Article June 24, 2019 Issue

Will you be my neighbor?

Ingrid Peschke

A version of this article was published in The Christian Science Monitor’s Christian Science Perspective column, February 28, 2019.

The 2018 documentary film Won’t You Be My Neighbor? chronicles Fred Rogers’s life and significant contribution as a public television pioneer in children’s programming. I am among many who grew up watching Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. At the heart of his message was a sense of everyone’s worth. He ended every show with “You make every day a special day just by being you, and I like you just the way you are.”

This concept of unconditional love and belonging clearly struck a chord with countless children over the show’s thirty-plus years. And Mr. Rogers didn’t shy away from applying this message to some of the more charged social and political issues of the times. On one segment he invited Mr. Clemmons, a policeman on the show played by a black actor, to join him in rolling up his pants and cooling off his feet in a kiddie pool on a hot day. Afterward, Rogers dried his friend’s feet, making a bold statement against the racial divides of his day.

For me, this segment of the show brings to mind the beautiful biblical image of Jesus humbly washing his disciples’ feet, openly demonstrating his instruction to do to others as we would want them to do to us. This message of equality and love for all is needed more than ever today as society grapples with those same issues.

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