Martin We Hardly Knew You!

It will soon be 50 years ago to the minute that Martin Luther King, Jr was taken down by an assassin's bullet. Memories fade and facts are sometimes changed by well intentioned memory keepers. There are those who hold the truth and others who think they hold the truth.

It is certainly not a bad thing that Martin Luther King, Jr has become a hero to so many. He has become a person to emulate and believe in. He is both real and a symbol to many in the black and white communities. All of this is good.

But 50 years later we have to understand that many really hardly knew him or what he stood for. Few have understood his faith, his nonviolence, and how both became connected to poverty, poor people and social action. In addition, the revisionists make us think all was well in the end when it never really was. Martin Luther King, Jr was hated by whites in the north and the south. He was assassinated by a bullet and gun fed by hate. Martin Luther King, Jr was hated before he came out against the war in Vietnam. He was pressed hard by the left and the right.

I had the privalige of seeing and hearing Martin Luther King, Jr once while I was in Selma many years ago. It was by no means a close or personal meeting. No, it was listening with hundreds of others outside of Brown Chapel, looking to a leader who wasn't afraid to talk about the hate and his fears. I watched him walk to the front of a crowd confronting more symbols and weapons of hate carried by white men in uniforms. This was the uppity black communist who was followed and harassed by the FBI and others in the establishment.

His faith was about politics. He believed in the Jesus who walked the streets, who reached out to the beggars and the unclean. The Jesus who knew that economics was behind someones struggle with injustice. Martin knew that poor men fought rich men's wars, always. He knew that some people looked up and others looked down on those who suffered. He also knew the fear some people lived under because he lived there too.

Like all men and women, Martin Luther King, Jr grew and evolved. He was speaking out in the north, He was speaking out about Vietnam and war, he was speaking out about poverty and poor wages. And let's be real clear. It wasn't going over well and he knew it. But sadly, his life was cut short in Memphis that night 50 years ago. He had so much more to say. More to say that would make many squirm and more to say that would anger those in power. And then he was gone and over the years love for him grew. Yes, that's good but we all need to know the fact is - Martin we hardly knew you.