“Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution”
On Monday, January 17, 2022, at 12:15pm online, The Maine Council of Churches and The BTS Center will host a public reading of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s sermon “Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution.” This event will also include a reading of a new poem by Portland’s Poet Laureate Maya Williams commissioned for the occasion. Click here to register
Delivered in March of 1968 at Washington National Cathedral, his sermon is still prophetic over a half-century later, as we continue to struggle with the injustices of racism, war, poverty, and now also climate change and a global pandemic.
In his sermon, Dr. King writes: “…one of the great liabilities of life is that all too many people find themselves living amid a great period of social change, and yet they fail to develop the new attitudes, the new mental responses, that the new situation demands. They end up sleeping through a revolution.” With all that demands our attention in the world today, Dr. King’s words point to a powerful truth – it is easier to sleep through a revolution than to be an active, thoughtful, engaged participant in the ongoing work of justice.
We hope that you will join us for this public reading, reflection, and celebration of Dr. King’s message that will include multiple voices, contemplative music, and space for reflection.
