Since my father died nine years ago, I’ve had the sad but inevitable experience of attending successive funerals of his brothers and sisters as his generation passes away. The eulogies at each of these services have covered common ground - a deep love of family, a character deeply rooted in common decency and respect for others, and a life spent contributing to community. When I remarked on these likenesses to my aunt, she replied, “Of course, they were all hewn from the same rock.”
Watching the funerals of John Lewis and John Hume over the last few weeks has evoked sad memories of my father’s passing, but it has also served as a reminder of the hard lessons that these two figures have taught us about the role of moral leadership in progressive social change.
Rooted in community.
The first lesson is that leaders such as Hume and Lewis don’t stand apart from the communities from which they rise. The morality they stood for is a morality that imbues many others in and beyond their generation. At Hume’s funeral, his son John Jr summed up this shared morality as follows:
