The Rev. Clyde Miller loved people, whether he was giving a speech, counseling them, or having a drink with them.
Miller, a well-known preacher and civil rights leader here for years, died on July 16 from kidney failure. He was 83.
A service is planned for 11 a.m. Aug. 3 at Peoples’ Presbyterian Church, 2780 York St.
Miller was conference minister (leader) of the Rocky Mountain Conference, United Church of Christ, from 1980 until 1993 and was widely known in the community for his efforts to break down barriers among various religions.
“Clyde was an out-there kind of person who had a strong voice for justice,” said the Rev. Tom Rehling, now UCC conference minister.
“He was about rattling cages,” Rehling said.
“He was the most spectacular conference minister,” said the Rev. Robb Lapp, another UCC colleague. “He was, at once, the most profane, the most appropriately outspoken, the most visionary, the most prophetic and the most clay-footed leader the conference has had,” Lapp said.
Miller, the first African- American to hold the job, fought not only for the rights of blacks but for those of women and other groups in society.
Perhaps his great strength was “the depth of his soul and his ability to stir the spirits of others through preaching,” Lapp said. “He hated being a bureaucrat but loved socializing and politicking.”
“He wanted equity for everyone and went directly to the heart of issues,” said his daughter Joy Miller-Davis of Tulsa, Okla.
Clyde H. Miller was born in Middlesboro, Ky., on Dec. 8, 1927, and graduated from Lincoln High School. He was going to be a teacher and enrolled at Kentucky State University. After two years he took time out to serve in the Army in Korea.
He said later “seeing how horrible Americans were treating our enemies, our allies and each other, I thought I had to go into the ministry.” He said he wanted to “help overcome the (racial and ethnic) differences we’d invented about each other.”
He enrolled at Chicago Theological Seminary, where he met Eva Whitlock. They married on Aug. 17, 1957.
While in Chicago, he was active in the civil rights movement, helped organize PUSH and directed a Catholic conference on interracial justice. He became director of the Boston City Missionary Society, an advocate for the city’s poor.
After coming to Denver, he traveled his area, which included Colorado and parts of Wyoming and Utah, and around the country, pushing for disarmament, and the rights of women, American Indians, the disabled and gays.
He taught courses at Boston College, Colorado College and Wesleyan University in Connecticut.
In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by another daughter, Claire Miller-Rashad, Denver; four grandchildren; one great-grandchild; and two sisters, Louise Ann Perkins of Lexington, Ky., and Myra Jean Miller of Chicago.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
