For over 25 years, the Zen Peacemakers have been annually Bearing Witness at Auschwitz/Birkenau. In this spirit, it has long been our desire to create a bearing witness retreat around America’s racial history – as seen through the eyes of African Americans. The intention has always been to engage without becoming a tourist; to seek unity without ‘othering’ those with whom we Bear Witness.

This year we plan on walking the grounds of a deep history in the expansion of slavery, Jim Crow, and the Civil Rights movement – 

Your support in viewing this film will help fund our Bearing Witness Retreat in Alabama from April 24 - 29th. Thank you,Zen Peacemakers.

Zen Peacemakers

Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power

Jessica Devaney

Geeta Gandbhir

Sam Pollard

Henry Adebonojo

Viridiana Lieberman

Kathryn Bostic

Jeff Skoll

Diane Weyermann

Fred Grinstein

Linzee Troubh

Anya Rous

Dema Paxton Fofang

The passing of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 represented not the culmination of the Civil Rights Movement, but the beginning of a new, crucial chapter. Nowhere was this next battle better epitomized than in Lowndes County, Alabama, a rural, impoverished county with a vicious history of racist terrorism. In a county that was 80 percent Black but had zero Black voters, laws were just paper without power. This isn’t a story of hope but of action. Through first person accounts and searing archival footage, LOWNDES COUNTY AND THE ROAD TO BLACK POWER tells the story of the local movement and young Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) organizers who fought not just for voting rights, but for Black Power in Lowndes County.