CLICK HERE to see an icon of Martin Luther King, Jr. by Br. Robert Lentz, OFM
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assasinated on this date in 1968. Forty years later, his life and words still inspire a world that longs for peace, nonviolent social change, and an end to racism.
The following quote from one of his stirring sermons in 1967 speaks profoundly and prophetically about peace and solidarity in a globalized world. . . . .
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It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated.
We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. We are made to live together because of the interrelated structure of reality.
Did you ever stop to think that you can't leave for your job in the morning without being dependent on most of the world? You get up in the morning and go to the bathroom and reach over for the sponge, and that's handed to you by a Pacific islander. You reach for a bar of soap, and that's given to you at the hands of a Frenchman. And then you go into the kitchen to drink your coffee for the morning, and that's poured into your cup by a South American. And maybe you want tea: that's poured into your cup by a Chinese. Or maybe you're desirous of having cocoa for breakfast, and that's poured into your cup by a West African. And then you reach over for your toast, and that's given to you at the hands of an English-speaking farmer, not to mention the baker. And before you finish eating breakfast in the morning, you've depended on more than half of the world.
This is the way our universe is structured, this is its interrelated quality. We aren't going to have peace on earth until we recognize this basic fact of the interrelated structure of all reality.
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The entire text of Dr. King's 1967 Christmas Sermon on Peace
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