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captainsblogIt's now more than 50 years since Martin Luther King became a nationally known leader, 40-plus since his tragic death, and this weekend marks the 25th national observance of his birthday as a national holiday (except among certain backwater holdouts such as Arizona). Despite that legacy, we've really yet to put much into the holiday other than the closings that it occasions. Unlike virtually every other federal holiday, Retail America has yet to embrace it with a long weekend of sales. There are marches and memorials in many places, but even those seem to be cutting back (San Francisco, for one, is holding its last parade this year). So what's a thoughtful American to do this year to honor the memory of one who did so much for so many?
I would suggest something I tried myself today, for the first time ever, in commemoration of the occasion or otherwise: take a few minutes and read, in its entirety, Dr. King's Letter from Birmingham Jail.
It's not a thesis or a treatise, and probably has a word count within even the attention span of a GenXer. It is exactly what its title says it is: an open letter, written from prison, to a number of Alabama clergy who had publicly resisted Dr. King's call for "direct action" in his effort to end close to 200 years of legal segregation and a decade or more of the illegal kind.
It is brief. It is eloquent. It is powerful in its response to the evil and injustice that the author had witnessed first-hand, even from his position of power and privilege in the safety of a respected southern pulpit, and to the even more oppressive injustice he witnessed inflicted on others.
Not long after his assassination, I have read (and this Google Book result, at least, confirms it) that some theologians proposed re-opening the New Testament canon to include this work as the 28th expression of the Gospel to guide us. While rejected as an inclusion at that level, it is nonetheless respected at the highest levels for its expressions of compassion, commitment and perseverance- the very things that Christ and His apostles commanded us to carry on.
As I read the letter, written nine years after Brown v. Board of Education and seven months before the South would take first JFK and then MLK in vicious bloodshed, I tried to gauge how much of King's visions- good and bad- were still in play today. I am sad to say that there's plenty of the same hatred and selfishness for this letter to speak to in 2010. The vitriol that has been levied against an elected President, the first of his race to attain the office, makes one wonder if the "whites only" sign has only been temporarily removed. The rhetoric has been cleaned up from the level that was tolerated in the late 50s- where a post like this would get me branded as a "nigger lover" and my house likely torched (which went on even in the suburban North of those years around the time of my birth)- but the enmity, the code words, the just-under-the-skin sentiments are still there. Maybe we've made progress in some degree, but not as much in kind; so much unkind still remains to be dealt with.
Maybe if the Right saw some of what Dr. King saw when he wrote that letter, they'd be a little closer to being right with God. Sadly, most of them won't.
Happy birthday anyway, Doctor.
I would suggest something I tried myself today, for the first time ever, in commemoration of the occasion or otherwise: take a few minutes and read, in its entirety, Dr. King's Letter from Birmingham Jail.
It's not a thesis or a treatise, and probably has a word count within even the attention span of a GenXer. It is exactly what its title says it is: an open letter, written from prison, to a number of Alabama clergy who had publicly resisted Dr. King's call for "direct action" in his effort to end close to 200 years of legal segregation and a decade or more of the illegal kind.
It is brief. It is eloquent. It is powerful in its response to the evil and injustice that the author had witnessed first-hand, even from his position of power and privilege in the safety of a respected southern pulpit, and to the even more oppressive injustice he witnessed inflicted on others.
Not long after his assassination, I have read (and this Google Book result, at least, confirms it) that some theologians proposed re-opening the New Testament canon to include this work as the 28th expression of the Gospel to guide us. While rejected as an inclusion at that level, it is nonetheless respected at the highest levels for its expressions of compassion, commitment and perseverance- the very things that Christ and His apostles commanded us to carry on.
As I read the letter, written nine years after Brown v. Board of Education and seven months before the South would take first JFK and then MLK in vicious bloodshed, I tried to gauge how much of King's visions- good and bad- were still in play today. I am sad to say that there's plenty of the same hatred and selfishness for this letter to speak to in 2010. The vitriol that has been levied against an elected President, the first of his race to attain the office, makes one wonder if the "whites only" sign has only been temporarily removed. The rhetoric has been cleaned up from the level that was tolerated in the late 50s- where a post like this would get me branded as a "nigger lover" and my house likely torched (which went on even in the suburban North of those years around the time of my birth)- but the enmity, the code words, the just-under-the-skin sentiments are still there. Maybe we've made progress in some degree, but not as much in kind; so much unkind still remains to be dealt with.
Maybe if the Right saw some of what Dr. King saw when he wrote that letter, they'd be a little closer to being right with God. Sadly, most of them won't.
Happy birthday anyway, Doctor.
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Date: 2010-01-16 10:49 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-01-17 04:29 am (UTC)Thank you!
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Date: 2010-01-17 02:45 pm (UTC)Everyone should visit there at least once. If it doesn't bring tears to your eyes, you have some serious soul-searching to do.
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Date: 2010-01-17 04:00 pm (UTC)