Honor King, but don’t forget his work

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was an eloquent and thoughtful speaker. Indeed, the world is blessed that his words resonate today as they did more than 50 years ago, challenging us to uphold the values of our shared humanity.

But he was about more than just words. Dr. King was also a man of action — whether crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., to fight for voting rights or sharing his dream before hundreds of thousands during the Poor People’s March on Washington. Or negotiating with presidents and power brokers for fairness and equal opportunity. He will always be remembered for his place on the front lines of history, working to change our nation for the better by both his words and deeds Dr. King died just as he lived, striving to fix the inequities of the day — inequities that remain with us. In this climate of mean-spiritedness, his words bring us comfort.

Sadly, on this day that we mark the 50th anniversary of his death, no one should bypass the work that still needs to be done by simply finding solace in his words. Too much of what he gave his life to achieve remains undone. His exquisite voice and powerful words of wisdom will never be silenced and neither should his life’s work

The income inequality that he fought against, speaking before Memphis sanitation workers the day before he died, remains a persistent scourge for our people. Fifty years later, many of the children he hoped would inherit a color-blind society live in poverty, a relentless backpedal crushing hope for future generations. And it is beyond shameless that we are living in a society where the heartless fate of our Dreamers, children who only know America as their home, are held hostage to financing a wall. We need to fight for their dream as Dr. King would.

Boston prides itself for having a special relationship with Dr. King, who as a young man came here to earn his degree in theology at Boston University. Many still feel his presence when he preached at Roxbury’s historic Twelfth Baptist Church. And of course, here is where he met his lifelong partner, Coretta Scott.

Years later, he would come back to challenge the Boston he loved and called his second home. His words on Boston Common in 1965 called out the disgrace of rampant housing discrimination, pointing out the inequities as a challenge for a “new Boston.” Today getting to his new Boston on a few fronts remains a work in progress.

Boston is often defined by the tumultuous desegregation of our schools. Despite recommendations more than 25 years ago that the system would benefit from hiring more teachers of color, it is disheartening and offensive that some refuse to see the importance and value of having more teachers of color in a school system that is majority minority.

On this day of reflection, and despite the work ahead, I do see hope for the future. I see it in the work of the NAACP with its long history of working in partnership with Dr. King and in the work of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. Both organizations unapologetically follow Dr. King’s creed by calling out: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

On the horizon I also hear words and a call to action spearheaded by a King of another generation. Nine-year-old Yolanda Renee King, granddaughter of MLK, proclaimed at the recent March for Our Lives Rally against gun violence that she too had a dream, that enough is enough. Let us honor the legacy of this man of peace and purpose by recommitting ourselves to working for what he stood for.