MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. COMMUNITY BREAKFAST
WATERVILLE ROTARY CLUB, WATERVILLE, MAINE
17 JANUARY 2005
Mayor LePage, Muriel Scott, Deborah Silva, Debbie Halm, Rabbi Krinsky, Pastor Anderman, Wayne Theriault, Waterville Rotary Club, Ethnic Vocal Ensemble, Jody Rich, Distinguished guest, family and friends ... good morning.
I consider it an honor to stand before you this morning as we gather to celebrate the 76th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s birth.
I would like to start my remarks by saying thanks to each and every one of you. Most people will spend this day like the close of most long weekends ... hanging out with the kids at the local movie theater; or catching up on those odd job around the house or just lounging around the family room watching the latest DVD releases. Most kids will see this day as any other day out of school ... they will enjoy it because it is another day without homework.
Now, I’m not saying that those things are bad ... but if you know anything about history ... this day [Martin Luther King Jr., Birthday celebration] demands a trip into our history and that we pause for a few hours of our busy day to pay homage to a man who meant so much to so many.
I thank you for being here today ... because your present symbolizes your stand for justice and equality for all, and that you are not willing to sit down in complacency or lay in the wallows of the status quo. After all, if we [American’s] don’t celebrate and recognize our history ... then who will?
The national theme for this birthday celebration is: “Remember! Act! Celebrate! A Day On, Not A Day off!”
As I was preparing myself to speak to you this morning. I pondered on numerous occasions as to what I would say to you. Although, I done this before ... I still find this speech challenging. How can I ... someone who was not even born before Dr. Kings’ assignation, a boy from in Chattanooga, Tennessee even begin to pontificate the impact of the life of a Nobel Peace Prize Winner and what he meant to so many people -- not just Americans but people all around the world.
This task is difficult because, I stand here today too young to understand what my ancestors had to endure. You see, being born in March 1968, my young eyes never had the opportunity to see the separate drinking fountains for whites and blacks; colored balconies in movie theaters. Too young to understand how a tired and thoroughly respectable Negro seamstress, named Rosa Parks could be thrown into jail and fined simply because she refused to give up her seat on an Alabama bus so a white man could sit down. Maybe I’m just to young ... to understand how, a six-year-old black girl named Ruby Bridges could be hectored and spit on by a white New Orleans mob simply because she wanted to go to the same school as white children. Maybe, I’m just to young to understand how a 14-year-old black boy like Emmett Till could be hunted down and murdered by a Mississippi gang simply because he had supposedly made suggestive remarks to a white woman.
Somebody might be saying those were isolated situations. Things like that didn’t happen to everybody ... well those of you old enough, think back and remember how, even highly educated blacks were routinely denied the right to vote or serve on juries. Maybe I’m just too young to fell the pain that my ancestors felt when they could not eat at lunch counters, register in motels or use whites-only rest rooms; when they could not buy or rent a home wherever they chose. To young to understand how in some rural enclaves in the South, how they were even compelled to get off the sidewalk and stand in the street if a Caucasian walked by.
Some of you here today are even younger than I and it may seem hard for you also to believe these were examples of conditions in the America that we call “the land of the free” and “home of the brave” ... less than 40 years ago.
Then I got to thinking ... that this task is not to difficult because even though I was not around during Dr. King’s life time, I still have a lot to be thankful for ... I have something to celebrate. Although, my 36-year-old body never felt the pressure of a fire hose, nor felt the bite of a German Shepard’s teeth nor the sting of a policeman’s Billy club. I stand here today because of thousands upon thousands of courageous men and women like Dr. King.
Although, I enjoy liberties today ... theses young eyes of mine never thought that the freedoms I enjoy would actually cost. I thought as a very young man, that freedom was just that “free.” Then I discovered that nothing in life is free. The Salvation that I so freely enjoy cost my Savior Jesus His life; standing up for justice cost Dr. King his life; the right to vote cost thousands their lives.
Maybe those examples are to distant for you to understand -- if you want to know the cost of freedom, then go to Afghanistan and ask about the price paid for them to have their first democratic election. Ask any Iraqi women about the cost of freedom for her to do something as basic as drive a car.. Ask any one of the soldiers from this great state of Maine about the cost of freedom ... some are now physical handicapped, and some psychologically deranged, disabled and mentally damaged ... some will even pay the ultimate sacrifice for the cost of freedom.
I don’t stand here today ... with the intent of giving you a litany of events of quotes about Dr, Kings life ... I will leave it up to you to read about him. Nor is it my intent to remind you over and over again about American’s dark past ... the blood stain of history records America’s guilt and pain.
But I will tell you that ... Dr. King risked his life to combat social injustice and to enhance the welfare of others. Although pieces of his dream have become reality ... truth be told, the 21st century continues to be a challenging time. Don’t believe me ... just ask my daughter how she was welcome into the Maine Public School System. Not even of month of being in the school did another 11 year old scream racial epithets at her --- and called her everything but a child of God.
The old Negro spiritual say ... We shall overcome someday. Well I’m waiting on that someday that I can send my child to school and not have worry about whether another child is being taught to be a racist at home. I’m waiting on that someday ... that I don’t have to worry about whether or not my child will be shot because she is a Christian or because she is not of the right ethnicity. No matter how much I try to protect her young mind, eyes and ears ... she still witness on a daily basis in year of our Lord 2005 [mind you] ... just how nasty some American can be. You see ... our work is not done!
But wait that’s not all ... this century is also challenging, because not only does millions of people still live in poverty in a country that has great wealth, but it is also challenging because educational opportunities are still not equal and accessible for many in America. Today, millions of people do not have access to adequate healthcare and they are still mistreated, physically assaulted and denied opportunities based on their race and religion.
Dr. King once said. “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy. The true neighbor will risk his position, his prestige and even his life for the welfare of others.”
So, the question that I have for each of you is ...what are YOU going to do to address the challenges we still experience as it relates human rights today not just in this country but also around the world?
But before you answer that. I would like to share with you a poem that I heard that I think would be fitting for this occasion. It is entitled “The Cold Within”
The Cold Within
Six humans trapped by happenstance
in black and bitter cold
Each possessed a stick of wood,
Or so the story’s told.
Their dying fire in need of logs,
the first woman held hers back
For on the faces around the fire
She noticed one was black.
The next man looking ’cross the way
Saw one not of his church
And couldn’t bring himself to give
The fire his stick of birch.
The third one sat in tattered clothes
He gave his coat a hitch,
Why should his log be put to use
To warm the idle rich?
The rich man just sat back and thought
Of the wealth he had in store,
And how to keep what he had earned
>From the lazy, shiftless poor.
The black man’s face bespoke revenge
As the fire passed from his sight,
For all he saw in his stick of wood
Was a chance to spite the white.
And the last man of this forlorn group
Did naught except for gain,
Giving only to those who gave
Was how he played the game.
The logs held tight in death’s stilled hands
Was proof of human sin,
They didn’t die from the cold without,
They died from the cold within.
Brothers and sisters ... and I repeat brothers and sisters our lives and the lives of our children don’t have to be like these six men. You actions or shall I say your inactions ... will determine the course of your future.
I came to tell you today that each one you have a responsibility. Making a difference will require action on your part. It is your responsibility to live the dream of Dr. King. Not just in words but in action. Not just in talk ... but I your daily walk.
The sacred mission to save America was not just for Dr. King but also with each one of us. If America is going to continue to poster ... it is going to take the efforts of countless everyday people like you and me and many others whose names we will never know who decide that they can not sit around idle and allow the cup on injustice, suffering, and pain spill over any longer.
But I must warn you ... Dr. King’s dream will become a afterthought -- if all we do is leave here and simply check the box as having came ... and go home and do nothing to make this country a better place.
Be not dismayed ... just remember, celebrate and act! We can make a difference, one small win a time. You can help somebody rise from the depths of despair on the wings of hope by changing your heart.
- We can begin today by changing our minds on how we view things.
- We can make a difference in our communities, in our neighborhoods, in our cities and in our state ... if we put down hatred and pickup love.
- We can continue to live out the dream of Martin Luther King ... if we put aside our differences and pick up togetherness.
- Put down community division and pick up tolerance and understanding for all of God’s people
- We can make a change today ... if we will be willing to unball our fist and extend to our fellow brothers and sisters the handshake of brotherly love.
- You can make a difference in your community by agreeing to help somebody ... instead of gathering all of the world’s riches for ourselves in our barn houses ... Let us remember the widowed and orphan; the homeless and the hungry. Let us speak out against injustice and continue to educate or family, friends and acquaintances racial equality.
We can make a difference! I believe that we can make a difference because I have hope in this great country. Let me tell you why I have hope ... I have hope because the terrible thing that happened to my daughter gave me hope. It gave me hope because as deplorable as that situation may have been ... I have hope because it wasn’t my daughter that told the principle what she was enduring ... but it was the other children who witnessed it and determined that what she was going through was not right. So the children ... decided to stand up for right ... even when the decision may have not been popular.
So that tells me that if our children are willing to stand up for justice; stand up for freedom; and stand up for righteousness ... then we [adult] can do so also.
As I close ... I leave you the words of hope that Dr. King so eloquent stated in his I Have a Dream Speech ... when he said
“... Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification, that one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exhalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I will go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.
With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning, "My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrims’ pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring."
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that; let freedom ring from the Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"
