UVA Sends Message of Love and Unity

On Wednesday night, thousands of University of Virginia and Charlottesville community members retraced the steps that neo-Nazi and white supremacist protestors took last Friday, a powerful repudiation of hate and bigotry.

The procession began around 9 p.m. in Nameless Field, where a sea of candles slowly lit up the night. From there, marchers wound through Grounds and down McCormick Road before pouring onto the Lawn in a steady stream. Hundreds of voices joined in songs like “We Shall Overcome,” “Amazing Grace,” “This Little Light of Mine,” “This Land is Your Land,” “Lean on Me,” and of course, “The Good Old Song.”

At one point, those hymns came to a quiet close and a solemn hush fell as a speaker requested a moment of silence for Heather Heyer and state troopers H. Jay Cullen and Berke Bates – the three victims who lost their lives over the weekend. Third-year student Joy Collins then read a poem by Maya Angelou, “Still I Rise.”