Sisters of Selma

1962

Vatican Council II, intended by Pope John XXIII to modernize the Catholic Church,  begins in Rome on October 11 with the enthusiastic support of women religious in America.   Around the same time, in the American South, federal attempts to enforce existing Civil Rights laws meet with resistance.

1963

In Alabama, the Dallas County Voters' League, an organization of Black professionals, invites Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee members to organize a voter registration campaign in the county seat, Selma. 

1964

A new Civil Rights Act gives federal authorities greater power to enforce the laws against racial discrimination.  In July, the District Court Judge in Selma halts the SNCC-organized marches by Black voters to the county courthouse.  The Voters' League appeals to Rev. Martin Luther King for help.  In October, Selma elects a new mayor who has the support of moderate Whites and Blacks.

1965

With the arrival of Rev. King and his Southern Christian Leadership Conference, mass demonstrations begin.  During January and February, marches to the courthouse frequently result in mass arrests.  The tension, in many instances, escalates to near-riots.

The demonstrations spread to neighboring counties.  On February 18, Jimmie Lee Jackson becomes the first victim of Governor Wallace's state troopers and dies in Selma at the Good Samaritan hospital run by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Rochester.  Rev. King calls for a protest march from Selma to Montgomery on March 7 but is denied permission by state, county, and city authorities.

On March 7,  voting rights activists in Selma disregard the ban and march to Edmund Pettus Bridge in an act of civil disobedience.  They are met by Alabama state troopers and the Dallas County sheriff's posse on horseback.  The violent confrontation makes the evening news.  "Bloody Sunday" shows the nation what "whites had done to blacks for three hundred years and more, largely without notice."  The wounded are taken to the same hospital where Jackson died.  Rev. King sends telegrams to leaders of all religious faiths asking them to join him "in Selma for a ministers' march to Montgomery on Tuesday morning, March 9."

The response is overwhelming.  Religious leaders pour into Selma to take part in Tuesday's march.  The authorities still withhold permission, however.  The marchers are halted and peacefully disperse.  That afternoon, Rev. James Reeb, a Unitarian minister from Boston is severely beaten by segregationists.

On Wednesday, a group of 54 men and women religious representing different faiths fly from St. Louis to Selma at dawn and take part in another attempted march.  According to media reports of that day, "none stood out so visibly than a squad of nuns."  Rev. Reeb dies that night. 

During the weekend, vigils and marches in memory of Rev. Reeb take place in cities big and small, from Ottawa, Canada to St. Augustine, Florida.  The daily marches continue in Selma but are stopped before they reach the county courthouse.  Men and women religious continue to come and take part.  Among them is a Catholic group from Kansas City.

On Monday, March 15, President Lyndon Johnson talks to the nation about the Voting Rights Bill in Congress.

Federal Judge Frank Johnson's decree finally allows Rev. King to lead the march from Montgomery to Selma.  On March 21, the long march gets under way with two Catholic sisters among the 300 carefully chosen by the organizers to stay the course.  After it ends in Montgomery four days later, the campaign claims yet another victim -- Detroit housewife and civil rights worker Viola Liuzzo.

On August 6, President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Bill into law.  It outlaws the use of literacy tests and other tactics to harass voters. 

1966-67

In response to the Vatican II statements on religious life, Perfectae Caritatis, the Conference of Major Superiors sends out a national survey.  This "Religious Community Survey" gives sisters the first ever opportunity to explore and explain "the collective internal life of women's communities and the belief patterns of individual sisters." 

1968

The first National Black Catholic Clergy Caucus convenes in Detroit in April, 1968. Inspired and encouraged by the NBCCC, the National Black Sisters Conference is founded.