Movin' On: Too Soon...A Conclusion

So a few days ago, I posted about a young man who went to high school, Sterling Wyatt, who died in Afghanistan on July 11 from an IED. I also posted about how the Westboro Baptist Church was planning on protesting his funeral. One of his friends heard about the WBC protesting his funeral, and asked people to wear red and make a human wall so that his friends and family wouldn't be affected by the WBC's hateful messages.

Today was Sterling's funeral. Thousands of people lined the streets for hours in downtown Columbia wearing red to hide the WBC and most importantly, show support for his family.

Source

The crowd splitting to allow his mother and brother to pass onto the funeral home.

There were so many people showing their support that the WBC was hardly noticed. According to the Columbia Dailey Tribune, "The protesters, mostly members of the Phelps family, arrived shortly after noon and were gone by 12:45 p.m. Several attendees near the church asked whether the group had shown up at all."

The love and support that poured onto the streets of downtown Columbia amazes me. I love Columbia; it's my hometown and I am proud to call it my as such. My love has grown exponentially after seeing what happened to honor Sterling. There were so many different "types" of people, all there to show support and gratitude for Sterling and his family. As Matt, a past professor of mine wrote on his blog, "There were Christians and agnostics and atheists there. There were Republicans and Democrats and Libertarians there. There were blacks and whites and asians there. There were artists and teachers and politicians there. There were babies and teenagers and old people there. There were gay and straight and questioning people there. There were rich and poor and homeless people there. There were veterans and conscientious objectors and peaceniks there."

I think Matt explained the "reason" thousands of people in red descended on Columbia's downtown best, "There was a moment when Sterling’s mother was making her way toward the church, and the crowd parted for her. As she moved through a wave of clapping began to take shape. Wave after wave built into an ovation that lasted for minutes on end. It was a whole community of support – not making it any easier, not pretending it was all ok – but recognizing her sacrifice. We’ve been in these damn wars for so long now and most of us don’t have to count the cost so we needed to see her face. We needed to be near her and respect her. She’s paying. Her son paid. They paid in real blood and real tears and real years gone. If the only thing Columbia could give this woman was an ovation of encouragement, if all we could do was let her memory of this day be filtered through our good wishes and red shirts, if our best job was to keep her from seeing the blasphemy that the Westboro picketers brought… then we did well. We couldn’t make it better, but we kept them from making it worse."

I am proud of Columbia. I'm proud of the people that rallied together to show their respect and honor Sterling and his family. I'm proud that Sterling's funeral was peaceful. There were no problems between the WBC and the community. I wish that I was able to be there, but I showed my respects for Sterling in other ways. Things like this make a town great.

Here is a video about Sterling's funeral and the people who came out to support him.