The Night The Church Burned

Every June 17, I can't help being thinking about the horrible night that my home church burned. Not just mine; there were 19 others that burned as well. At least that many. My church was Mt. Zion Methodist. It was summertime, the hot season. I remember it well. In some ways, it's like yesterday. Time stands still, about some things. Especially here in Mississippi. That night, Mississippi was ablaze. Folks not from here stoked an already roaring fire True, they got burned by it, but a lot of us here did too. It was just them getting burned that seemed to make it important. 
My name is Rose, and I am one of the remaining churchgoers who were attacked that fiery night, by narrow-minded men filled with hate and fear. But they wanted US to be afraid.
They were men of power, at least here. The sheriff, the bank president, a minister or two; those who owned and ran the town. We all knew who they were, even as they hid behind white masks. 
It wasn't any different than any other church gathering,, for most of us. We were here to celebrate, and to sing, and to give thanks and worship. 
We had heard that a special guest of some kind or other hadn't shown up. But there wasn't really time to give much thought to that, because in what seemed like a flash, windows were being broken by flaming torches thrown thru them. We heard gunshots, men yelling. We scattered, trying to get out of the old church building before it was engulfed in flames. The smell of burning flesh, people screaming as they were set on fire. The men who attacked us, they actually grabbed church members, doused them in gasoline and struck a match to them. Some of them actually laughed about doing it. They hurled racial slurs at us while they did it. I myself am glad that I will never understand the kind of person who could do that. 
I was blessed, myself, that I only had a burned arm and leg, a few cuts and bruises, at least as far as physical wounds go. But I lost family and friends in the fire. There isn't a price tag you can put on the cost of that. 
Over that night, the whole church burned to the ground. It smouldered for days. 
It was only later that we learned that there were other churches that were done like we were, too. 
Freedom Summer, that's what they call that summer of 1964, now. That, and some project or other. 
I forget the name....but I'll never forget the summer, long as I live.