Repent, Resist & Reform

On April 7, 2018, an event took place to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at Taylor Memorial United Methodist Church in Oakland, California. Many Saint Mary’s

Rev. Hubert Ivery and Mary Lim-Lampe presenting on the Challenges of Community Organizing

College students attended the event in relation to our Racism in US Politics class, in partnership with Genesis.The event focused on building the beloved community in the face of the three evils, Militarism, Racism, and Materialism. Speakers of all different professional titles came together to discuss issues and elaborate on their area of specialty, while leaving many impactful and powerful messages on the audience.

Rev. Staci Current, District Superintendent for Bay District, gave an amazing worship session on maintaining three kinds of love in the face of adversity: repent, resist, and reform. The importance of REPENTANCE was to not only apologize once for a bad action, but to live a life of constant repentance and reconciliation to maintain inner peace with ourselves and those around us. The second was to RESIST all forms of negativity in the face of adversity and that we should never go to a low level or we will become low as the enemy. In living a life of resistance, we need to love those as Martin Luther King started his life with love and ended his life full of love. Lastly, we need to REFORM. When it comes to reformation she spoke highly on the necessary action to always adjust to what we have but never remain silent. When we leave, we want to be certain that we have done our part to make the world a better place and be the light in a world of darkness. In the famous words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,” Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”