"The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday Observance"

READING

Today's reading is the famous letter that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote when he was serving a sentence at the Birmingham City Jail for participating in a civil rights demonstration. It is a response to an open letter from eight prominent white Birmingham religious leaders, who urged Dr. King to call off the demonstrations and let the civil rights struggle work its way through the courts. Deeply disappointed in the lack of support, Dr. King justified his actions and called on the Christian church to take a stronger moral position.

He writes, "So here we are moving toward the exit of the twentieth century with a religious community largely adjusted to the status quo, standing as a taillight behind other community agencies rather than a headlight leading [people] to higher levels of justice.

"In deep disappointment, I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love, Yes, I love the church; I love her sacred walls. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, the grandson and the great-grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But oh! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and fear of being nonconformists.

"There was a time when the church was powerful. It was during that period when the early Christians rejoiced when they were deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society . . . .

"Things are different now. The contemporary church is often a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. It is so often the arch-supporter of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church's silent and often vocal sanction of things as they are. . . .

"Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Maybe I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, the true ecclesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. . . . Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment."

SERMON

The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute is neatly tucked into the older part of downtown, near a large city plaza filled with monuments and old trees. To get there from the hotels you walk past the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, where just months after Martin Luther King was arrested four girls were killed in a monstrous act of racial violence. The Civil Rights Institute depicts the tumultuous events of this era with powerful authenticity. There is even a recreation of the jail cell where King languished in solitary confinement in the dark for days, and wrote his historic letter.

It’s an unpleasant little room, with no books or typewriter. King wrote with pencil and paper that had been smuggled in to him, quoting from memory not only Jesus and the prophet Amos, but also Martin Buber, Reinhold Neibuhr, and Saint Augustine. When he finished, the “Letter from Birmingham City Jail” was circulated widely. None of the people he addressed ever responded, however, nor did any newspaper publish it.

At this point in his career, mainstream America regarded King as an extremist and provocateur. The "New York Times" published an editorial blaming him for creating “inflamed tensions” in Birmingham. Even liberal politicians carefully calculated how much distance to maintain without sacrificing the African American vote. Everyone wanted him to move more slowly. But King railed against those “who,” as he put it, “paternalistically believe [they] can set the timetable for another[’s] … freedom.”

The letter was a response to a statement put together by eight Birmingham religious leaders - all white, all moderate in their opposition to segregation - urging King and his followers to back off from confrontation. But King would have none of that. As he sat in his jail cell, he pieced together his argument, drawing on his Christian faith and his country’s Constitution.

To be sure, he was emotional and frayed by the stress of solitary confinement. “King himself,” historian Taylor Branch notes, “regarded his letter as partly cathartic, a venting of emotion ‘when the cup of endurance runs over.’” And “he addressed the eight Birmingham clergy in dozens of voices - begged, scolded, explained, even cooed to them, and conspired icily with them as fellow experts.” At times, his focus “wandered from the Birmingham clergymen altogether as King seemed to plumb within himself the core reason he submitted to jail.”

Reading his letter today, one senses that he was reaching deep into his reserves of faith to stay firm and strong. He must have had his share of self-doubts. He certainly had more than his share of enemies. Yet his message remains hopeful. Though he may have written it mainly for his own solace, the “Letter from Birmingham City Jail” still teaches the rest of us how faith and action always go together.

The letter addresses the question of what role the church should play in the struggle for justice. Should it, as the Birmingham clergy urged, exercise patience and moderation? Or should it exhort action and confrontation?

King explained the steps that a movement based on nonviolence takes before committing to action. It calls for a thorough investigation of facts, an effort at negotiation, and an inward reflection, first, before a decision is made. “There can be no gainsaying that racial injustice engulfs this community,” King wrote, listing unsolved bombings and brutality aimed at people of color. Despite their efforts to negotiate with the political and economic leaders of the city, no progress had been made. The time came for the civil rights leaders to discern whether the situation called for nonviolent action and if so, whether they had the strength to withstand jail. Finally they set a date and put their organization into motion.

King made it clear that every step of the way, the patience and moderation that others urged on them had been exercised thoughtfully and faithfully. What others called precipitous and extreme was in reality painstakingly deliberate. Justice was long overdue. “We have waited for more than 340 years for our Constitutional and God-given rights,” King chided. Even so, people everywhere - from the sanctuaries of Birmingham to the pages of the "New York Times" - felt he was moving too fast.

Today it is clear who was right. But back then, under pressure from all sides, even King must have wondered whether he was asking for too much. In one of the best parts of the “Letter from Birmingham City Jail,” King wrote that he had “gradually gained a bit of satisfaction from being considered an extremist. Was not Jesus an extremist?” he asked. And Amos and Paul and Martin Luther and Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson?

“So the question,” he concluded, “is not whether we will be extremist but what kind of extremist will we be. Will we be extremists for hate or will we be extremists for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice - or will we be extremists for the cause of justice?”

These are important questions, in King’s time and in ours. If the church has moral leadership, we must use it. To use it, we must take a stand. Many will view a courageous position as extreme; there are all kinds of risks that go with it. But the strength that comes from faith is not meant to maintain the status quo, as King would say. It is meant to make the world a better place.

Looking back on the civil rights movement in King’s time, the issues are clear and the choices are simple. Racial injustice is wrong. People like us, who affirm the inherent worth and dignity of all persons, would not hesitate to stand with King. And many Unitarian Universalists, including our minister emeritus, Ernie Pipes, marched with King in Selma. Injustice sometimes presents itself, however, as ambiguous, as a moral dilemma, with right and wrong not so clearly defined. How can people of faith today take a stand and rest assured that history will prove them right? What if we are wrong? When extremists are wrong, they are very wrong, as we all know.

The old threats to community have not disappeared either. A religious group that takes positions risks internal discord, destabilizing the very institution that gives it a collective voice. So sometimes we just want to keep the peace and let each individual decide. Or say that our faith is in “the inner spiritual church,” as King calls it, in the contemplative life, not the life of action.

These are all legitimate concerns, reflecting very real aspects of community life. King cared about all of them too. But he expected more. He was often disappointed. But he remained optimistic. “I hope the church as a whole,” he wrote, “will meet the challenge of this decisive hour.”

The challenges of today’s decisive hours come with the same risks and the same uncertainty as they did in King’s day. Issues of war and peace, economic justice, and civil rights, among others, can challenge us and divide us over and over again. We have more to lose, however, by avoiding the challenge than by facing our differences. And our faith can guide us, just as King’s guided him.

Martin Luther King spoke powerfully about the Jewish and Christian tradition of prophetic action, of speaking the truth as Jesus and Amos did. His God was a God of justice. But he also placed his faith in democracy, in the right of all people to freedom and equality. The “Letter from Birmingham City Jail” spoke in words of faith not only in God, but in the Constitution. “We will win our freedom,” King wrote, “because the sacred heritage of our nation and the eternal will of God are embodied in our echoing demands.”

Our faith, while not so certain of the will of God, is strong in our affirmation of the values that preserve the worth and dignity of all people. We believe that people can learn the truth by gathering in community and listening to each other. We trust that we can arrive at understandings that respect our differences, yet do not diminish our power to take a stand on the issues of the day.

Our congregation has taken such stands through statements of conscience - as we did during the months leading up to the war on Iraq – and declarations of affirmation - as we did when we voted to become a Welcoming Congregation. When we take care to have good dialogue and education, our democratic process takes care of the rest. It’s a lot of work, but it’s how we earn our moral authority. And without moral authority, we would not be the church we hope to be.

Or that King hoped we would be. He staked the success of the civil rights movement on goodhearted citizens and people of faith, who would recognize injustice and do what they could do to overcome it. Though the work is not yet finished, we can celebrate what was begun in those brave early steps, when people risked everything, even their lives, to stand up for what was right. And we can hope, as King hoped, that we would be the people who would join them.

Sources used to prepare this sermon include “Letter from Birmingham City Jail,” by Martin Luther King, Jr., in "Testament of Hope,""Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years," by Taylor Branch (Simon & Schuster, 1998).