Shortly after the close of the Civil War in a fashionable Richmond church, members of the congregation were invited to come to the altar rail to receive Holy Communion. After several rows of worshippers came and left the altar side by side after receiving communion, a black man walked down the aisle toward the altar. A tense silence gripped everyone, no one got up to go down to the altar to receive the bread and wine without waiting for the ushers to let their row go up together.

The black man started to kneel alone. Quietly, a tall, graying man with a military bearing stood up and strode down the aisle to the black man’s side and together they knelt. Before the officiating clergyman could continue, people recognized that the man kneeling beside the black man without showing any distinction was General Robert E. Lee. Although Lee said nothing, everyone realized he had shown his faith through his act of joining the lonely black worshipper at the altar.

Lee’s example is an example for all. We must not be content with any system that divides us as fellow Christians. We must seek to demonstrate our essential unity. Only then can we say truly: “We are one in Christ.”