On Saturday, August 22, people from across the community gathered at Simpson United Methodist Church in Charleston for the West Virginia Council of Churches’ Lynching Remembrance Service, sponsored by the Council’s Dismantling Racism Program Unit.
It was an afternoon grounded in a difficult conviction: we cannot faithfully move toward reconciliation without being willing to remember and tell the truth about our past.
During the service, we remembered African Americans who were victims of racial terror lynchings in West Virginia. Their names and stories remind us that the history of lynching is not confined to some distant place. Racial violence is part of West Virginia’s history as well, and remembering those who suffered is an important part of the continuing work of confronting racism and seeking healing in our communities.
But remembrance was never intended to be the end of the afternoon.
Our featured preacher, Rev. Paul Dunn, Pastor of First Baptist Church of Charleston, turned our attention to Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan and the command with which Jesus concludes the story: “Go and do likewise.”
Rev. Dunn challenged those gathered to consider what the Good Samaritan teaches us about dismantling racism. The Samaritan did more than notice the wounded man beside the road. He saw him as a human being, allowed what he saw to move him, and then acted.
As Rev. Dunn reminded us:
“We’re gonna dismantle racism, we’re gonna have to learn how to see each other as God sees us.”
That kind of seeing is profoundly theological. It means looking beyond race, social status, background, neighborhood, politics, or any of the other categories by which we separate ourselves from one another and recognizing the image of God in the person standing before us. Rev. Dunn emphasized that “no one person has exclusive rights on God’s image” and “no one culture of people” does either.
Yet seeing alone is not enough.
One of the simplest and most powerful lines of the sermon came as Rev. Dunn reflected on the Samaritan’s response to the wounded man:
“Compassion is seeing pain and wanting to help.”
He went on to describe compassion as something deeper than sympathy from a distance. Compassion means recognizing another person’s suffering and allowing that suffering to call something forth from us. As he put it, compassion means that “we suffer together.”
That distinction matters for the work of dismantling racism. It is possible to acknowledge that racism exists. It is possible to deplore the violence and injustice of the past. It is even possible to remember those who suffered—and then return to business as usual.
The Good Samaritan offers another way.
He saw. He had compassion. And then he chose to do something.
That movement—from remembrance, to compassion, to action—captured the spirit of Saturday’s gathering. Remembering those who were lynched in West Virginia is not simply an exercise in recounting history. We remember because their lives mattered. We speak their names because they should not be forgotten. And we tell the truth about what happened because honest remembrance can help shape the choices we make today.
Near the conclusion of his sermon, Rev. Dunn returned again to Jesus’ question about who proved to be a neighbor to the wounded man. The answer was not the person who merely noticed him. It was the one who stopped, crossed the distance between them, and acted with mercy.
And Jesus’ response remains the challenge before us: “Go and do likewise.”
The West Virginia Council of Churches extends its deep gratitude to the Dismantling Racism Program Unit for its leadership in planning and carrying out this important service; to Simpson United Methodist Church, our gracious host congregation, for opening its doors and welcoming the community; to Rev. Paul Dunn for bringing a challenging and hope-filled word; and to the Vandalia First Baptist Men’s Chorus for sharing their gifts of music and helping make our worship together so meaningful.
We are also grateful to every person who came to remember, worship, listen, and reflect.
The work of dismantling racism will not happen through one service, one sermon, or one afternoon. But gatherings like this matter. They create sacred space in which we can tell the truth about where we have been, remember people whose lives were taken by racial violence, recognize the image of God in one another, and recommit ourselves to becoming the neighbors Christ calls us to be.
We remembered.
We listened.
We were challenged.
And now comes the most important part:
Go and do likewise.