A local church on held a screening of the film "Selma," hosted by a man who marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the Alabama town.
HILLSDALE -- A local church on held a screening of the film "Selma," hosted by a man who marched with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in the Alabama town.
Lisa Schoelles is public theology advocate for for Hillsdale United Methodist Church. Her role is to bring faith to issues outside the church, particularly social justice issues.
In the summer she marched with the NAACP during the America's Journey for Justice March in Georgia. The experience made her aware of how prevalent racism still is.
"We all think we're pretty open-minded but there's subtle things that are there," she said.
To bring the issue home, she invited the Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell to Hillsdale to screen "Selma" on Jan. 9, a week before Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Schoelles knew of Caldwell through his work advocating for gay rights within the church, but Caldwell, an 82-year-old retired minister, is also a veteran of the civil rights fight.
Caldwell first met King in 1958 when he visited the Boston University School of Theology, where Caldwell was studying for his master's degree in divinity and he was present when King delivered his "I have a dream," in 1963 in Washington, D.C. and marched with King in Selma.
After "Bloody Sunday," when police brutally attacked nearly 600 people marching for voting rights, King invited religious leaders to a second march that Tuesday. Caldwell flew from Boston on the same plane as the Rev. James Reeb, a white Unitarian Universalist minister. Reeb and two other ministers were beaten by men with clubs the night after the march. Reeb died two days later.
In a talk with about 25 attendees, Caldwell asked what lessons Selma held for modern-day Hillsdale. In 2016, America still deals with police abuse, racism and xenophobia, Caldwell said. But today, in affluent Bergen County, economic inequality looms as a justice issue.
"Economic justice touches the whole populace and I believe that if Martin King were here today he would be pushing the nation on economic justice," he said.
Schoelles invited members of other local congregations, and attendees came from as far as South Orange. After Caldwell's talk, they plan to work together on social justice issues. She's hoping to hold another talk on economic justice in April.
"We wanted people to understand why it's a time to remember and why it's a time to be engaged," she said. "We're a great country. We can do this."
The conversation in Hillsdale should take place everywhere, Caldwell said.
"No matter what our economic or racial or ethnic status we've got to find ways to talk civilly about the justice issues of our time," he said.
Myles Ma may be reached at mma@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @MylesMaNJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.