Reflecting on Dr. King

     One of my earliest memories is sitting on the steps going up to the attic of our house, I was looking down on the landing below as my mother frantically ran between the phone, and the radio, and the TV shouting, “They shot Dr. King! They shot Dr. King!”  Even at 5 years old I knew who they were.  And I knew we were at war.

     When I was a young man, Dr King didn’t have a lot of juice in my circles.  This was the early 80s and everyone was wearing X caps.  That is, if you dug baseball caps which I didn’t, but the idea was Malcolm X was way more popular than Dr. King.  I had spent some time in a revolutionary organization started by Kwame Ture, who used to be called Stokely Carmichael.  He had argued the desirability of non-violence with Dr King in the 60s.  I was personally with Brother Ture on several occasions and felt it was a great blessing to be with one who had worked with and had the courage to disagree with Dr King.

                  Dr. King and Kwame Ture (aka Stokely Carmichael) during a Freedom March

     As I got older, I started to appreciate Dr. King more.  His straight up courage, creativity and discipleship impressed me.  I now see him as an example of faith in action; a demonstration of how to attune to a high level of consciousness and to transform society from that elevation.  Albert Einstein said, “Our current problems cannot be solved at the same level of consciousness at which they were created.”   Dr. King created solutions to some of the most intractable problems we have, inspired by a high level of consciousness.

     There is a famous photo of Dr. King taken inside his Southern Christian Leadership Conference office in 1966.  In the photo, Dr. King is standing in front of a photo of Mahatma Gandhi.  Think about it, for a Black Christian pastor in the U.S. South to have a photo of a Hindu holy man in a place of prominence in his office is a miracle of sorts, albeit of a lesser order than desegregating the Birmingham public transportation.  One can read a lot into that photo and I choose to focus on its ecumenical flavor.  It says to me that Truth can be found in many faiths traditions and I honor Dr. King for being courageous enough to not only learn from Mahatma Gandhi but to acknowledge he was affected by the great Indian spiritual leader.

                       Dr. King in his Southern Christian Leadership Conference office

     This is especially relevant to my life because I’ve spent the last two decades studying meditation and yoga with an Indian spiritual teacher.  As a Black American man I’ve definitely been in a minority on this quest.  As a child, I was introduced to my neighborhood Episcopal church under my mother’s tutelage.  One of my first victories in the quest for independence was convincing my mother to let me out of their Sunday school program I hated.  Apparently, she wasn’t very committed to the church either because she and my sisters also left not too long after I did and never found another.  My father didn’t do church.  

     Although, years after my church defection, as a young man, I read Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda and decided this was the life for me.  Several years later I met a meditation teacher, Mata Amritanandamayi, I remain with to this day.  I mention this because my meditation practice created another connection to Dr. King.  In 2003, I took my family on a pilgrimage to India for a meditation festival.  We read in the program guide that Dr. King’s daughter, Yolanda, would be giving a talk.  We knew that Yolanda King had met our teacher in the U.S. so this wasn’t a big surprise.  

    Yolanda King placing a garland around humanitarian and spiritual leader, Mata Amritanandamayi

    However, my wife and I were surprised one afternoon when we left the meditation festival to get our shopping on in the local business district and ironically on Gandhi Boulevard, we spotted Yolanda King walking with an African-American female friend.  They were by themselves.  Now catch this, here we are four African-Americans together on the other side of the world, all there for the same event, and my wife and I certified groupies.  We’ve created opportunities to talk with KRS-1, Angie Stone, Lenny Kravitz, and other minor stars.  We are not shy and do not shrink around Stardom.   

     Yet, there was something so different about Dr. King’s daughter that neither of us approached her.  We just watched in awe as she looked over some Indian clothing on the boulevard and we hold that memory in our heart as more evidence of the family’s ecumenical spirit.  Given that Ms. King died at a relatively age a few years after this encounter, it reinforced for us that you have to grab life when you have the chance because you may not get another opportunity.

     As an advocate for social justice, I love that famous line from Dr. King’s 1963 Letter from a Birmingham Jail.  For the young folks who missed this in history class, Dr. King was in Birmingham, Alabama leading protests against government and retail segregation he was arrested one of the 30 times during his 39 years visiting Earth.  While incarcerated he wrote an open letter to some white clergy who had been suggesting he chill with the rabble rousing. One sentence frequently lifted out of that letter states, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

     I want to remind you, however, of the less talked about corollary to that law: 

     Justice anywhere is a threat to injustice everywhere.  

    Injustice may have seemed starker in Dr. King’s day.  Evil appeared more exposed.  Now issues of social justice seem to have proliferated like the 600 stations on cable TV as opposed to the three channels in the 60s. Today, it may be easier to get paralyzed by the choices of where to confront injustice.  Do you get involved with the Occupy Movement, fight school inequalities, support refugee networks, promote antiwar activities, join the movement to end sex trafficking?  It can be overwhelming.  A simple approach to the problem of injustice that everyone can take on starts close to home; in your relationships, at work and in the home.

     For years, I’ve organized groups that help fathers explore and understand their family relationships.  These programs have caused me to look at the issue of interpersonal patriarchy and the right use of power with my wife and children.  Dr. King’s legacy will be forever intertwined with all the other movements for social justice that grew out of the Civil Rights movement.  Social justice struggles for women, immigrants, gays, even on behalf of children.  When Dr. King was writing his letter from the Birmingham jail, it was unlikely that a man would be arrested for what we would commonly call wife or child abuse today.  

     As a society, we’ve learned to live in greater intimacy and harmony not only across diverse communities, but also in our homes.  One of the keys to Dr. King work was the practice of forgiveness.  One can’t imagine Dr. King employing the strategy of non-violent civil disobedience if he didn’t have a strong belief in forgiveness.  As a Christian pastor he came by it honestly.  In the Book of Matthew, Jesus instructs his followers, not to forgive seven times, but 77 times.  Dr King echoed that idea two millenia later when he said, “Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it’s a permanent attitude.”  

     My dictionary defines forgive as, to grant pardon; and pardon, to release from penalty for an offense.  You see how potentially problematic and powerful this notion of forgiveness is.  The rational part of our mind rebels, thinking, if we don’t punish the evil doers they will never learn.  However, as Christ and Dr. King taught, forgiveness is a powerful strategy for transforming others and ourselves.  We may not be strong enough to forgive those who thwart our human and civil rights.  But what about those closest to us, who we profess to love?

     If I didn’t mention this my wife, son or daughter would probably tell you that I haven’t mastered the forgiveness attitude.  I live with two late adolescents, i.e., young adults and their teenaged years were the most frustrating years of my life and we’re still working it out.  But, if we can’t learn to forgive the penalties of even a loved one in our family, how will we manage to forgive all the other less related people doing stupid things out there? Forgiveness comes easier when dealing with a loved one.  And it's still hard.

     As of this past Sunday, I’ve been married for 23 years and that has not always been a walk in the park either.  But as difficult as my wife and children can be to live with, the person I have to work most on forgiving is me.  I still make a lot of mistakes and it can be painful for me to look back at all the major blunders I’ve made over the decades.  With myself and others, I have clearly experienced that forgiveness; releasing myself and others from the penalties of the offense is liberating, literally it’s freeing for the person who does the forgiving, as well as the person who is forgiven.  It gives a relationship space to start fresh and new, in a healthier place. 

     I’d like to thank Dr. King for echoing this truth around the planet in my youth.  

 This blog is based on a talk I gave at Dr. King's 2012 Birthday Celebration in Arlington, MA.