Psalm 101
Of David. A psalm.
1 I will sing of your love and justice;
to you, LORD, I will sing praise.
2 I will be careful to lead a blameless life—
when will you come to me?
to you, LORD, I will sing praise.
2 I will be careful to lead a blameless life—
when will you come to me?
I will conduct the affairs of my house
with a blameless heart.
3 I will not look with approval
on anything that is vile.
with a blameless heart.
3 I will not look with approval
on anything that is vile.
I hate what faithless people do;
I will have no part in it.
4 The perverse of heart shall be far from me;
I will have no part in it.
4 The perverse of heart shall be far from me;
Psalm 109
For the director of music. Of David. A psalm.
1 My God, whom I praise,
do not remain silent,
2 for people who are wicked and deceitful
have opened their mouths against me;
they have spoken against me with lying tongues.
3 With words of hatred they surround me;
they attack me without cause.
do not remain silent,
2 for people who are wicked and deceitful
have opened their mouths against me;
they have spoken against me with lying tongues.
3 With words of hatred they surround me;
they attack me without cause.
Days of Light and Darkness: Psalm 101 and 109
Remember a time when you were poised for the promise of success – a new job, a new marriage, college commencement—and you were on the crest of a wave? I am reminded of this when I read Psalm 101. Like David, as a newly crowned king, I was determined to be a respected leader, to surround myself with hardworking and honest associates and friends, and trusted that “all would be well with the world.”—or at least with my world. I had just moved from the East Coast and was starting my own PR business in the fledgling, independent book publishing community of San Francisco. My clients published small print runs of books on gay and lesbian rights, environmental issues, the need for affordable housing, Buddhism, underground comics, New Age culture, and other decidedly California fare for the time. It was 1972. I, too, thanked the Lord for my newly found opportunity. In my young idealism, I vowed to eschew anyone who criticized these free-wheeling, progressive causes and promised myself and God to maintain an open heart to the lost and misbegotten souls that, as F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, was its own ticket to happiness.
That same year, a much more civic minded person than I had also moved to San Francisco – Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in California where he won a seat on The City’s Board of Supervisors in 1977. He championed the rights of gays, lesbians, and marginalized citizens. His flamboyant campaign and early marches on City Hall were legend. If anyone was “on the crest of the wave” on Election Day, it was Harvey. He successfully fought to pass a stringent gay rights ordinance for San Francisco and was the darling of social progressives.
In many ways psalm 109, another reading for today, represents the shadow side of the world of psalm 101. King David has ruled for some years and is falsely accused and verbally attacked for his political rule. Likewise, ultra-conservatives tried to undermine Harvey Milk and his political agenda. On a smaller, but more personal scale, mainstream newspapers refused to review my clients’ books and chain bookstores never bought them. We were dependent on the few independent bookstores, which bought the small press books on consignment. Newspapers, except for alternative weeklies like The Berkeley Free Press and The San Francisco Guardian simply ignored them and the issues they raised. We soon preferred bad ink to no ink at all.
For Harvey Milk, the consequences of maintaining his political and personal integrity against the conservative persuasion were far more dire than mine. In fact, they proved fatal. On November 27, 1978, Supervisor Milk and San Francisco Mayor George Moscone were assassinated by Dan White, another city supervisor, who had recently resigned but wanted his job back. White’s district was described by The New York Times as “a largely white, middle-class section that is hostile to the growing homosexual community of San Francisco.” As a supervisor, White openly saw himself as the board's “defender of the home, the family and religious life against homosexuals, pot smokers and cynics.” That day wrapped San Francisco in a shroud.
Anne Kronenberg, his final campaign manager, wrote of him: “What set Harvey apart from you or me was that he was a visionary. He imagined a righteous world inside his head and then he set about to create it for real, for all of us.” Milk was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009.
I had opened my heart to Harvey as I had to the idealism of the small press community. In the fall-out, I learned two things: Light can attract darkness, but if we remain in God’s spirit, we can move out into the light once again.
Note: The film, Milk, is an excellent docudrama of Harvey Milk’s political career.
(Deborah Johansen Harris)
