Remembering Martin Luther King

"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." --Martin Luther King, in his "I have a Dream" speech, August 28, 1963, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

I was alive when Martin Luther King was shot in Memphis. I still remember that day vividly. I was in grade school then. It happened on April 4, 1968. I was outside on the front lawn, waiting for what seemed like forever, to go to my grandparents' house. We had unusually warm weather for early spring. I was wearing spring clothes that day, something known back then as a "playset", because the shorts and top matched.

I  was lying down on the soft grass, closing my eyes and almost falling asleep in the warm sunshine. I had my little transistor radio with me (I am "dating" myself here! We had no Podcasts back then, not even a Sony Walkman).  Suddenly over the radio came a report that Martin Luther King had been shot in Memphis.  I sat straight up as I heard the news. I tried to understand what it meant.

We finally got in the car and went to my grandmother's house. The television was on. I stood stock still in front of the screen. The announcers were saying that Mr. King spoke out for the blacks. Some were hinting that the blacks would riot in the streets, or that we would have another civil war in this country over his death. That scared me.

I was sad that grown ups were saying this about a man who tried to help his people. I was confused over why everyone seemed so fearful of what he had been saying.

I had a family member who called people, with different skin color or ethnicities, all kinds of nasty names. My sibling and I would laugh at these names, the names that seemed so outrageous. Surely he was not serious? Surely he was only mocking about how a bigot would sound? This relative would then turn to us and say, "WHY are you laughing? I am deadly serious!" We would fall silent. Maybe this relative DID mean it. . . .

As I got a little older, I began to more fully understand the impact of Martin Luther King. I was a only a little Anglo girl, growing up in the white suburbs. But I had been bullied for years-- called names for being a girl with a smart brain; called "Four Eyes" for needing to wear glasses; tormented for needing to wear braces to correct my misaligned teeth. I was called traitor because my father was from a different country. I was told, "Go back where you came from! We don't want you here!"  I was called mean names for the shape of my nose.

I would get hurt and angry over this bullying. I shed bitter tears over the unfairness of it all. I could not help that my intelligence was put inside a girl's  body. Nor could I help the shape of my nose, the country of my father, the need for braces or glasses.

At a fairly young age, I figured out that if people could be so hateful to a little white girl, how must it feel to be a person of color in America? And what did this say about the grown-ups? Were we not supposed to treat all of each other as brothers and sisters of God?

Martin Luther King has become one of my heroes, because he spoke the Truth. He said that the United States of America had undergone a civil war, but blacks in our country were still not free.

I have a dear friend who is like a mother to me. She was active in the civil rights movement at the time. She tells me that at the time that Martin Luther King was speaking out, many other clergy were trying to silence him. Yes, clergy were telling him not to speak the Truth!

Even as a child, I knew the Truth about bigotry. Today, I tell my son stories about the civil rights movement. When he says things to me like, "Mommy, it's okay to be different!", I cry real tears, but they are tears of joy. He knows the Truth. He speaks it. He lives it.

Today he asked me, at what time did Martin Luther King die? When I asked why, he said, "Because I want to hold a minute of silence for Martin Luther King then." I did not know the answer, so we looked it up on Google.

The site that came up was Wikipedia. When we opened the site, the entire article about Martin Luther King was replaced by text that said, "We don't care, we don't care. we don't care.... etc." Filling the whole page. Someone had gone in and edited the article to become an article of Hate.

Very quickly, someone at Wikipedia wiped out those words. Then they set to the task of restoring the original article.

I cried when I saw how someone had defaced the piece on Martin Luther King. My son saw my tears, but I did not care! He needs to see those tears. He hugged me and tried to console me.

I told him, my voice shaking, "They murdered him because he dared to speak the Truth! I will never stop speaking the Truth! And you must grow up to speak the Truth too!"

It is so sad to me that, on the day in which we honor Martin Luther King, racism still lives.  King had a dream that his four little children would one day be judged only for their character and not the color of their skin.

I am still waiting for that day. I had hoped that by the time of my son's generation, we would know better, understand better, and love more.

(c) The Spiritual Devotional 2012. All Rights Reserved.