At King breakfast, a call to pick up unfulfilled dream

The Enterprise

By Rick Boyd

On March 3, 1968, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. preached about unfulfilled dreams. Five years earlier, he had galvanized the civil rights movement, and much of nation, with his "I Have a Dream" speech.

Barely a month later, King was assassinated.

On Monday, Jan. 18, those gathered at St. Mary's College of Maryland for the 12th annual prayer breakfast celebrating King's legacy were called on to carry on his work, and as the Rev. Michael Barber of Dominion Apostolic Ministries International said in his invocation, "ignite a new generation of dreamers."

The remarks of those who spoke at the breakfast acknowledged that the dream King outlined in 1963 was still not the reality in 2016. Many of the speakers also sounded a call to invest in young people to help fulfill it.

It's true that the nation elected its first African-American president in 2008, Tuajuanda Jordan, president of St. Mary's College, said Monday. But as Barack Obama nears the end of his second term, "have things gotten worse during his tenure?" Jordan asked. "I think so."

She urged those at the breakfast to help move St. Mary's County, the state and the nation forward because "we are not on a good path right now."

It was Maj. Gen. Linda Singh, adjutant general of Maryland, who spoke Monday morning of King's sermon about unfulfilled dreams shortly before his death.

King talked of a biblical passage in the eighth chapter of the first book of Kings, about David's plan to build a temple to God, a goal that went unrealized.

"Your dream will not be fulfilled," King said of God's message to David. "The majestic hopes that guided your days will not be carried out ... You had the desire to do it; you had the intention to do it; you tried to do it; you started to do it. And I bless you for having the desire and the intention in your heart. It is well that it was within thine heart."

"We're at a point now where we have a lot of unfulfilled dreams," said Singh, the breakfast's keynote speaker. "Are we going to leave those dreams unfulfilled? Are we going to speak up?"

The words in King's "I Have a Dream" speech resonated with her from the time she was very young, Singh said. "I had a dream to be somebody."

She called on those attending the breakfast to "respect people for who they are, because I had people who did not respect me."

Singh left home at 16 after she was sexually molested, she said. She was homeless and dropped out of high school. "I gave someone else the power to say, ‘You're not going to be somebody,'" she said.

"If I listened to every negative thing that people told me," she said, "I wouldn't be where I am today."

When she first put on a uniform at the age of 17, she said, "I had not clue where it was going to lead." As adjutant general of Maryland, Singh is responsible for the daily operation of the Maryland Military Department, which includes the Maryland Army National Guard, Maryland Air National Guard, Maryland Emergency Management Agency and Maryland Defense Force.

Her education now includes a bachelor's degree, two master's degrees and other advanced studies. "This is the only country in the world where I would be able to do that," she said.

"Let's step up and ... help our children find out what it means to have good values," she said as she called for adults to "put some time and energy in our young."

Tell them "it is OK to be different," she said, adding that she could not "do what I do if I was the same as everyone else."

The disturbances in Baltimore last summer after the death of a young black man detained by police were not just about Freddie Gray, she said. "Since 1968, have we moved the ball forward for that community? ... I would say no. We have to look at communities and give them hope.

"Are you going to let honor and duty ... to our children go untouched?" she asked, and called on the audience to think about what Martin Luther King Day means. "Let's make it every single day we go out to give" to communities.

Earlier, Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md., 5th), sounded a similar theme. He encouraged people to be invigorated by King's message and "continue the mission he left for us on this earth" and to see the call to service as "a recognition of daily responsibility."

Janice Walthour, first vice president of the St. Mary's County chapter of the NAACP, noted that the chapter was formed on Jan. 7, 1946. "After 70 years we are still here — God kept us here," she said, as she called for others to join in the NAACP's work to address health inequalities, income disparity and achievement gaps in schools in St. Mary's.

After the First Missionary Baptist Youth Choir sang, and before the children of Spring Ridge Middle School Rhythm Club performed, Jordan, the college's president, spoke briefly about the optimism she felt during a performance last year of "Crossroads: On Common Ground," which she said chronicled where the college and St. Mary's County had been and where it was now based on conversations among students.

"They have hope, so we must have hope as well," Jordan said.

Monologues developed that explore student understandings of race, ethnicity and identity will be performed later this month on campus. Demilade Adebayo, treasurer of the Black Student Union at St. Mary's College, said after the breakfast that the "Common Ground" was originally performed on campus in the 1990s, and was modified by the current cast. That process, she said was "very honest and inspiring."

Because they were speaking during the creation of art, Adebayo said, it was easier for students to talk openly and express their feelings and concerns.

A single evening performance of "Speaking of Race," which is based on the "Common Ground" discussions, is scheduled in the Bruce Davis Theater in Montgomery Hall, on Thursday, Jan. 28, starting at 8 p.m. The performance is free and open to the public.