Remembering mlk jr.’s words of wisdom on his 96th birthday anniversary and 39th national holiday
13th January 2025 · 0 Comments
As the 39th anniversary of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s National Holiday approaches on January 20, we all owe a debt of gratitude to the courageous civil rights advocate and spiritual leader. King gave his life in the fight against segregation and poverty and lobbying for equality, justice and living wages for poor people.
If he had lived, the Rev. King would be celebrating his 96th birthday rather than losing his life to an assassin’s bullet. He only lived 39 years but accomplished so much before being martyred during attempts to get better wages for striking sanitation workers in Memphis, Tenn., on April 4, 1968.
Each year’s celebration is special, as numerous organizations pay homage to MLK Jr. with parades, art, music, lectures, performances, giving to the needy and cleaning up communities during the holiday’s Day of Service.
According to King Center CEO Dr. Bernice A. King, MLK Jr. and Coretta Scott King’s daughter, this year’s observance theme is “Mission Possible: Protecting Freedom, Justice, and Democracy in the Spirit of Nonviolence365.”
Celebrants are asked to focus on their commitment to civil rights and nonviolent activism and encourage community service initiatives that promote racial equality and social justice across all communities.
The Rev. King was a humble man, pastor, scholar, philosopher, teacher of nonviolent resistance, father and husband. He was also one of the most gifted orators in the world.
His words of wisdom captured audiences across the racial divide and convinced a diverse population of freedom fighters to join him in making the case for unity, equality, and economic reciprocity in the United States.
This year, The Louisiana Weekly pays homage to King’s legacy by sharing with our readers, hopefully, teachers and students, the words of wisdom he left to the world. His words and philosophies are a timeless blueprint for activism and accomplishment, a force for unity of purpose and brotherhood and a way to inspire others and speak truth to power.
Like his parents and grandparents, King was taught the importance of education at an early age. He followed in his father and grandfather’s footsteps, who also graduated from Morehouse College. And he was a brilliant, high-achieving student.
King skipped the 9th and 11th grades and entered Morehouse College at age 15. At age 19, he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in sociology and entered the predominately white Crozer Theological Seminary. King was elected president of the student body by popular vote. After being elected by a nearly all-white student population, he worked through his educational institution to turn his classmates toward justice. In his first speech as president, he calls for action, saying:
“We have no alternative but to protest. For many years, we have shown amazing patience. We have sometimes given our white brothers the feeling that we liked the way we were being treated. But we come here tonight to be saved from that patience that makes us patient with anything less than freedom and justice.”
After earning his doctorate in systematic theology from Boston University at 26, King used the value of education as a key component in the movement toward racial freedom and justice.
King used his name to promote school integration. In 1958 and 1959, he served as the honorary chairman for two youth marches for integrated schools in Washington, D.C. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize when he was 35.
So here, our dear readers, are words of wisdom of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., which continue to echo through generations. Some may have been forgotten but are instructive and applicable today.
‘The Purpose of Education’
“It seems to me that education has a two-fold function to perform in the life of man and in society: the one is utility and the other is culture…
“Education must also train one for quick, resolute and effective thinking. To think incisively and to think for oneself is very difficult.
“We are prone to let our mental life become invaded by legions of half-truths, prejudices, and propaganda.
“At this point, I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose. A great majority of the so-called educated people do not think logically and scientifically.
“Even the press, the classroom, the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths. To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education. Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction.
“The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society. The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals.”
We fervently hope our readers share this with teachers, students and family members. At a time when our books are being banned, American history is being whitewashed and our struggle calls for perpetual activism, we can all benefit from King’s words of wisdom.
This article originally published in the January 13, 2025 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
