Support UM News on World Press Freedom Day: Give to help sustain and expand the storytelling capacity of UM News. Your donation today will transform information into inspiration and ensure we can continue sharing stories of God’s work in the world through The UMC. Help us reach our $10,000 goal and keep this vital ministry fair, faithful, trusted and free for all!

Two voices from the civil rights movement

In a conversation about civil rights and voter suppression, two African American women shared some pivotal experiences with participants at the I AM Her Women’s Leadership Summit.

Clara Ester grew up in Memphis under the Jim Crow law and was trained to be a community organizer in high school. She became actively involved in the civil rights movement through a United Methodist pastor, the Rev. James Lawson. They were involved in the Memphis sanitation strike, and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. came to offer his support.

Ester was at the Lorraine Motel on May 4, 1968, when an assassin’s bullet found King. “I watched him being lifted up and thrown back on that balcony area,” she recalled quietly. Then, somehow, she found herself standing over him. She unbuckled his belt and checked his pulse; his eyes were open. “He had a beautiful smile on his face.”

A deaconess who just finished her term as vice president of United Methodist Women, Ester has continued “to speak up and speak out around social issues that affect anyone who has been deprived of their human rights,” she said.

Her focus this fall is on people exercising their right to vote. “I pray to God that every protester, every concerned citizen, will take that vote to the polls.”

The Rev. Francine Thirus is a Chicago native whose parents moved there from Alabama as part of the Great Migration. A teacher, teacher’s union activist and lawyer before she became a pastor, she remembers the shock over the death of Emmett Till and the discrimination against Blacks in housing, education and employment.

In 1968, King’s death “knocked the wind out of our sails temporarily,” she said. “But we had to pull together. There was only one of him, but there were thousands and thousands and millions of us. It pushed us forward.”

The death of George Floyd in Minneapolis earlier this year provided the same jolt. “Just as we did before, we have to continue on to fight this battle,” Thirus said. “The most powerful tool we have right now is the vote.”

Return to main article


Like what you're reading? Support the ministry of UM News! Your support ensures the latest denominational news, dynamic stories and informative articles will continue to connect our global community. Make a tax-deductible donation at ResourceUMC.org/GiveUMCom.

Sign up for our newsletter!

Subscribe Now
Global Health
Bishop Eben K. Nhiwatiwa holds newborn Clarence Rinomhota as his mother, Sarah Mushamba, looks on at Chindenga rural health clinic in Mutoko, Zimbabwe. The center, which was dedicated Feb. 22, is the final clinic under the United Methodist Nyadire Mission Hospital to be renovated. Photo by Kudzai Chingwe, UM News.

Nyadire Connection dedicates sixth rural health center

New mothers express appreciation for the care they receive at revitalized church clinic, while staff tout state-of-the-art equipment and upgrades.
Mission and Ministry
Sister Alegría (right) and Sister Confianza, members of the Amigas del Señor (Women Friends of the Lord) Monastery in Limón, Honduras, pray during evening compline. Photo by Paul Jeffrey, UM News.

United Methodist nuns blend spiritual traditions

Laywomen Beth Blodgett and Prairie Cutting arrived on the Caribbean coast of Central America nearly two decades ago, determined to start a new spiritual community in a remote corner of Honduras. Paul Jeffrey has their story and photos.
Violence
Hundreds of members of the World Federation of Methodist and Uniting Church Women march in Gaborone, Botswana, wearing black in solidarity with victims and survivors of gender-based violence. The issue dominated conversations at the group’s Southern and East Africa seminar held April 3-6 in the country’s capital. Photo by Eveline Chikwanah, UM News.

African women speak against gender violence

Over 600 Methodist women from Southern and East Africa marched in solidarity with survivors of gender-based violence and those suffering in silence.

United Methodist Communications is an agency of The United Methodist Church

©2025 United Methodist Communications. All Rights Reserved