Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881

The Daily Northwestern

32° Evanston, IL
Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881

The Daily Northwestern

Northwestern University and Evanston's Only Daily News Source Since 1881

The Daily Northwestern

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Candlelight vigil radiates King’s spirit of optimism

The sanctuary at Alice Millar Chapel is usually dim, but on Friday night it was lit up by songs, words of encouragement and candlelight celebrating the life of Martin Luther King Jr.

More than 100 people filled the pews of Alice Millar for the MLK Jr. Candlelight Vigil, sponsored by Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity. The audience rose to its feet almost as soon as it sat down, granting a standing ovation to Sharrieff Muhammed-Bey, a Dewey Elementary School fifth-grader who began the evening by reciting part of the “I Have a Dream” speech.

“This evening is a time to think about the values of civility, freedom, equality, racial integration and love of one’s fellow man,” said University President Henry Bienen. “We will always fall short of a perfect realization of those ideals, but that’s no excuse for not trying.”

Those values are what makes King the personal hero of the Rev. Michael Curry, who delivered the keynote address. Curry, pastor of the First Church of God Christian Life Center in Evanston, challenged the audience to dream as big as King did.

“I believe that tonight, Dr. King would want us to understand that holding on to a dream takes more than just sitting in a room thinking about it,” Curry said. “A dream takes real effort. There is a God who has given us the ability to dream. You can dream from the fields of oppression. You can also dream from the mountaintops of achievement.”

But the dream of equality and brotherhood is not an individual pursuit because those ideals benefit all of society, Curry said. People should learn to work together for the common good as King taught, he said, and this spirit of cooperation is also echoed in the Bible.

“I hope we will not think in terms of black and white, Asian and Hispanic,” Curry said. “Tonight we would think of all of humanity as one. Hold on to your dream, and give every effort that you can engage yourself so that others can understand the divine empowerment of the Lord Almighty, that they might rise up above who they are and become who the Lord God Almighty would desire us to become.”

A wave of bright, tiny lights then spread through the chapel as members of Alpha Phi Alpha lit their candles and passed the flame along each pew.

Joined by the Alice Millar Chapel Choir and the First Church of God Christian Life Center Sanctuary Choir, the audience sang “We Shall Overcome.”

Curry said that King would have encouraged that spirit of optimism for a better society.

“If he could have escaped that assassin’s bullet, he would say to us tonight that this is the divine authority that God has placed in all of us,” Curry said. “We have the authority to think those things into being that seemingly are impossible.”

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Candlelight vigil radiates King’s spirit of optimism