Citizens participate in Interfaith Breakfast in honor of MLK on
January 19 in Durham, NC.
by Julie Z. Russo
In the more than 50 years since the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his sermon “I Had a Dream” on the mall in Washington, DC, his vision of a more perfect world free of discrimination and violence and in support of equal opportunity continues to resonate throughout the world. Dr. King’s message is what inspires Rashonda Blue, a Southeast Raleigh Magnet High School student in Raleigh, to excel in school and in a YMCA Achievement Program, surmounting the incarceration of both of her parents. Dr. King’s civil rights demonstrations to end segregation in the south during the 1960s inspire journalists like WRAL News Anchor David Crabtree. After attending the funeral last year of anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela in South Africa, Crabtree declared “non-violence is not only the way, it is the only way.” And Dr. King’s advocacy for social justice motivates faith leaders like Reverend Michael F. Burbidge, bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Raleigh, to challenge inequality, injustice, and division in his own sermons.
To honor the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., two days of events were held throughout the Triangle with Raleigh and Durham city officials and religious leaders presiding at a wreath laying ceremony at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Gardens and delivering speeches before concerts at the Duke Energy Center for the Performing Arts on Jan. 16 and Jan. 19. More than 500 citizens gathered at an interfaith prayer breakfast in Durham to remember Dr. King with prayers, songs, and public testimony with clergy members announcing “we are God’s family, united in love,” said Rev. Burbidge. “May our witness endure, may our hope prevail.”
Held at sunrise, the 35th annual MLK triangle interfaith prayer breakfast brought together the collective voices of Raleigh and Durham’s faith community as well as its city leadership. The event motto was “Think, Act and Serve” and its theme was a call for a more equitable society. The audience was summoned to consider international progress for peace since Dr. King’s assassination on April 4, 1968.
Called a “Year of Awakening” with a spate of crimes in Ferguson, Cleveland, and New York that have brought tensions between the African American community and the police to the forefront, the overall tone of the meeting was sobering when considering the disadvantages of today’s minorities. “Pressing issues of justice and fairness” would keep Dr. King up at night worrying if he were alive today, said Dr. James H. Johnson, a professor of entrepreneurship and strategy at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Dr. Johnson’s research is on demographic changes in the country pointing to an inevitable “browning and greying” of America reflecting an increasing number of non-Anglo Saxon immigrants and an aging baby boomer population. An influx of 1.5 million new residents including 61 percent who are non-white and 28 percent who are Hispanic occurred within the past decade in North Carolina. The obstacles posed by these changes include “hyper-segregated” schools that do not adequately address integration and poverty, Dr. Johnson said.
Following in the footsteps of the Rev. Dr. King, faith and civic leaders hope to provide a voice for the disadvantaged with calls of remembrance and role models. Rabbi Eric Solomon of Beth Meyer synagogue in Raleigh was among the rabbis who visited a deportation center in Ghana along the African coastline where slaves were boarded on ships. At the prayer breakfast, Rabbi Solomon recalled his story of looking out at the beautiful ocean, but also remembering the bodies of slaves who did not survive the harrowing journey. One source of healing is to acknowledge their suffering, Rabbi Solomon said. Oliver Muhammad, Senior Imam of the Islamic Center of Raleigh, reminded the audience of Dr. King’s prophecy that “no one is truly safe, if our neighbors don’t feel safe.” The real superheroes are the Ghandis, and Kings, and Mandelas who faced ridicule, even imprisonment to work towards a society free of bigotry, said Steve Rao, a Morrisville city council member representing the Hindu Community.
Martin Luther King, Jr. challenged the status quo by asking questions about how to respond to the crisis of discrimination and poverty. To address these problems, the public must understand the driving forces causing these inequities, and then seek to solve present day-issues in the community, according to the Triangle MLK Committee. Every citizen is asked to serve, no matter their station, during their life, said Mayor Bill Bell of Durham. “We can't become complacent,” said Roy Watson, a director at Blue Cross Blue Shield, “one of the great lessons the great orator MLK imparted...a man of action, is that religions be judged by the content of their character.” The power of collective engagement that supercedes individual goals will be necessary in educating the next generation, Dr. Johnson said.
From prayers to the uplifting gospel music of recording artist Jekalyn Carr, the breakfast concluded with the solemn closing remarks of Dr. Johnson: “We have a long way to insuring all of God’s children have equal access to opportunity in America.”