Dear Friends,
There’s a powerful synchronicity that within a single week, we—as a nation—are both honoring Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a man who, motivated and empowered by his faith, fought for equality and justice, and that just four days later, we are inaugurating a new president, who will assume responsibility for uniting a divided nation still struggling with the same values for which Dr. King gave his life.
It’s almost as if this timing is intentional, demanding that we all take a good hard look at our current state of affairs both at home and abroad. Most obviously, extremists across many faiths are claiming religion to justify the use of violence to achieve power and political ends.
That’s why it is more important than ever that, today, we pause and truly recognize Dr. King. Not only for all he accomplished for the Civil Rights Movement but also for the way he accomplished it—with an unshakeable commitment to nonviolence, based in his faith.
Dr. King reminds us that religion never justifies violence. That violence doesn’t equal power. And that a true leader serves everyone.
Dr. King’s legacy proves that there’s another way, a better way for us to empower one another–whether as an ordinary man or woman, or as the President of the United States.
World peace through nonviolent means is neither absurd nor unattainable. All other methods have failed. Thus we must begin anew. Nonviolence is a good starting point. Those of us who believe in this method can be voices of reason, sanity, and understanding amid the voices of violence, hatred, and emotion. We can very well set a mood of peace out of which a system of peace can be built.
– Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Today is a day to remember. And for all of us to be inspired to emulate all that Dr. King stood for.
Pausing to remember,
Joyce S. Dubensky
CEO