A friend included this quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. in a vigil notice,"There are some things in our society and in our world to which I'm proud to be maladjusted, to which I call upon all people of good will to be maladjusted, until the good society is realized...I never intend to adjust myself to the madness...and the self-defeating effects of physical violence."
Rev. King was so committed to the principal of non-violence that, in spite of threats to his life and family, he never carried a gun or allowed his bodyguards to carry a gun. Sometimes I wonder if we have so associated Rev. King with the civil rights movement that we have forgotten his equally strong commitment to non-violence. He never wavered in his conviction that non-violence was the path God wants us to follow. Dr. King believed that justice could not be served through violence.
What does this commitment to non-violence say to us today? 32 Americans are murdered each day by guns and it hardly makes the news. Even a catastrophic shooting like that at Northwestern Illinois University or Virginia Tech causes no great changes in our gun laws. Are we acquiesing to a society that takes such violence for granted?
If so, I will stand with Dr. King and say I'm proud to be maladjusted.
