January 15, 2017
I dedicate this post to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Today would have been his birthday. I kept these photos of Jung II-woo from 2011 for this occasion as they played with light in a really special way… to me that light is like Peace. Cr. On Photos.
The images you will see next are from a “Peace” project I did recently with my students. (I am an elementary Spanish teacher.) I told my students we would all make Peace doves (palomas de la paz) and write messages about peace on them and make them fly in our building! This way we would be sending continuous messages about Peace out to our world.
Last…but not least at all! These are some of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.s’ words of wisdom. How I wish we had a president like him!
Cr. Stanford’s The Martin Luther King, Jr.Research and Education Institute
“Nonviolence is absolute commitment to the way of love. Love is not emotional bash; it is not empty sentimentalism. It is the active outpouring of one’s whole being into the being of another.”
–Martin Luther King, Jr., 1957
“Through our scientific and technological genius, we have made of this world a neighborhood and yet we have not had the ethical commitment to make of it a brotherhood. But somehow, and in some way, we have got to do this. We must all learn to live together as brothers or we will all perish together as fools. We are tied together in the single garment of destiny, caught in an inescapable network of mutuality. And whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. For some strange reason I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. And you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the way God’s universe is made; this is the way it is structured.
John Donne caught it years ago and placed it in graphic terms: “No man is an island entire of itself. Every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.” And he goes on toward the end to say, “Any man’s death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind; therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.” We must see this, believe this, and live by it if we are to remain awake through a great revolution.”
–Martin Luther King, Jr., Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution, 2 June 1959
“More recently I have come to see the need for the method of nonviolence in international relations. Although I was not yet convinced of its efficacy in conflicts between nations, I felt that while war could never be a positive good, it could serve as a negative good by preventing the spread and growth of an evil force. War, horrible as it is, might be preferable to surrender to a totalitarian system. But now I believe that the potential destructiveness of modern weapons totally rules out the possibility of war ever again achieving a negative good. If we assume that mankind has a right to survive then we must find an alternative to war and destruction. “Don’t ever let anyone pull you so low as to hate them. We must use the weapon of love. We must have the compassion and understanding for those who hate us. We must realize so many people are taught to hate us that they are not totally responsible for their hate. But we stand in life at midnight; we are always on the threshold of a new dawn.”
–Martin Luther King, Jr., “Pilgrimage to Nonviolence,” Strength to Love, 13 April 1960
“At Oslo I suggested that the philosophy and strategy of non-violence become immediately a subject for study and serious experimentation in every field of human conflict, including relations between nations. This was not, I believe, an unrealistic suggestion. World peace through non-violent means is neither absurd nor unattainable. All other methods have failed. Thus we must begin anew. Non-violence is a good starting point. Those of us who believe in this method can be voices of reason, sanity and understanding amid the voices of violence, hatred and emotion. We can very well set a mood of peace out of which a system of peace can be built. Racial injustice around the world. Poverty. War. When man solves these three great problems he will have squared his moral progress with his scientific progress. And more importantly, he will have learned the practical art of living in harmony.”
–Martin Luther King, Jr., “Dreams of Brighter Tomorrows,” Ebony Magazine, March 1965
And of course I have to include this…
May our world be in Peace!!!
Fan 13
WITAT
I have been down lately. I got very sick from all the changes in temperature so and I have been voiceless with a chest congestion for the past 5 days. I’m a coughing machine. Seriously! I don’t know how big my lungs are but they can sure store stuff in there! Unfortunately, I had to miss a lot of school. You may think “Hey that’s fortunate! You get to be in your PJ’s all day!” And yes, I was thankful the first day, and the second! but being at home longer than that can get pretty depressing when you are not feeling well.
You become more aware of the news… I tried to stay away from the really awful stuff but it’s not easy…they really want to show the miserable stuff! Talking about the news I went to see “The Post.” It was a great movie! It was about the position of the press when it has to go against the government! Directed by Steven Spielberg, with Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks and music by no other than…John Williams at 85 years of age! You can’t really get a bad movie with this formula! They are all so great in what they do!
And I found a lot on the coming Winter Olympics in Pyeong Chang, got the App… It was fun watching the relay of the torch going through Seoul yesterday. I love how the South Koreans are embracing this Olympics amid such a dangerous political climate, and I really wish this love spreads into North Korea and the rest of the world… please keep our world in Peace dear “leaders”!!!
This video is really cool: