East Hawaii will celebrate the values of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with a program starting 2 p.m. today at Mooheau Park Bandstand in downtown Hilo.
East Hawaii will celebrate the values of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with a program starting 2 p.m. today at Mooheau Park Bandstand in downtown Hilo.
The free public event celebrates the birthday of the Nobel Peace Laureate and America’s preeminent spokesman for nonviolent civil disobedience during the Civil Rights Movement, who was assassinated April 4, 1968, in Memphis, a day after his “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech.
The Rev. Dr. William Knight, pastor of the Open Arms Metropolitan Community Church in Pahoa, is the event’s emcee. Knight, who is originally from Cleveland, said during his youth, he met members of the Little Rock Nine, a group of African-American students who in 1957 integrated Little Rock Central High School after being initially prevented from doing so by Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus.
“During our conversation, they talked about how they had met and been impressed and inspired by Dr. King,” Knight said Friday. “That began an awareness of his work, an awareness of his outreach and his compassion for human beings. I wasn’t able to attend the March on Washington because I was in the service at the time. But I have been a follower of his work and a follower of his teaching ever since that point.”
Though Knight was unable to attend the 1963 march where Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech was delivered, he reflected on perhaps the speech’s most famous passage: “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”
“I remember the night that President Obama was elected hearing those words echo in my heart, and looking forward with just incredible anticipation that we had just turned a corner, and our ability as a nation to reach beyond the constricts and the confines of sheer racial animosity. I thought we had turned that corner,” Knight said. “Unfortunately, we have unleashed what has previously been a hidden wellspring of animosity and frustration and anger. And that has shown up in ways that are just heartbreaking — attacks on schoolchildren, attacks on churches, attacks on mosques, attacks on synagogues. It’s just been a complete reversal of everything that Dr. King stood for and everything that he marched for and everything that he spoke so eloquently about.”
“But he also said that we must not give out and we must not give in. And so I hold to that.”
Dr. King would have been 88 years old on Sunday (Jan. 15), but the day in his honor is held on the third Monday each January, and it is a federal, state, county and bank holiday.
In addition to Dr. Knight and his Open Arms Metropolitan Community Church Singers, presenters will include the Rev. Eric Anderson of the Church of the Holy Cross UCC, poet Michele Dalton, the Hamakua group Alternative Medicine, Tim Vandeveer and Phil Barnes of the Democratic Party of Hawaii, Jim Albertini and the Malu ‘Aina Folk Singers, Tomas Belsky, and the Monday Afternoon Hot Pond Jammers, among others.
There will be a collection box for the Hawaii Island Food Bank on site. There will also be a contest for original artwork in the form of posters and banners best reflective of Dr. King’s values, with age categories for under 12 and 12 and older. Those wanting to enter a poster or banner are asked to sign up at the bandstand beginning at 1 p.m. The audience will pick the winners.
Organizers are also encouraging sign waving, campaign-style, along Kamehameha Avenue by Mooheau Park before and after the program.
Anyone who wants to speak, share a story, sing, or perform, is asked to call 965-8945 to be included on the program. All types of music are encouraged, and organizers hope the latter part of the program will become a jam session.
“Dr. King said everyone can make a difference. Everyone can do something. … Everybody can be great because everybody can serve,” Knight said. “And his message was your ability to serve your community, to serve your nation was not restricted to your education or … your economic situation. Your ability to serve comes from your heart. If your heart is full of grace and your soul is full of love, your ability to serve and help create a more perfect union is something that all of us can do.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.