Support for gay marriage, stem cell research part of Santa Monica MLK service
WILSHIRE-MONTANA — There is a difference between optimism and hope, and it is hope alone that will carry us forward in the direction of justice.
That was the message delivered Monday by prominent local educator Paul Cummins to several hundred Santa Monicans and others gathered to pray, sing and remember civil rights champion Martin Luther King, Jr., born in 1929 and killed 39 years later.
Optimism is important because it reveals good intentions, said Cummins, founder of Crossroads and New Roads schools in Santa Monica. But in hope is a commitment to action, to working hard until equality and justice are reality, he added.
“Where is the outrage?” demanded Cummins, saying economic divides have widened since MLK’s assassination, while oppression continues to thrive. “We need to register our outrage and speak out where we see injustice The 20th annual interfaith MLK service, sponsored by The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Westside Coalition and held at the First United Methodist Church on 11th Street, also featured song from the John Adams Middle School Norsemen Honor Choir and the Santa Monica College Emeritus College Gospel Choir. Additionally, scholarships were presented to Santa Monica students Hector Ornelas and Terra Elijah, based on essays they penned about MLK.
Several community leaders attended the annual event, including City Manager Susan McCarthy, Santa Monica Police Department Chief James T. Butts, Jr., City Councilman Richard Bloom, superintendent of schools John Deasy, school board member Maria Leon-Vazquez, acting SMC president Tom Donner, SMC trustee Dorothy Ehrhart-Morrison and Nat Trives, chairman of the Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce.
Standing at a podium on-stage, backed by a black-and-white painting of King speaking with furled brow, Clyde Smith of the MLK, Jr. Westside Coalition reminded listeners that King’s birthday was not declared a national holiday for several decades after his 1968 death. It took years of lobbying and some six million signatures, presented to the U.S. House of Representatives by King’s wife, Coretta Scott, and musician Stevie Wonder, before the national holiday was formally established in 1983.
Wonder, Smith noted, was a musical genius. His taking the lead in pushing for a national holiday to remember the great orator and civil rights champion was fitting, Smith continued, as King had hoped to be remembered as a “drum major for justice.”
Cummins and other religious leaders who spoke during the Monday morning service called upon listeners to continue in the quest for racial equality, and urged them to work diligently towards several other goals: To house the homeless, to provide quality education and healthcare for all, to pay workers a real living wage.
Rabbi Neil-Commess Daniels from Beth Shir Sholom Temple added legalizing gay marriage and pushing forward with stem cell research to those goals.
“And of course, the list could go on and on,” Daniels said, calling each an injustice and a disaster much the same as the Dec. 26 Indian Ocean tsunami that killed more than 150,000. “There is no need to try to imagine what Dr. King’s agenda would be today. We know. It is all the natural disasters around us we have wrought.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on January 18, 2005. Read the original PDF.