Lift every voice and sing till earth and heaven ring, Ring with the harmonies of liberty….

As of now, I’m joining with any groundswell movement to make this stirring anthem the national anthem of the United States of America. My Black sisters and brothers have sung this as their own anthem since before the “Star-Spangled Banner” was picked by Congress to represent allegiance to the flag. I hope they would not be offended that white people like me might finally decide to sing it with them, officially as well as individually.

The words were written in 1900 by poet James Weldon Johnson, and set to music composed by his brother,  J. Rosamond Johnson. In my imagination, I hear its soaring notes echo throughout a stadium or an arena as Americans of all descriptions (or in the absence of descriptions) celebrate their unity and community, their common struggle through darkness, their new day of truth and hope: not a military triumph, but a victory of the human spirit we share.

All three verses are suitable to this moment in American history, as we face up to our “gloomy past,” whether as the oppressed or the oppressors. Some might object to the references to “faith” and to that indefinite God represented by the motto In God We Trust, who is “everybody’s” God or “nobody’s” depending on your personal persuasions. No one could doubt that “the blood of the slaughtered”—through war, slavery, and conquest—stains our collective souls and deserves our reverent honor for its victims as well as its heroes. No one could complain that its inspiring music is any more or less “singable” than the anthem we struggle through at present. Replacing a notorious British drinking song with a truly American tune could be nothing but good.

The poet of Ecclesiastes says there’s “a time for tearing down/and a time for building up.”

As some tear down the monuments, the flags, and the forces of division, let others of us build up the spirit, the symbols, and the sounds of “liberty and justice for all.”

If this doesn’t give you goose bumps, check your pulse.

Lift every voice and sing….