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Tribute to Martin Luther King Jr.

Crowd fills up church

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By Joe Cisar, Sentinel Correspondent, January 15, 2007

Last updated: Monday, January 15, 2007 10:25 AM EST

As the interfaith worship service was ready to begin at 4 p.m., First United Church of Christ on North Pitt Street was full and people were still coming in the front doors.

Folding chairs were set up, and with a crowd estimated at more than 500, every available patch of space in both the loft and on the main floor, outside of the aisles, was taken.

Carlisle’s 18th annual commemoration honoring the life and legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. started about 10 minutes late. The theme was “We Are One, In Harmony.”

This year’s speaker, the Right Rev. Nathan Dwight Baxter, bishop of the Episcopal Church in Central Pennsylvania, said he lived in Carlisle in the mid- to late 1970s, but “This ain’t the Carlisle I remember,” implying both that he was impressed with the audience and that things had changed for the better in Carlisle over the past 30 years.

In his address, Baxter challenged those present to remember the past but also try to imagine what King would be doing today.

Bringing to mind King’s words, “I have a dream,” Baxter repeatedly referred to a common “moral vision” with regard to civil rights.

Diverse crowd joins in march

At 3 p.m. Sunday, about 150 people marched to the beat of the Wilson Middle School Drum Line down High Street to the Old Courthouse from First United Church of Christ at 30 N. Pitt Street. To the rear, about 10 young women from the Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church of Carlisle and nearly 20 male basketball players in warm-up suits from Carlisle High School were “just helping out, showing support for the community,” team member Adolph Comer said.

At the front of the line were several police escort vehicles and most of the speakers. Mayor Kirk Wilson noted not only that the number of march participants was increasing each year, but that the audience itself was “more diverse than it used to be.” In saying this he pointed to the groups of children and adults, clergy and athletes that were passing by. Contemplating the traffic, Wilson commented that more people need to take some time to think about this, “as I’m sure people in traffic are doing now,” he added.

As several mothers with strollers waited outside at the bottom of the stairs, speakers gave their own perspectives of Martin Luther King Jr. on the second floor of the Old Courthouse. Brenda Sampson, president of Greater Carlisle Chapter of the NAACP, recalled King’s words, “Darkness cannot put out darkness, only light can do that.”

Janeal Jaroh, representing the Cumberland County Historical Society, said that King spoke at Dickinson College on April 11, 1961.

The theme of his speech then was “segregation is death.”

“How long and costly will the funeral be?” — King’s question, cited by Jaroh, still hit home with the audience today.

Jaroh also indicated that Cumberland County in particular had much to overcome.

“Our county had slaves longer than any other county in Pennsylvania,” she said. Jaroh was optimistic, nonetheless, and hoped that Cumberland County will “be part of a positive change.”

Carlisle’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. commemoration was founded by members of the Minority Law Students Association of the Dickinson School of Law in January 1990.

“Do we each have a moral vision for the world, or do we have a vision of our own glory?” he asked the crowded church.

Baxter called King the greatest icon of civil rights but went on to cite several of the other names commonly associated with the civil rights struggle in the 1950s and ‘60s.

It was just as important to acknowledge those who had been forgotten, he said.

One of the “unsung heroes” he mentioned in detail was a 39-year-old Italian-American mother of five, who went down to Alabama to provide transportation for voter registration. Viola Liuzzo “wanted to be a part” of what was going on and joined in the Selma-to-Montgomery march. Said to have had a premonition of what was to happen, she was waylaid on the open road at night and murdered.

Baxter’s point was that civil rights was not a social or a political movement, but a spiritual movement.

At the other end of the spectrum, he noted that religion is not “just a cherry on the top of life’s success.”

If King were alive today, he asked, would he still be talking about Vietnam?

Baxter, who noted he is a Vietnam veteran himself, argued against those who criticized King for mixing civil rights with war protest. The common denominator — justice — was first and foremost in life, according to Baxter.

In making the connection, Baxter brought up one of King’s early seminary influences, the German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Author of “The Cost of Discipleship,” opposed the Nazi regime in Germany and was ultimately arrested for helping a group of jews escape the country. He was executed in a concentration camp in 1945.

In a similar vein, King was to later speak out against Vietnam as an unjust war.

Baxter said that the number of threats on King’s life increased dramatically after King started speaking out against the war. Many accused the civil rights leader of hurting the cause of his own people by putting attention on the war instead.

Baxter referred to one of King’s speeches, known as “Breaking the silence,” in which King asserted a connection between Vietnam and the struggle for civil rights.

“The build-up in Vietnam destroyed the gains made in civil rights,” Baxter said. “Civil rights are for everyone.”

Baxter believes that if King were alive today, he would be taking a stand against the war in Iraq, also as an unjust war.

Baxter concluded by conceding, “I know my words have upset some folks,” but again stressed the importance of a common moral vision and courage.

Sunday night’s service started off with song, prayer, scripture readings and musical numbers accompanied by piano, drums, and sometimes keyboard. With those in the back row occasionally straining their necks to see the directions of the leader, the choir performed with passion. Young people were the highlight of the event.

Maliek Taylor performed his memory verse despite devilishly earsplitting feedback from the microphone.

Several dozen kindergartners from Crestview Elementary, under the instruction of Ann Bean and Denise Stasyszyn, performed a couple of numbers that had the audience in tears of delight.

One involved a finale of waving small colored banners to the tune of “Beautiful Rainbow World.” Another was “We’re just one small voice singing out a song,” complete with hand gestures, such as holding up one finger for the number “one.”

During the offertory, a collection was taken for the Martin Luther King Jr. scholarship fund and essay contest. The 2007 winning essays were included in a 54-page booklet that was handed out at the door. This was the first year they ran out of booklets.