The Heart of Humanism

This blog entry contains the flyer for our exciting event next monday, and a controversial poem by Langston Hughes. Please note the poem is not to be taken as a statement of the values of contemporary Humanism, but rather, as evidence that Hughes (along with many famous African American Intellectuals) engaged in a serious critique and ultimately a rejection of traditional religion, in favor of a more human-centered philosophy of life. For a detailed description of the upcoming event, see the entry below.

Goodbye Christ
by Langston Hughes
Published in Negro Worker (Nov.-Dec. 1932)
***
Listen, Christ,
You did alright in your day, I reckon—
But that day’s gone now.
They ghosted you up a swell story, too,
Called it Bible—
But it’s dead now,
The popes and the preachers’ve
Made too much money from it.
They’ve sold you to too manyKings, generals, robbers, and killers—
Even to the Tzar and the Cossacks,
Even to Rockefeller’s Church,
Even to THE SATURDAY EVENING POST.
You ain’t no good no more.
They’ve pawned you
Till you’ve done wore out.

Goodbye,
Christ Jesus Lord God Jehova,
Beat it on away from here now.
Make way for a new guy with no religion at all—
A real guy named
Marx Communist Lenin Peasant Stalin Worker ME—
I said, ME!

Go ahead on now,
You’re getting in the way of things, Lord.
And please take Saint Ghandi with you when you go,
And Saint Pope Pius,
And Saint Aimee McPherson,
And big black Saint Becton
Of the Consecrated Dime.
And step on the gas, Christ!
Move!

Don’t be so slow about movin?
The world is mine from now on—
And nobody’s gonna sell ME
To a king, or a general,
Or a millionaire.