Sunday, August 28, 2016

Sunday Reflection - A Dream 53 Years Old Today


Fifty- three years ago today, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered one of the greatest orations an American -- or anyone -- has ever given. Here, he begins the purposeful repetition of "I have a dream..." that crescendos into the oration's emotionally rousing conclusion:
"Let us not wallow in the valley of despair, I say to you today, my friends. 
And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. 
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."
Many of us (of a certain age) can practically recite the conclusion from heart:
And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: 
          Free at last! Free at last!
   Thank God Almighty we are free at last! 

2 comments:

Feline Mama said...

Thank You for this post. I think about Rev. King & think his soul is heartbroken looking down on US today. All that he accomplished & worked towards seems.....
BROKEN. De-volution. Going backwards. Great job "humans".

W. Hackwhacker said...

Thanks for dropping in again, and for your comment. Yeah, it's hard not to be discouraged with what you see. That's why we wanted to include Dr. King's line about "Let us not wallow in the valley of despair..." It's hard when you see the rampant racism and bigotry that seems just as virulent now as when he was alive. That "one day" he dreamed about depends so much on the hearts and souls of very imperfect humans. We just have to do what we can in our own small ways to move that time forward one day at a time.