Oral history interview with Reverend John Mendez
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John Mendez was born in New York City on January 7, 1948. He was educated in the NYC public schools. Like many other African-American youth he was placed in a lower academic track, and from that time on never forgot the sting of being treated differently because of his color. Mendez got involved with gangs in his teenage years, but was drawn out of it after hearing Fred Shuttlesworth (a veteran civil rights activist and founding member of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights) speak. Mendez got further inspired by hearing Dr. Martin Luther King preach, and he became an activist and committed Christian from that point on. At the age of 16 Mendez spoke at a worldwide gathering of Baptist youth in Bern, Switzerland. A number of colleges accepted him, but he chose to attend Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina. This was a propitious decision, as Shaw University was the birthplace of SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.) At Shaw Mendez was a student leader and read deeply about philosophy, Black Nationalism, Marxism and imperialism. Mendez did his religious studies at a number of institutions including the United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, Wake Forest University and Shaw University. Reverend Mendez began his lifelong career as a minister in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He was the Senior Pastor at Emmanuel Baptist Church for 36 years, and became a prophetic minister preaching to the whole person, spiritually, mentally and physically. Mendez's many contributions to social justice include over 30 years with the Apache Stronghold group, the NAACP, and the Moral Monday demonstrations led by Reverend Barber. (Please see the interview with Reverend Willard Bass concerning the Moral Monday Movement.) The Moral Monday demonstrations resulted in the arrests of Mendez (and almost a 1,000 others) for civil disobedience, and became the basis for the Poor Peoples' Campaign that is a national movement. Mendez has been a leader in the fight to stop voter suppression in North Carolina, an on-going struggle with a number of court victories on the side of justice. He is a part of the Racial Justice Working Group of the National Council of Churches. In 2003 Reverend Mendez became a leader in the 19-year fight for the exoneration of Darryl Hunt, an African-American man wrongfully convicted for a rape-murder in Winston-Salem. Reverend Mendez speaks in his interview of his realization that there's only one spirit and that one spirit unites all religions together. Mendez is also a licensed psychotherapist who seeks to decolonize the minds of people of color from the brainwashing of white supremacist culture. He was a founding member of the Howard Thurman Counseling Program. Retiring as a minister in 2019, Reverend Mendez shows no sign of stopping; he is a lifelong activist whose work and ministry truly speak to a total commitment for human justice. We are inspired by his courage and deep faith.
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