“The only God I know is the God made flesh” (Martin Luther, Marburg Colloquy, 1529). It was his recounting his journey in the Deep South of the United States, at a time when Blacks lived under the height of Jim Crow racial segregation. The memoir he published in 1961 about his experiences. This is a nonfiction book by white journalist John Howard Griffin. For thirty-seven days, Griffin traveled through the Deep South living as an African American laborer. Because of this, “…we do not have a High Priest who is unable to understand and sympathize and have a shared feeling with our weaknesses and liabilities to the assaults of temptation” ( Hebrews 4:15). Black Like Me is celebrated on this date in 1961. He laid aside His glory, and took on our humanity, living on earth as a man, despised and rejected. 1Ĭhrist did more than change His appearance. He wrote about his experience and travels in his 1961 book Black Like Me.

For this book Griffin assumed the identity of an itinerant black man by chemically altering his skin color and shaving his head, and visited several racially segregated states during a six-week period of 1959. This enabled him to have a greater understanding of racial inequality and mistreatment simply because of skin color. He is best remembered for Black Like Me (1961), still in print in 1990 and translated into thirteen languages. It is a fascinating story of living in a predominantly white society, and the sad discrimination and prejudice he faced. After the publication of his experiences, first in the magazine Sepia, then in this book, Black Like Me in 1961, Griffin and his family became targets of. He is best known for darkening his skin, and journeying through Louisiana, Mississippi, and Georgia to experience segregation in the Deep South in 1959. John Howard Griffin (1920 – 1980) was an American journalist and author, much of whose writing was about racial equality.

Black like me 1961