Unhappy Martin Luther King Day!
By Rev. Daryl C. Greene

On April 4, 1968, I was rejoicing as my parents left the house to go to their choir practice at church. It was the one night of the week when we were allowed to watch TV. I turned on the tube to watch my favorite program, Ironsides. But the show was interrupted by a news broadcast. Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated while stepping out on the balcony of his Memphis hotel room to address a crowd of Civil Rights demonstrators. My sister, my brother and I watched in silence as we heard the shot and saw him fall. I felt numb with disbelief. As the news casters droned on, a feeling overwhelmed me that I had not known before. Rage! I kept thinking, "That is the end of the non-violent Civil Rights Movement.”

I was 12 years old when that happened. 40 years have come and gone. Eventually the Constitution of the United States was amended and the Civil Rights Act was passed, guaranteeing equality of opportunity regardless of race. But it seems that we have taken two steps forward and at least one step back since those days.

Yes, legal apartheid has been abolished. Yet Affirmative Action has been watered down, if not dropped altogether. Many neighborhoods are still just about as segregated as they were. White flight to the suburbs has meant that inner city schools that were mandated to be integrated remain bastions of segregation in education. Poverty rates among minorities have not changed one bit. The number of single mothers raising children has increased. And more than 25% of black males between the ages of 18 and 40 are locked up in prison. So, in what way have we as a nation moved toward achieving Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream?

In what ways has the Church facilitated the lifting up and the social integration of minorities? White pulpits have fallen silent on the subject. Some do not even mention Martin Luther King Day in their prayers or liturgy. With a few notable exceptions, black churches remain black and white churches remain white. Perhaps this is so because white churches are too boring, dry and unemotional to interest anyone who did not grow up in those traditions. Perhaps, however, it reflects the truth that white social circles still do not include blacks, or any other minorities for that matter, except in cases of interracial marriage. Perhaps, it is because many white churches are what I call the class reunion of 1945. Churches composed of men and women who grew up in school together, and although they may now live in new suburban communities, still go to church in their old neighborhood. Even though those neighborhoods have changed, and may now be full of people of color, few if any have been included in the fellowship of the old churches.

The Kingdom of God is composed of people of all colors of the rainbow. When will our local churches reflect this rainbow of color? If "Christ has broken down the dividing walls of hostility " when will the walls of social segregation be torn down?



Dr. Greene is an ordained minister of the United Church of Christ and a resident of Richmond, IN. He is also the author of Benjamin's Dog Joseph, Feeling Better: The Wisdom of the Doc, You Can Feel Better: How to cope with chronic pain and physical disabilities, and co-author of Walking Free: the Nellie Zimmerman Story.

For further information about his books, please visit www.densmorereid.com

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