This past Saturday, Blake and I had the pleasure of attending The Baddour Center’s “Dancing for Our Stars” event held at the Halloran Center at the Orpheum in Memphis.
It was our first time attending the event. So, I was a little unsure of what to expect walking into the facility.
Wow! I was blown away at the huge turnout to support both The Baddour Center and the dancers. Not just one, but several communities absolutely showed up and showed out to raise funds for the center’s mission of providing care and love to those they serve.
People from Batesville and Panola County, Senatobia and Tate County, Hernando, Southaven, Memphis, Sardis and the list goes on, all took part in bringing their pocketbooks and casting votes on the best dancers.
I had such a wonderful time mingling and speaking to people about why they wanted to support The Baddour Center.
One thing is for sure. These people have their hearts in the right place. They simply wanted to show compassion, empathy, love and acceptance for those who are different than themselves.
And what a great thought that is.
Ya know, it reminded me of last Thursday when my small group Mission Mississippi meetings got started for the year. The whole point of Mission Mississippi is to bring together those of Black skin and those of White skin in a Christlike model of love and acceptance and hear the different perspectives we have had in life.
Now of course, my perspective of as a 37-year-old White woman from the mid-west will be different from a 60- year old Black man from the deep south. We’ve seen different things in life. We’ve experienced different types of hatred. He may have been discriminated against unfairly due to the saturation of pigment in his skin tone. While I’ll never know exactly what that may feel like, I can empathize with his feelings of anger and utter disappointment, because I have felt the unfair judgment of men thinking that I couldn’t do the same job as a male because I had different organs. I can take my own understandings and those feelings and place myself in the Black man’s shoes. I can empathize to show him he’s not facing a life’s battles alone.
Because let me tell you, if any of us think we can make it through life without the support of our friends, family, loved ones, or our community, we are all sadly mistaken.
As a culture and society, it would do us well to remember those who show compassion and love, tend to live happier lives than those who chose the path of bigotry, hatred, isolation, and outrage at any change in this constantly evolving world. T
he only way we gain any ground in this world is by working together toward common goals.
I mean take any great movement in our society. Whether you want to think back to the beginnings of democracy in Roman culture. Or perhaps the tumultuous onset of the Christian faith. Or consider the start of the Civil Rights movement. Or Hey! Even the American’s with Disabilities Act. They all became successful by people empathizing and working together toward a goal that was best for all concerned.
The Baddour Center, right here in Senatobia, has touched lives from around the nation. Mission Mississippi is working on changing hearts and minds right here in our state.
It makes me wonder, what can we as Tate County residents accomplish if we set our minds to work together. If we fix our hearts on compassion and what benefits all. What might we NOT accomplish by responding to one another with love first?
