Happy Martin Luther King Day

January 19, 2009 by 6 Comments

Barack Obama called for this Martin Luther King Day to be a day of service. That’s good. Holidays need some special activities to set them apart and make them catch on. We’ll see if this becomes a tradition.

Filed Under: Holidays 6 Comments
About Gene Veith

Professor of Literature at Patrick Henry College, the Director of the Cranach Institute at Concordia Theological Seminary, a columnist for World Magazine and TableTalk, and the author of 18 books on different facets of Christianity & Culture.

  • Bryan Lindemood

    Today all doctors and health services should refrain from Abortion services. And all people should do their children the service of not aborting them. The Civil rights issue of this moment: Protect the rights of all people equally.

  • Jonathan

    I agree, Bryan.
    And I submit that our pro-life view must also cause us to speak out against our country’s culpability for the killing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today’s a good day to read and listen to MLKing’s 4/4/67 speech against the Vietnam war. It’s a powerful statement of justice and equality. Here are two paragraphs:

    “A true revolution of values will lay hand on the world order and say of war, “This way of settling differences is not just.” This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation’s homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

    “America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing except a tragic death wish to prevent us from reordering our priorities so that the pursuit of peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. There is nothing to keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with bruised hands until we have fashioned it into a brotherhood.”

  • FW

    #1 bryan Lindemood

    true morality is about what YOU would do, not about what others should do.

    So what do suggest that you and I do, personally,bryan on martin luther king jr day, to save babies and their mothers at risk for abortion?

    btw I live in brasil, so your response has to be beyond a political one……

  • Bryan Lindemood

    Sorry to disappoint you, FW, but I spent my only day off this week with my wife and 4 children and helped around the house a little. This is a very important part of my God-given vocation and I guess we could say it is connected somewhat loosely to my dedication to promoting the sanctity of human life, though not seen beyond my own household. But still, that’s something, isn’t it?

    Hope you did whatever you wanted to do today.

    In my other vocation as undershepherd, many local people know of my public stance of protest against the United States’ unjust abortion laws. I try to be pretty open about that and educate as many people as I am given the opportunity about the sin of extinguishing innocent human life and how our civic laws and our caring actions in our various vocations can reflect these important human concerns.

    Sorry, wasn’t much of an “activist” today.

  • FW

    1) not disappointed at all. pleased.

    2) nothing you did was “loosely connected ” to the sanctity of human life. everything you do as a christian . every thing. is a testimony to how God holds your life and others sacred in your baptism.

    salt is not necessarily considered an “active ingredient” and Jesus was not exactly “active-ist” hanging very very dead on the cross. but you and I are salt. and our lives are joined forever to that death on the cross.

    consider the lilies of the field. they toil not, neither do they spin or become activists……

    enjoy life in the cool shade of the cross. thanks for your kindly post.

  • http://kirkles.tumblr.com Kirk

    “consider the lilies of the field. they toil not, neither do they spin or become activists……”

    That is absolutely classic.

    My mother actually had an interesting thought on this today. She was telling me about a news story she saw which quoted MLK Jr.: “Anyone can be great because anyone can serve.” She really thought this was a wonderful legacy. She pointed out that, for all his failings, MLK Jr’s legacy is service. What a great legacy that would be to hold.


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