Eugene Patterson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who lent his pen to the Civil Rights movement, died on Saturday night.

An article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution honored him, saying “As editor of the Atlanta Constitution from 1960-1968, Gene Patterson’s image and words anchored the editorial page during the most tumultuous years of the civil rights movement in the South. With his mentor and best friend, Ralph McGill, Patterson used his platform to persuade his fellow white Southerners that on matters of race they were wrong, and that if they changed, the sky would not fall.

“‘I see what you’re trying to do,’ one reader accused. ‘You’re tyring to make us think that we’re better than we are.'”

I had to stop reading when I hit those words. That, more than anything, sums up my passion for writing and communication.

There are plenty of people who write about what is wrong with people, what is wrong with the world. Sometimes, I am one of them. It certainly provides a lot of material, and as modern news networks could tell you, there’s nothing like outrage to boost your numbers.

But even when Jesus had strong words for people and the sin they were invovled in, he didn’t just berate and shame them. He called them to something better, to himself.

That’s what I want to do, too.

Not out of humanistic impulse, but because human beings were created to be so much more than our current fallen state would warrant. Not out of shame, but because the church, with Christ as its head, is capable of so much more than we are settling for.

Isn’t that exciting? Doesn’t that energize you to make a difference?

There is a time to call out the sin and depravity of the human heart.

There is a time to call out the Imago Dei potential of the human soul.

Sometimes, as Gene Patterson showed us, those times are one and the same.

“Don’t just make a living. Make a mark.” -Eugene Patterson, etched near the entrance of the Poynter Institute for Media.