yes. I know it’s 2018. I’ve moved on, but I’m still a little salty…

I’m probably begging for trouble, but as I often tell friends, I’d have to borrow an F to give one. I am making my declaration. I may very well be “ghost” on social media tomorrow, the 2018 celebration of the life and legacy of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It’s been a week, and I am weary. Mother country has once again broken faith, broken my heart, and reminded me that I am the darker, unloved child. I need peace and restoration.

Before I go beautifully dark (because my dark has ALWAYS been beautiful), this…

I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin…we must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand, we are called to play the Good Samaritan on life’s roadside, but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho Road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life’s highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.

A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth….

These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression, and out of the wounds of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are rising up as never before. “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light.” We in the West must support these revolutions.

These are the words of Nobel laureate Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, in a speech entitled “A Time to Break Silence,” delivered 4 April 1967, one year before an assassin’s bullet violently silenced him forever. They might have been written this week. I am grateful that 50 years after his untimely death, he, my beloved father, and so many warriors of the Civil Rights era are not here to have their hearts broken by America, again.

Jill Scott says it best for me of this country and its twisted relationship with me and mine…

You say you mean good for me

But you don’t do it

You say you have a plan but you just don’t go thru with it

You say you know the way to go

And I should follow

But all of your empty promises

Leave me hollow

Please. Even if you mean well, do not use Dr. King’s words as blunt instruments to silence discourse. Do not hide behind phrases too often taken out of context. Silence is often the appropriate response. Everything does not require your well-intentioned opinion.

Finally, before you come to school me about my country, kindly endure a generational legacy of institutional oppression, of any sort, before typing a single word. Before you come to school me about my faith, know that I no longer claim the modern American definition of Christian…I’m just desperately trying to follow Jesus.

If you feel the need to do or say anything…”physician, heal thyself.” I’m good….although I may be a little salty….