Thoughts from MLK, Jr. Day at Goshen College

On Monday January 16, 2012, Goshen College held its annual MLK,Jr. Study Day. One of the events was a public interview with Dr. Vincent Harding, a historian and colleague of Dr. King. Dr. Harding has been a visitor at Goshen College numerous times. He is a former Mennonite pastor and knows Mennonites and our campus well.

Photo is from pilgrimpathways.wordpress.com

He was asked to speak about our goal of building a multicultural community. Some of this things he said are relevant to our study and discussion of Latino Literature. Below I have paraphrased part of the conversation from my notes:

Q: What does it mean to have an intercultural campus?

VH: A community in which we are encouraged to share our uniqueness. A community built of many communities whose goal is to create something new together.

Q: Will opening too wide to others cause us to lose our (Mennonite) identity?

VH: Identity is not of much value to us when we are grasping onto it too tightly, but rather when we use it as a basis for engaging others. Live is about metamorphosis. If the caterpillar refused to be anything but a caterpillar, it would lose its chance to fly.

Q: What is your definition of servant leadership?

VH: Leadership is something that is always in process of developing. King became a pastor and a Ph.D. to be a "leader," but he only truly began to lead when he began listening to the people who shared his vision and listening to how they wanted to be led.

Harding ended by answering several questions he had been asked earlier, on paper.

He emphasized the role of women in the Civil Rights movement, a vital component that is too often overlooked on MLK,Jr. Day.

He insisted that Christians cannot take Jesus seriously without looking for society's outcasts and standing by their side.

And he spoke of freedom as a process that we live into. He quoted a South African he has once heard on the radio say, "I am a citizen of a country that does not yet exist." He adapted this saying to inspired us with the vision that "We are citizens of a country that we are still in the process of creating."

The March on Washington. Photo found on desertpeace.wordpress.com