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Lecture doesn't do justice to MLK
By Kristin Van Heukelem
Perspectives Co-Editor
FILE PHOTO
Martin Luther King Jr. gives an impassioned speech, unlike the one given at the January Series on Monday.
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I laughed out loud during the January Series lecture on Monday, but it wasn’t because the speaker told a joke. It was because, in a perfect moment, a resounding snore rose up from across the Fine Arts Center auditorium. The speaker, James Skillen, was delivering a speech titled “Creative Justice” and I, like many others, had been shifting around to keep myself awake. Unfortunately, the speech did not exhibit creativity (in its delivery or its discussion of justice) nor did it give the listeners much to think of in terms of social justice in contemporary society (much less inspire them to action). Instead it amounted to a dry history lecture on slavery, abolition and civil rights with some emphasis on the role of the church.
Upon entering the auditorium that day, I was struck by the low attendance to this lecture in comparison to other ones I had attended. I was saddened to see that on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, of all days, there were so few people there to hear this lecture, which was even subtitled “A Celebration of Martin Luther King Jr.” Thoughts of frustration about the whitewashed world in which we live at Calvin and the apathy of people in the community about these issues went through my mind. But while these things still bother me, had I known what that lecture would be like, I wouldn’t have filled a seat either.
I guess I had hoped that someone who works for the Center for Public Justice in Washington, D.C. would have some thought-provoking things to say about public justice. I know that it is something I need to hear more about, and it seemed an appropriate way to honor the day. Instead I heard a history lesson I’ve heard a thousand times, several reminders that we’re all made in God’s image, and a litany of names of important black musicians, orators, inventors, etc. It was probably unintentional, but an unfortunately patronizing message that “black people are talented and creative and contribute to society, so we should treat them as equals” was conveyed as Skillen touted the music of Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong.
While he was venerated and quoted in this lecture, Martin Luther King Jr. was not properly commemorated, nor were his ideals adequately communicated. And I suppose that’s what I was hoping for. I suppose I was hoping to be kept awake by passion for justice, by admonition or instruction, or at least by information. Perhaps I had wrong expectations entering the lecture. And perhaps in my drowsiness I did not truly hear all the content of Skillen’s speech. But I wanted something to bring life to the enduring, longing, prophetic words of King. Instead, the lecture ended with a bland call to “join the march,” followed by two seconds of silence while the audience slowly realized that that was supposed to be a dramatic end and broke into tentative applause.
And yet it made me think. My frustration comes from the part of me that still hears passion and the truth in King’s cries: “I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.”
Our community needs to listen to King's words. The auditorium should have been packed by a disappointed audience—by a people longing for justice and the revelation of the glory of the Lord.
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