With Head and Heart: The Autobiography of Howard Thurman

by Howard Thurman

There are times when guidance as to techniques and strategy is urgent, when counsel, support, and collective direct action are mandatory. But there can never be a substitute for taking personal responsibility for social change. The word “personal” applies both to the individual and the organization—in this instance, the church. The true genius of the church was revealed by what it symbolized as a beachhead in our society in terms of community, and as an inspiration to the solitary individual to put his weight on the side of a society in which no man need be afraid. It was not merely a building, a novel undertaking in structure and formal commitment, it was not propaganda or a new teaching—no, it was a spirit which it did not create itself, but off which it dared to become an embodiment and living witness. By special grace, it emerged at a historic moment in world crisis created by the struggle between totalitarianism and democracy. There remains one other comment about my preaching ministry. I believe that above all else the preacher’s life experiences, with his successes and failures, hopes and aspirations, make up the only authentic laboratory in which all his fundamental commitments can be tested. I know my own life better than I can ever know any other. Inasmuch as my life is lived as a black man in a predominantly white society, my personal adventures are profoundly influenced by this fact. The result is that in the most unlikely moment, there may spring into my mind ...