal of human rights for 
all people, even as she approached the century mark.?

*Bloom is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in New York.

News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.