God Squad: Celebrating King and his nonviolence credo

Holidays are supposed to have rituals and beliefs. Having just traversed the winter religious holidays of Hanukkah and Christmas and the secular holidays of Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, we prepare this coming Monday for a holiday that has no agreed-upon rituals, and that is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. This saddens me because I so admired Dr. King and so want this day to have a deeper significance than just a day with no postal delivery.

I have no idea what rituals might eventually grow around this day of memorial for the last great American leader, but I do have a strong idea about what belief we should lift up in his memory. It is the belief in nonviolence.

The greatest support for nonviolence comes from the Eastern religions of Buddhism and Hinduism, whose doctrine of ahimsa was embraced by Gandhi and King as a foundational spiritual and political value. As the Buddha taught, “The only way that wrath can be conquered is by non-wrath.”

There is also a proof text in the Christian Testament in the famous passage about turning the other cheek in Matthew 5:38-48: “But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.”

As King developed his own version of nonviolence, there were six main principles:

Principle one: Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people. It is active nonviolent resistance to evil. It is aggressive spiritually, mentally and emotionally.

Principle two: Nonviolence seeks to win friendship and understanding. The result of nonviolence is redemption and reconciliation. The purpose of nonviolence is the creation of the Beloved Community.

Principle three: Nonviolence seeks to defeat injustice, not people. Nonviolence recognizes that evildoers are also victims and are not evil people. The nonviolent resister seeks to defeat evil, not people.

Principle four: Nonviolence holds that suffering can educate and transform. Nonviolence accepts suffering without retaliation.

Principle five: Nonviolence chooses love instead of hate. Nonviolence resists violence of the spirit as well as the body. Nonviolent love is spontaneous, unmotivated, unselfish and creative.

Principle six: Nonviolence believes that the universe is on the side of justice. The nonviolent resister has deep faith that justice will eventually win.

I urge you to visit the King Center website (thekingcenter.org) for a list of this year’s programs and services. The work of deepening this holiday for all Americans is being done there.

May God receive his soul among the holy and the righteous.