Presented with the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute
Only an irrelevant religion fails to be concerned about man’s economic well-being. Religion at its best realizes that the soul is crushed as long as the body is tortured with hunger pangs and harrowed with the need for shelter. —Martin Luther King, Jr. in Strength to Love
In January 2007, Stanford’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute published Advocate of the Social Gospel, volume VI of The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr. This unique thematic volume of the King Papers Project features King’s never-before published sermon file. In 1997, Mrs. Coretta Scott King granted the King Papers Project permission to examine personal papers kept in boxes in the basement of the family home. The most significant finding of this exploration was the discovery of files King used to prepare his sermons, a collection of documents King kept in his study. A battered cardboard box held over two hundred folders, containing material King used as the inspiration for his celebrated sermons, many of which are published in his 1963 book, Strength to Love.
Collectively these documents shed considerable light on the preaching and theological preparation of one of America’s most prominent religious leaders. They reveal that King’s concern about poverty, human rights, and social justice is clearly present in his earliest handwritten sermons, which convey a message of faith, hope, and love for the dispossessed.
To celebrate this publication and probe the meaning of Dr. King’s preaching, we present an interfaith roundtable that focuses on the relation of spiritual practice and social change. The roundtable is moderated by Rabbi Patricia Karlin-Neumann of Stanford’s Office for Religious Life. It includes representatives from a range of faith traditions.
PROF SUSANNAH HESCHELSusannah Heschel holds the Eli Black Chair
in Jewish Studies in the Department of Religion at Dartmouth College.
Her scholarship focuses on Jewish-Christian relations in Germany during
the 19th and 20th centuries, and her numerous publications include a
prize-winning monograph, Abraham Geiger and the Jewish Jesus (University of Chicago Press), which won a National Jewish Book Award, and a forthcoming book, The Aryan Jesus: Christians, Nazis and the Bible (Princeton University Press). Several years ago she edited a volume of her father's writings, Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity: Essays of Abraham Joshua Heschel, that includes a biographical introduction.
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~jewish/faculty/heschel.html
IMAM ZAID SHAKIR
Imam Zaid Shakir was born in Berkeley,
California and accepted Islam in 1977 while serving in the United
States Air Force. He obtained a BA with honors in international
relations at the American University in Washington, D.C. and an MA in
Political Science from Rutgers University. Spending time overseas in
Egypt, Syria, and Morocco, he studied Arabic as well as the traditional
Islamic sciences, including Islamic law, Quran, and Islamic
spirituality. Upon returning, he co-founded Masjid al-Islam in
Connecticut and taught Political Science at the Southern Connecticut
State University. As Imam of Masjid al-Islam from 1988 to 1994, he
initiated a community renewal and grassroots anti-drug effort in the
local neighborhood. In 2001, he graduated from Syria's prestigious Abu
Noor University and returned to continue his work with the Muslim
community in America. Since 2003, he has acted as a professor and
scholar-in-residence at the Zaytuna Institute in Hayward and currently
serves as a Board Advisor for MeccaOne Media.
http://www.zaytuna.org/teacherMore.asp?id=10
REV. DR. HENG SURE
Dharma Master Heng Sure was ordained as a
Buddhist monk in 1976. For the sake of world peace, he undertook an
over six hundred mile pilgrimage from South Pasadena to Ukiah,
repeatedly taking three steps and one bow to cover the entire journey.
In the entire two years taken to make the pilgrimage, he observed a
practice of total silence. Rev. Heng Sure has an M.A. in Oriental
Languages from UC Berkeley, and a Ph.D. from the Graduate Theological
Union in Berkeley. He serves as the Managing Director of the Berkeley
Buddhist Monastery and teaches at the Institute for World Religions and
Graduate Theological Union. He lectures on the Avatamsaka Sutra at the
Berkeley Buddhist Monastery every Saturday evening. He is actively
involved in interfaith dialogue and in the ongoing conversation between
spirituality and technology.
http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma9/findreligion.html
REV. DR. RAPHAEL WARNOCK
The Rev. Raphael G. Warnock serves as the
Senior Pastor of the Ebenezer Baptist Church, spiritual home of the
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Rev. Warnock graduated from Morehouse
College cum laude in 1991. He also holds a Master of Divinity degree
and a Ph.D. from Union Theological Seminary, New York City. While Rev.
Warnock’s work and activism have been local, his vision has always been
global. As a student at Morehouse College, he organized and served as
the keynote speaker at a Peace Vigil protesting George Bush’s
initiation of a War against Iraq on January 15th, the birthday of a
peacemaker. During the 1992 Democratic Convention in New York City, he
coordinated, under the auspices of Clergy and Laity Concerned (CALC)
and the Abyssinian Church, an alternative People’s Convention in memory
of Fannie Lou Hamer, the Mississippi sharecropper who told the nation
in 1968 she was “sick and tired of being sick and tired.” His
leadership and advocacy has been further demonstrated through his work
with The National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS. A 1993 recipient
of Union Theological Seminary’s coveted William H. Hudnut Preaching
Award, Rev. Warnock is sought after as a preacher and scholar who
demonstrates an abiding commitment to Christian ministry, disciplined
scholarship and diligent struggle on behalf of the oppressed.
http://online.historicebenezer.org/EbenezerPastorPages/pastorwarnock.aspx
RABBI PATRCIA KARLIN-NEUMANN (moderator)
Rabbi Patricia Karlin-Neumann came to
Stanford in 1996. She is the first university chaplain from a tradition
other than Christianity in Stanford's history. In 2001, she was
appointed Senior Associate Dean for Religious Life. She teaches and
lectures widely on Jewish feminism, rabbinical ethics, the relationship
between religion and education, and social justice.
http://www.stanford.edu/group/religiouslife/aboutKarlin-Neumann.html