On Jan. 31, I attended the ICE OUT! protest in front of the Massachusetts State House, where hundreds of protesters gathered to urge both local and state officials to end cooperation with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This extremely powerful gathering not only featured incredibly influential speakers, but musical performers as well – B! Vocal (Boston Voices of Community and Labor) and the Good Trouble Brass Band.Â
Though I was already compelled by community, standing shoulder to shoulder in the freezing cold with fellow Bostonians dedicated to preserving our democracy, I did not fully grasp the moment until a familiar refrain began to play, performed by the Good Trouble Brass Band. A siren song of my youth that I’d recognize anywhere.Â
“This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine…”
From preschool to fourth grade, I attended a Catholic elementary school, where we were required to go to Mass with our class once a week. Some of my earliest memories are in that church – the harshness of the cold pews, the stiffness of the kneeler, the hymnals that were practically falling apart. That peeling book was always my favorite part of the service. As a kid, I loved thumbing through its fragile pages to find whatever song we were supposed to sing. Though it’s been over 10 years since I set foot in St. Mark’s, I can still remember my second grade class squished together in the pews, a sea of white button-down shirts, singing “Go Tell It On The Mountain” or “Hark! The Herold Angels Sing”, but my favorite was always “This Little Light of Mine.” Often the last song we’d sing in our services, I reveled in its simple, yet powerful message, and though I wasn’t necessarily the best singer in that church, I was certainly the loudest.
But despite hearing it my entire life, I never fully grasped what it meant to “let it shine” while surrounded by stained glass and white button-down shirts in the newly renovated church. I needed to be right here on Tremont Street, raising my sign in the air, and singing among hundreds of people who mean every word. This was our light – the powers of protest and song coming together in perfect harmony to highlight the right side of history. And as I stood shoulder-to-shoulder with my fellow protesters, I kept thinking about the kid standing in the pews at St. Mark Elementary. I wondered if he’d be proud of me, and decided that of course he would. I made his words, our words, a reality.