Talking It Over

I was 14 years old the first time I saw Martin Luther King Jr. It was 1962, and my church youth group went to hear him speak at Orchestra Hall in Chicago. When he finished, we waited in the auditorium until everyone was gone, just so we could shake his hand.

We were teen-agers living in a secure middle-class neighborhood that was virtually all-white. But even from that suburban cocoon, I could not mistake his passion and conviction. Here was a man who had weathered persecution and harassment to stand up for what he believed was right: racial tolerance, social justice and non-violent change.

On every continent, ordinary people are heeding Dr. King's message that "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Whether they are residents of a Moslem town in Central Bosnia who have pledged to share their harvest with their Croat neighbors or mothers in northern Ireland who have organized their neighborhoods to help end a quarter-century of sectarian violence, they are refusing to give in to ancient grudges and traditions of hate.

Take a look at Billings, Mont., where citizens closed ranks against purveyors of bigotry when a series of hate crimes scarred their community.

It started when headstones at a Jewish cemetery were desecrated in the fall of 1993. Then, parishioners at a black church were harassed by three white men during a service. A few weeks later, a Native American woman found swastikas and epithets spray-painted on her house. Soon afterward, a beer bottle smashed through a glass door at the house of the local symphony director, who had immigrated from Israel.

One incident in particular struck a nerve. A cinder block was hurled through the bedroom window of a 5-year-old boy, where a menorah had been placed to celebrate the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. The boy was not hurt. His bed was covered with shattered glass.

The community of Billings mobilized as if every citizen's rights had been violated. Members of the painters union volunteered their time to paint over the graffiti. Some local churchgoers wore Stars of David, and a group of concerned citizens held a vigil across the street from the local synagogue.

The Billings Gazette printed a full-page picture of a menorah, which thousands of non-Jewish residents clipped out and pasted in their windows in a show of solidarity for their Jewish neighbors.

A Catholic high school put up a sign saying "Happy Hanukkah to our Jewish Friends." And a local sporting goods store displayed a message that said: "Not in Our Town."

Like Dr. King, the people of Billings had the power to imagine what it is like to be in someone else's shoes.

For children today, who are growing up at a time of new cultural tensions and divisions, the King message of compassion, unity and tolerance is especially urgent.

The power of imagination shines most brightly in children and young people. Without the idealism of youth, we would never have had a civil rights movement. Inspired civil rights workers were often in their teens and early 20s. Martin Luther King himself was a young man when called to a life of service.

One way we can spark imagination in our children is to read stories to them about people who stand up for their convictions. In hearing accounts of other people's lives, children learn that each of us can make a difference in our world.

In "A Call to Character," Colin Greer and Herbert Kohl have pulled together a collection of stories, including one by Ossie Davis called "Just Like Martin," in which a 14-year-old not only commits himself to the non-violent civil rights struggle but wins his father's reluctant admiration and support for doing it. In the end, they march together, Daddy coming to respect his son's sense of responsibility and his courage against the billy clubs he will face.

There is also a story by the renowned scholar and theologian Rabbi A.J. Heschel, an ally of Dr. King during the civil rights movement. He remembers how, as a 7-year-old boy, he heard the Old Testament tale of Isaac's narrow escape from sacrifice.

"Supposing the angel had come too late?" he cried.

"An angel cannot come late," his teacher comforted him.

How many times in our own lives do we put off helping others, either out of a lack of empathy or a failure to understand their situation?

Martin Luther King was right, if only we would hear his message. "I've decided to stick with love," he once said. "Hate is too great a burden to bear."

COPYRIGHT 1996 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

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