The colorful, punchy USA TODAY
always offers a pulse of the country – a worthwhile guilty pleasure about once
a month, usually when I’m on the road.
Having spent three days sequestered
in the world of team handball, and one night unexpectedly stranded in Dallas,
my perusal of this morning’s paper reminds me this is Martin Luther King Day,
that the Inauguration is tomorrow – and that America, along with many of us as
individuals, is at a unique precipice of self-examination.
Here are some clips that seemed to
portray this moment from today’s paper:
Os Guinness, “Faith and
Inauguration” editorial:
“A terrible questions stalks our
land, even at this moment of promise and hope: Is there any principle left by
which the United States can transcend the present bitterness and divisions over
religious in public life and live up to the promise of the American experiment?
Obama… demonstrates civility in
action: the ability to respect and listen to people of profound differences,
and to work with them on issues of importance for the common good. Uniquely, perhaps, he would be capable
of delivering the Gettysburg Address of the American culture wars…
What our nation requires is a
statesman’s address by the “President of all Americans” to Americans of all
faiths and no faith. In short,
what is needed is a challenge to the entire nation – activists, pundits and
bloggers included – to live up to the promise of the American experiment in
light of the culture wars ant home and the sectarian strife around the
world. What we need is a rebirth
of a tough-minded civility that is a genuine habit of the heart, and valued as
a necessity in a democracy as well as a virtue in a republic.” (italics mine)
“Where King preached, Obama’s
the Word” cover story:
“The dean of Washington National
Cathedral calls it ‘one of those grace notes of history’ – the confluence,
today and Tuesday, of Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Barack Obama’s
Inauguration Day.
Obama told USA TODAY last week he
wasn’t sure exactly how King’s words would be reflected in his own speech
Tuesday “because I’m such a student of his speeches and his writings that
they’re probably burned into my consciousness.” But, he added, ‘certainly my
presence is going to reflect him, because if it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t be
standing there.’”
Raphael Warnock, speaking as King’s
successor as senior pastor at America’s Freedom Church, Atlanta’s Ebenezer
Baptist:
(Warnock) drew a historical line
from the biblical figure of Joseph to King to Obama – all dreamers who saw
something better for their people…
“Joesph was a dreamer. And so his
brothers tried to kill him. And don’t you know that’s what we do to dreamers.
We try to destroy dreamers… And yet, come Tuesday we will have sitting in the
Oval Office a dreamer in chief… It’s been a long time coming.”
“At Ebenezer, King spoke of tribulations, how he’d
like to be remembered.” page A2
Excerpts from two of Martin Luther
King Jr.’s final sermons before he was slain on April 4, 1968.
“Unfulfilled Dreams” – March 3,
1968
“It will be dark sometimes, and it
will be dismal and trying, and tribulations will come. But if you have faith in the God that
I’m talking about this morning, it doesn’t matter. For you can stand up amid the storms. And I say it to you out of experience…
yes, I’ve seen the lightning flash. I’ve heard the thunder roll. I’ve felt the sin-breakers dashing,
trying to conquer my soul. But I heard the voice of Jesus, saying still to
fight on. He promised never to
leave me, never to leave me alone. No, never alone.”
“The Drum Major Instinct – Feb.
4, 1968
“Every now and then I think about
my own death and I think about my own funeral. And I don’t think of it in a morbid sense. And every now and then I ask myself,
‘What is it that I would want said?’….
... If you want to say that I was a
drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major
for righteousness. And all of the
other shallow things will not matter.
I won’t have any money to leave behind. I won’t have the fine and
luxurious things of life to leave behind.
But I just want to leave a committed life behind. And that’s all I want
to say.”
And that’s all I want to write
today. Are we drum majors? Are we band members? Are we committed? Here's the World-Renowned Grambling Tiger Marching Band preparing for tomorrow's Inauguration from USA TODAY:
