A bit from "Letter from Birmingam City Jail" by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Here are some words from King that have resonated with me for years, perhaps since I first felt a deep disappointment with the church. It has been 11 years. On the newly celebrated MLK holiday in 1998 I decided to pick up and read "A Testament of Hope" (the Essential writings and speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr.). I read it just about cover to cover and could not put it down. His courage to choose the way of Jesus and to preach love in the midst of being jailed, stabbed, threatened, and the like gave me great courage to do the same. This was one of the most difficult periods of my ministry. The church was causing me great disappointment and I found in King a friend on the journey.

"But despite these notable exceptions I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church. I do not say that as one of the negative critics who can always find something wrong with the church. I say it as a minister of the gospel, who loves the church; who was nurtured in its bosom; who has been sustained by its spiritual blessings and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen...So here we are moving toward the exit of the twentieth century with a religious community largely adjusted to the status quo, standing as a taillight behind other community agencies rather than a headlight leading men to higher level of justice...Yes, these questions are still in my mind. In deep disappointment, I have wept over the laxity of the church. But be assured that my tears have been tears of love. Yes, I love the church; I love her sacred walls. How could I do otherwise? I am in the rather unique position of being the son, and the grandson and the great grandson of preachers. Yes, I see the church as the body of Christ. But, OH! How we have blemished and scarred that body through social neglect and fear of being nonconformists. There was a time when the church was very powerful. It was during that period when the early Christians rejoiced when they were deemed worthy to suffer for what they believed. In those days the churches were not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society...If the church of today does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authentic ring, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century."