DEBORAH POTTER, correspondent: St. Nikolai Evangelical Lutheran Church hasn’t changed much since the sixteenth century. Bach once played the organ here, and the music is still a draw. But on this day the tourists have come to hear about the church’s more recent history from the man who led it through a difficult time. Christian Fuhrer became pastor here in 1980, when the world outside the church was divided by the Cold War and Germany was split in two, most visibly by the wall the East German government built in Berlin in 1961. The Communist state was determined to keep more of its people from escaping to the free West. In the German Democratic Republic—the GDR—atheism was the norm. Churches like St. Nikolai were spied on, but stayed open.

PASTOR CHRISTIAN FUHRER (in translation): In the GDR, the church provided the only free space. Everything that could not be discussed in public could be discussed in church, and in this way the church represented a unique spiritual and physical space in which people were free.

Pastor Christian Fuhrer

POTTER: In the early eighties, Fuhrer began holding weekly prayers for peace. Every Monday, they recited the Beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount. Few people came. But in the late eighties, as the Soviet Union opened up to the West, more East Germans began to demand change, including the right to leave, and in Leipzig they gathered at St. Nikolai, which proclaimed itself “open for all.”

PR. FUHRER (in translation): The special experience that we had during the years of peace prayers and then with this massive number of non-Christians in the church, which was exceptional, was that they accepted the message of Jesus.

POTTER: As a college student, Sylke Schumann was one of the hundreds and then thousands who joined the vigils in the sanctuary and marched in the streets holding candles.

SYLKE SCHUMANN: Seeing all these people gather in this place and then from week to week and more and more people gathering, you had the feeling this time really the government had to listen to you.

POTTER: In October 1989, on the 40th anniversary of the GDR, the government cracked down. Protestors in Leipzig were beaten and arrested. Two days later, St. Nikolai Church was full to overflowing for the weekly vigil. When it was over, 70,000 people marched through the city as armed soldiers looked on and did nothing.

PR. FUHRER (in translation): In church people had learned to turn fear into courage, to overcome the fear and to hope, to have strength. They came to church and then started walking, and since they did not do anything violent, the police were not allowed to take action. They said, “We were ready for anything, except for candles and prayer.”

SCHUMANN: I remember it was a cold evening, but you didn’t feel cold, not just because you saw all the lights but also because you saw all these people, and it was, you know, it was really amazing to be a part of that, and you felt so full of energy and hope. For me, it still gives me the shivers thinking of that night. It was great.

POTTER: Just one month after that massive demonstration, the wall between East and West here in Berlin came down. The church had sent a powerful message: the East German government no longer controlled its people.

The joy and relief on that day 20 years ago became reality thanks in part to the effort of one tenacious pastor and what he describes as his firm faith in this teaching of Jesus:  “Blessed are the peacemakers.”

PR. FUHRER (in translation): If any event ever merited the description of “miracle” that was it—a revolution that succeeded, a revolution that grew out of the church. It is astonishing that God let us succeed with this revolution.

POTTER: Fuhrer, who retired last year at age 65 as required by his church, has written a book about those historic days. St. Nikolai itself has gone back to being a parish church, its congregation not much larger than before. But Fuhrer says he didn’t do what he did back then to draw people to the church. In his words, “We did it because the church has to do it.”

For Religion and Ethics Newsweekly, I’m Deborah Potter in Leipzig.

In East Germany, the church provided the only free space in connection with the groups—people who wanted to discuss topics that were taboo, such as the refusal to serve in the army, military education. Everything that could not be discussed in public could be discussed in church, and in this way the church represented a unique spiritual and physical space in East Germany in which people were free.

Here [at St. Nikolai Church in Leipzig] we have said peace prayers since 1981 and every Monday since 1982. That was something very special in East Germany. Here a critical mass grew under the roof of the church—young people, Christians and non-Christians, and later those who wanted to leave [East Germany] joined us and sought refuge here.  The church became a very special place, and in particular the Nikolai Church, which we could describe like this: the church was finally on the side of the Lord, on Jesus’ side. In other words, it was on the side of the oppressed and not on that of the oppressors, with the people and not with those who had the power. The special experience we had here was that the people accepted Jesus’ message, especially the message of the Sermon on the Mount. We experienced in a very special way that everything that is written here is true. If you don’t believe, you won’t stay. The “comrades” did not believe, and they did not stay. “Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit.” “He pulls the powerful from their throne and lifts up the poor.” “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” We experienced it just like that—the church as a refuge and a place for change, Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, no mention of paradise and redemption, but the daily bread in the reality of political hopelessness.

Pastor Christian Fuhrer

The special experience that we had during the years of peace prayers and then with this massive number of non-Christians in the church, which was exceptional, was that they accepted the message of Jesus. They grew up in two consecutive atheist dictatorships. They grew up with the Nazis who were preaching racism, the master race, prepared for war, and replaced God with Providence, as Hitler liked to say. They also grew up with the Socialists preaching class struggle and vilified the church by saying Jesus never existed, that’s all nonsense and fairy tales, legends, and your talk about nonviolence is dangerous idealism; what counts is politics, money, the army, the economy, the media. Everything else is nonsense. And the people who were brainwashed like this for years and grew up with that. The fact that they accepted Jesus’ message of the Sermon on the Mount, that they summarized it in two words—no violence—and the fact that they did not only think and say it, but also practiced it consistently in the street was an incredible development, an unprecedented development in German history. If any event ever merited the description of “miracle” that was it: a revolution that succeeded, a revolution that grew out of the church, remained nonviolent, no broken windows, no people beaten, no people killed—an unprecedented development in German history. A peaceful revolution, a revolution that came out of the church. It is astonishing that God let us succeed with this revolution. After all the violence that Germany brought to the world in the two wars during the last century, especially the violence against the people from whom Jesus was born, a horrible violence, and now this wonderful result, a unique, positive development in German history. That is why we are so happy that the church was able to play this role and enabled this peaceful revolution.

The most important thing for us was the power of prayer, which is still true today. We are not praying to the air or to the wall, but to a living God. We did not pray for the wall to come down. It was more comprehensive: [We were praying] for peace, justice, and the preservation of our creation. We addressed the very specific needs of human beings in our prayers, and God has blessed those prayers in such a way that nobody could have predicted. We went on, step by step. It got bigger and bigger, and in the end the prayers prevented us from drowning in fear and gave us the strength to face the opposition outside. In other words, more and more protests came from the church and spilled onto the street, combined with the strength that we got from our faith. The fear was very powerful, but our faith was more powerful than the fear, and the prayers gave us the strength to act. That is still the same today.

What motivated me was Jesus’ saying “You are the salt of the earth,” which means that you must get involved; you cannot stay in your church. You must get involved in this situation; the salt must be inserted in the wound, in the place that is not in order, that is sick. That’s where you must go. This thought to get involved in politics is a thought that Jesus already voiced in the parable of the Good Samaritan. Someone is beaten and lies there, those who beat him are gone, and now two people coming from temple are approaching, are looking the other way and walking away. Jesus says that they are guilty, not because—they did not do anything, they did not beat him, but they did not help him. If we just leave the world alone and do not get involved, we are just as guilty as those two, as Jesus said in that parable, who looked the other way and did not want to hear about it. You must get involved, because you are the salt of the earth.

St. Nikolai Church

[Dietrich] Bonhoeffer really impressed me with his philosophy in approaching the atheist, the non-Christian, with the Christian message in a way that is easy to understand. I first learned that from Jesus—the simple language. Jesus did not speak the language of the temple, but the language of the people. He talked about the mustard seed, the farmer, the worker in the vineyard, the jobless who are waiting in the marketplace, hoping to get hired. Those are all things that people can understand, and then he introduced the message of God’s love into this clear language. And Bonheffer said that we should apply Jesus’ language in such a way that it can be understood even if you were not born into the Christian tradition or into a Christian household. That was really impressive. In addition, the examples impressed me very much, the fact that people applied the Sermon on the Mount one-to-one. First, to put Christians to shame, it was a non-Christian and Hindu who did it: Mahatma Gandhi. Very much in the spirit of the Sermon of the Mount, he engaged in nonviolent resistance and freed his people from British colonialism, but gave his life for it, as did Jesus. He was shot in 1948. The second one was, thank God, a Christian: Martin Luther King. He prepared and executed this idea of nonviolence, peaceful resistance, in a wonderful way. It was a very tense situation, and the fact that it was possible for an African-American to become president of the United States today even exceeds Martin Luther King’s dream. Then it became our turn to apply the teachings of the Sermon of the Mount here in Leipzig. But you cannot forget to mention Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu. They have always impressed us. We felt that we were walking together with them to fulfill Jesus’ legacy.

The police were always very violent, especially on October 7th when they beat hundreds of people. With this violence they wanted to prevent people from gathering here, here in the church and on the plaza. They gradually increased the amount of violence, but achieved the opposite of what they expected. Especially on October 9th, they had created such a frightful scenario that they thought people would not dare show up here. Instead, even more people came. In church people had learned to turn fear into courage, to overcome the fear and to hope, to have strength, as I mentioned before. That was very important, and during those years and in particular during this frightful time, people overcame their fear. They did not bring their children, because you had to fear for your life. The children stayed at home. They came to church and then started walking, and since they did not do anything violent, the police were not allowed to take action. “We were ready for anything, except for candles and prayer,” they said. If the first group had attacked the police, the police would have known exactly what to do. You can see it on TV every night how police and armies react to demonstrators. That did not happen, and the officers and generals called Berlin and asked what they should do, but they did not get any instructions. Those in Berlin did not say anything, the officers here did not do anything, and thus the movement that did not result in any violence, as the people learned in church, began to spread, and that is when the following became clear in East Germany: This is the beginning of the end of East Germany. It cannot go on, the people got what they wanted. Peace prayers were held all over the country. When they saw the images from Leipzig on October 9th, they started demonstrations everywhere else. The crowds became larger and larger, and then [Erich] Honecker handed in his resignation, and on the 18th the politburo resigned. On November 9th, on this very important day, on this day the wall was overcome from the East. Those are experiences that you cannot learn in college, and I would like to summarize them as follows: the Nikolai Church was open to everyone. The church was open to all people, no matter if they were Christian or non-Christian. The next thing is that throne and altar do not belong together. That is a huge mistake that the church made during the past century. No, the street and the altar belong together, just as Jesus did not hide in the temple, but was mingling out in the street, in the houses and on the plazas. We as a church must go into the street and let the street come into the church. The church must be open to everyone. We can teach nonviolence as a practical application of the Sermon on the Mount, turn swords into ploughshares as in the Old Testament, open to all, as mentioned before, and we are the people. We have to learn to have a certain self-confidence, overcome fear, find our voice once again in church, approach bad situations with this self-confidence, be able to make changes within society, reject injustice, and refuse to go along, and I think what is important in all of that is the power of prayer. Without prayer we would not have changed anything, we would not have been able to overcome fear, we would not have had the strength to change things and to take the message of the Bible seriously, being able to interject yourself into a social reality, finding the message of Jesus and the Bible and applying it to the current situation, not uttering long sentences but finding the right word for the right situation, knowing how to act. For me the main criterion for action was: What would Jesus say in this situation? Then I came to the conclusion that we needed to do it the same way he would have done it.

The role of the church did not diminish, at least not here in the Nikolai Church. It continued. Huge protests against the war in Iraq, peace prayers involving many people to save jobs…It continued, but under different social circumstances. However, there are always certain peaks, unique times, such as October 9th. It was a peaceful revolution which was a unique process. You cannot expect that it will go on like that every day. What this revolution aimed to achieve was indeed achieved, and then people stepped back. The important thing to remember is that we did not do that to get people to join our church, but because it was necessary. That is what Jesus did as well. When he provided help, he never asked if that person went to the temple or if that person said all his prayers. He just realized that this human being needed help, so he helped. That is exactly how we did it. We never said “but you must return the favor,” the way it is done in politics and in the world. We created something, and the blessing continued for the people. The most important thing is that the church has to remain open. Whenever people need the church again, in everyday life or in very specific situations, they should find the church open. The church should be there for the people, the way Jesus intended. An inviting, open church without the expectation that people join; an inviting, open church offering unconditional love, just as Jesus did, and [we must] act in this spirit.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: The delegation was a who’s who of the civil rights era, among them John Lewis, Andrew Young, as well as Martin Luther King III retracing the steps of his iconic namesake who’d come 50 years ago to pay homage at this shrine to Mahatma Gandhi in New Delhi.

Martin Luther King III said his father came to India as a pilgrim.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, III (speaking to group): My dad said that he came to many countries around the world as a tourist but came to India as a pilgrim.

DE SAM LAZARO: His father’s visit to India may be a little known footnote from an eventful period in American history. But it was a pivotal event for the leader of the civil rights movement.

Dr. CLAYBORNE CARSON (Historian, Stanford University): It really allowed him to get his credentials as a Gandhian, which was very important to him. He saw himself as a follower of Gandhi, someone who had learned a great deal from Gandhi. So going to India was crucial for him because he felt that he would be judged by Gandhi’s followers and that they would understand him to be someone who was carrying on that tradition.

DE SAM LAZARO: For King in 1959, India — independent only since 1947 — was a beacon of hope. Even though Gandhi was assassinated barely one year after independence, his civil disobedience approach had successfully liberated India from British colonial rule. King was influenced by such nonviolent tactics as Gandhi’s famous 200-mile march to protest the salt monopoly, which made one of life’s basic necessities unaffordable for many Indians.

King’s visit with Gandhi’s followers invigorated the American civil rights movement. Former U.S ambassador and Atlanta mayor Andrew Young was a King lieutenant.

Ambassador ANDREW YOUNG: Dr. King talked about this trip all the time, and he talked about the influence that Gandhi had on his life. He learned the meaning of the heritage that he had grown up in, and he talked about that. In fact, our whole civil rights movement — the March on Washington — was a reflection and effort on our part to imitate Gandhi’s Salt March to the sea. Our teachings, the methods that we used all came from the life and the spirit of Mohandas Gandhi.

Ambassador Andrew Young

DE SAM LAZARO: Fellow civil rights era veteran now Congressman John Lewis said the Gandhian influence profoundly shaped his own values.

Representative JOHN LEWIS (D-Georgia): If it hadn’t been for Gandhi and Dr. King, I wouldn’t be a member of the U.S House of Representatives. The teaching of Gandhi changed my life forever, made me a better human being, and today I can say in spite of the arrests — I was arrested 40 times during the ’60s, beaten, left bloody and unconscious — but the teaching of Gandhi freed me, liberated me, and I don’t feel any ill feeling or malice or hatred toward anybody.

DE SAM LAZARO: It’s a Gandhian value that transcended religious and cultural traditions as distant as King’s Christianity and the Hinduism Gandhi was born into.

Dr. CARSON: One of the things about King and Gandhi is that you can follow them without being either a Christian or a Hindu. I think that one of the strengths that they brought is that they understood the universal applications of those ideas that came out of a cultural tradition, and that’s what’s made them — that’s what allows someone to listen to even to a King sermon and be inspired by it even if one is not a Christian.

DE SAM LAZARO: There’s no known footage of the 1959 King visit, but a radio address was recently discovered in the archives of India’s radio network.

Voice of MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR (audio from 1959 radio broadcast): Since being in India I am more convinced than ever before that the method of nonviolent resistance is the most potent weapon available to oppressed people in their struggle for justice and human dignity. In a real sense, Mahatma Gandhi embodied in his life certain universal principles that are inherent in the moral structure of the universe, and these principles are as inescapable as the law of gravitation.

Representative John Lewis

DE SAM LAZARO: Half a century later, this trip to India took place after a historic American election, and the link — Gandhi to King to Obama — was plain to see for many.

Ambassador YOUNG (speaking to delegation): He had on his wall of his Senate office pictures of Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi and Abraham Lincoln.

GEORGE DUKE (Jazz Musician, speaking to audience): One thing I know for sure—Gandhi and Martin Luther King understood the blues.

DE SAM LAZARO: The 50-year commemorative trip sponsored by the State Department included musical performances by George Duke, Herbie Hancock, a number of up-and-coming musicians joined sometimes by Indian artists like tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain.

Throughout the two-week tour across India, one question came up frequently: What would Dr. King think about India today? Would he see much change over 50 years?

Mr. KING III: Even in a country like India, which has so much in terms of technology and information today — opportunity — there’s still immense poverty, and that would not—that would be very painful, I believe, to him and my mom.

DE SAM LAZARO: Nor, in fact, would King likely be pleased at an India today that is a nuclear armed military power — repudiation, it would seem, of a plea he made in his 1959 radio broadcast here.

Dr. Clayborne Carson

Voice of MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. (audio from 1959 radio broadcast): Just as India had to take the lead and show the world that national independence could be achieved nonviolently, so India may have to take the lead and call for universal disarmament. And if no other nation will join her immediately, India may declare itself for disarmament unilaterally. Such an act of courage would be a great demonstration of the spirit of the Mahatma and would be the greatest stimulus to the rest of the world to do likewise.

Dr. CARSON: One of the ironies is that as King met with Nehru and other followers of Gandhi who were now part of the government of India, he found that in some ways he was more Gandhian than they were, because they were now in power. They were now not committed to the kind of course that Gandhi had advocated — the non-industrializing that he felt that that was the wrong course for India to take.

DE SAM LAZARO: Similarly, Carson says, King would be a thorn in President Obama’s side today since he opposed all uses of military force. That’s the thing about visionaries like Gandhi and King, he says. They’re easy to admire, but difficult to emulate.

KIM LAWTON: These days, Congressman John Lewis often finds himself in the role of tour guide … reminding America of the painful days of the civil rights movement. On this afternoon, he’s showing fellow members of Congress where some of the key events of the struggle occurred.

Rep. JOHN LEWIS (D-GA): I make a point of trying to take people back, and especially young people — and those of us not so young — back to the roots of the movement.

LAWTON: For Lewis, those roots were not just social or political, they were deeply spiritual — a fact he fears is being lost as more time passes.

Rep. LEWIS: I’m deeply concerned that many people today fail to recognize that the movement was built on deep-seated religious convictions. And the movement grew out of a sense of faith — faith in God and faith in one’s fellow human beings.

LAWTON: Lewis got involved in the movement because of his own belief that all people were created equal in the image of God, worthy of dignity and justice. Martin Luther King Jr. inspired him to put those ideas into action.

Rep. LEWIS: One Sunday, I heard Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. preach on the radio. I was 15 years old, in the 10th grade. I heard Dr. King say things like, “We must not just be concerned about the pearly gates and the streets made out of milk and honey, but we have to be concerned about the streets in Montgomery, Alabama.” And I felt like he was talking to me.

LAWTON: The young Lewis became active in the nonviolent protests and the rallies, which were usually held in churches, and permeated with hymn singing and prayer.

Rep. LEWIS: On some occasions, it was just like being in church on Sunday morning. It was like being at a prayer meeting. We would sing songs, in Mississippi, in Alabama, in Georgia, in little churches: “I’m going to do what the spirit said do.” If the spirit said sit in, if the spirit said march, if the spirit said walk, if the spirit said picket –”I’m going to do what the spirit said do.”

LAWTON: In 1961, as a 21-year-old theology student, Lewis volunteered for the Freedom Rides, a journey he now re-creates to teach others what happened. In an act of social defiance, blacks and whites rode on segregated buses together.

The Freedom Riders were jailed for two nights. After their release, they ended up at the First Baptist Church of Montgomery.

Rep. LEWIS (during speech): An angry mob gathered right outside of the church, in this area, and started burning cars.

LAWTON: Lewis’s activism propelled him to the inner circle of the civil rights movement, although often he was in the background. He worked closely with King and was recognized as one of the so-called “Big Six” leaders who pulled together the 1963 March on Washington. At 23, he was the youngest speaker at the march. Now he’s the last surviving speaker.

(to Rep. Lewis): How did Martin Luther King Jr. influence you spiritually?

Rep. LEWIS: Martin Luther King Jr. had a major impact on my search for truth. I felt like he was doing the work of the Master. That he was saying in effect that our hands, our feet, our minds, must be the hands, the feet, and mind of God Almighty.

LAWTON: Lewis paid a price for his convictions. He was jailed 40 times, and repeatedly beaten by mobs and police. One of the most devastating incidents took place on March 7, 1965 — Bloody Sunday. Twenty-five-year-old Lewis, in a tan trenchcoat and black backpack, led 600 marchers across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. State troopers attacked. Lewis was one of the first to fall. He was beaten unconscious, and nearly died. Today, Lewis is welcomed as a hero when he visits Alabama. Local police, many of them black, escort him around town.

(to Rep. Lewis): You went through so much. How did you move beyond it without being paralyzed by hate?

Rep. LEWIS: At a very early stage of the movement, I accepted the teaching of Jesus, the way of love, the way of nonviolence, the spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation. The idea that hate is too heavy a burden to bear. I don’t want to go down that road. I’ve seen too much hate, seen too much violence. And I know love is a better way.

LAWTON: Nearly four decades after he fought for voting rights, the 65-year-old Lewis is an elected official, serving in his ninth term as a member of Congress. He describes himself as uncomfortable in the limelight.

Unidentified Man: The conscience of the House of Representatives of the United States, Congressman John Lewis.

LAWTON: But when he steps into the pulpit, as he did at this rally for immigrant workers’ rights, his preaching style as a Baptist minister is clear.

Rep. LEWIS (at rally): In Montgomery, an angry mob met us in May of 1961, beat us. I was beaten — left lying bloody and unconscious. But I didn’t give up. You must not give up.

LAWTON: Lewis says it was the courage and unified work of religious leaders across the spectrum that fueled the civil rights struggle. He regrets more of that isn’t happening now.

Rep. LEWIS: Sometime I feel today that maybe, just maybe, the religious leaders are too quiet. They need to make a little noise — need to push and to pull, and to be prophets. On some of the big issues, moral issues, seem like we been so silent. Somehow we need to find a way to reclaim our position as people of faith.

LAWTON: As one of the surviving leaders of the civil rights movement, Lewis wants to make sure the role of faith in changing the nation is never forgotten.

Rep LEWIS (Singing at Rally): We shall overcome someday.

Rep. LEWIS: Sometimes when I look back and think about it, how did we do what we did? How did we succeed? We didn’t have a Web site. We didn’t have a cellular telephone. But I felt when we were sitting in at those lunch counter stools, or going on the Freedom Ride, or marching from Selma to Montgomery, there was a power and a force. God Almighty was there with us.

LAWTON: I’m Kim Lawton reporting.

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What spiritual legacy did the civil rights movement give to the United States?

The civil rights movement of the ’60s imbues the American community with a spirit that is still with us today. Many of us that got caught up and involved in the civil rights movement saw our involvement as an extension of our faith. We would sing songs … in Mississippi, in Alabama, in Georgia, in little churches: “I’m gonna do what the spirit said do.” If the spirit said sit in, if the spirit said march, if the spirit said walk, if the spirit said picket — “I’m gonna do what the spirit said do.” Without our faith, we wouldn’t have been able to succeed. On many occasions, before we’d go out on a sit-in, before we went on the freedom ride, before we marched from Selma to Montgomery, we would sing a song or say a prayer. Without our faith, without the spirit and spiritual bearings and underpinning, we would not have been so successful. Without prayer, without faith in the Almighty, the civil rights movement would have been like a bird without wings.

On many occasions, when we had been beaten, arrested, in jail, you had to call upon something, some force, some power much larger, much greater, and much more powerful. In my estimation, the civil rights movement was a religious phenomenon. When we’d go out to sit in or go out to march, I felt, and I really believe, there was a force in front of us and a force behind us, ’cause sometimes you didn’t know what to do. You didn’t know what to say, you didn’t know how you were going to make it through the day or through the night. But somehow and some way, you believed — you had faith — that it all was going to be all right.

You talk about the music of the movement. I’ve heard recordings from some of those meetings, where people took simple Sunday school songs and made them relevant to what was happening. What was the power of that music?

On many occasions, people would be so inspired, so moved … they would start singing some of the gospel songs or some hymn of the church. And they would improvise; they would make it current, or make it so powerful, that you knew somehow and some way that you had to go. You had to go and sit in. You had to go and march, because it was the power of the message, of the words of a song — the beat, the rhythm. And on some occasions, it was just like being in church on a Sunday morning. It was like being at a prayer meeting. And whether it was a sit-in, or whether it was on the freedom ride, or the march from Selma to Montgomery, I felt on many occasions like it was a very deep religious experience.

Are you concerned that the religious aspects of the movement are being lost the further we get from those days?

I’m deeply concerned that many people today fail to recognize that the movement was built on deep-seated religious convictions, and the movement grew out of a sense of faith — faith in God and faith in one’s fellow human beings. From time to time, I make a point, trying to take people back, and especially young people, and those of us not so young, back to the roots of the movement. During those early days, we didn’t study the Constitution, the Supreme Court decision of 1954. We studied the great religions of the world. We discussed and debated the teachings of the great teacher. And we would ask questions about what would Jesus do. In preparing for the sit-ins, we felt that the message was one of love — the message of love in action: don’t hate. If someone hits you, don’t strike back. Just turn the other side. Be prepared to forgive. That’s not anything any Constitution say anything about forgiveness. It is straight from the Scripture: reconciliation. So the movement, the early foundation, the early teaching of the movement was based on the Scripture, the teaching of Jesus, the teaching of Gandhi and others. You have to remind people over and over again that some of us saw our involvement in the civil rights movement as an extension of our faith.

Were there tensions between those of faith and those in the movement who were social progressives but perhaps didn’t have any religious beliefs? Were there tensions between those two wings?

At times, you had what I would call a schism, maybe a small conflict between those who said, “This is the right thing to do. We do it because it is not in keeping with the Constitution; it is not in keeping with the Declaration of Independence, [with] our Bill of Rights.” But then others were saying, “I’m doing it, I’m standing up because [of] my faith, my belief in God the Father, in the Holy Spirit, in Jesus Christ, or in the teaching of all the great religions of the world, that this is the thing to do.”

But those tensions didn’t hinder the movement?

These tensions between sort of the social and the spiritual, it didn’t hinder. I think people felt the movement was so right and so necessary that we could not let the tension between the social and the spiritual interfere with the success of the movement.

How did Rev. King influence you spiritually, in the development of your own spiritual journey?

I grew up in rural Alabama, 50 miles from Montgomery, in a very loving, wonderful family, wonderful mother, wonderful father. We attended church; we went to Sunday school every Sunday. But one Sunday I heard Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. preach on the radio. I was 15 years old, in the 10th grade. He was talking about Paul’s letters. And he turned it around and talked about Paul’s letters to the Christians in America. And I felt he was talking to me. The words of Dr. King were so inspiring I wanted to find a way to get involved in the civil rights movement. I heard Dr. King say things like, “We must not just be concerned about the pearly gates and the streets made out of milk and honey, but we have to be concerned about the streets in Montgomery, Alabama.”

A few years later, I had the opportunity to meet him, and it changed my life. I felt like he was doing the work of the Master. That he was saying in effect that our hands, our feet, our minds must be the hands, the feet, and mind of God Almighty. That we must do the work, and whatever we do it must be in keeping with the building of what he called the Beloved Community, of what some of us may call the kingdom of God here on earth.

You were so young. That must have been key to your spiritual development.

Martin Luther King Jr. had a major impact on my search for truth, on my search to become a better human being and try to do what I consider the will of God. When you heard Martin Luther King preach, whether it was at a pulpit in Montgomery, Alabama, at some little church in the backwoods of Mississippi or southwest Georgia, or from his church in Atlanta, it was a message that was so moving and so powerful that you had to be willing and prepared to act according to that message.

As you look at your life now, how do you see all of that?

When I look back and even consider where I am today, if it hadn’t been for the teaching and preaching of Martin Luther King Jr., for getting that early foundation in the church, I probably wouldn’t be here. I don’t know where I would be. I probably would’ve got lost maybe in a sea of despair, maybe become very bitter and hostile. But, in a sense, the movement, Martin Luther King Jr., and these other religious leaders who led the civil rights movement, they not only rescued many of us but they also saved us and made us better human beings.

You went through so much. How did you move beyond that without becoming paralyzed by hatred?

At a very early stage of the movement, I accepted the teaching of Jesus, the way of love, the way of nonviolence, the spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation. The idea of hate is too heavy a burden to bear. It’s better to love. When we were involved in the sit-ins, in the freedom ride, on the march from Selma to Montgomery, we were not struggling against people but against customs, traditions, a bad way of life, and we were trying to win people over and be reconciled to each other. I think I had maybe what I call an executive session with myself, and maybe an executive session with God Almighty, and said, “I’m not going to hate. I don’t want to go down that road. I’ve seen too much hate, seen too much violence. And I know love is a better way.” You feel so different, and you feel so much better. You sleep better. You rest better. When you don’t have any ill feelings, you don’t have any hate or malice to people who maybe arrested you, beat you, jailed you, or tried to kill you. We all are brothers and sisters, we’re all a part of the same family, we all live in the same house — the house of faith.

But was it a struggle to get to that point?

You know, life is a struggle, it is a battle, and we cannot do it alone, we cannot do it alone. We were not able to do it alone. We had the help of God Almighty. Sometimes when I look back and think about it, you know, how did we do what we did? How did we succeed? We didn’t have a Web site. We didn’t have e-mail. We didn’t have a fax machine. We didn’t have a cellular telephone. But I felt when we were sitting in at those lunch counter stools, or going on the freedom ride, or marching from Selma to Montgomery, there was a power and a force. God Almighty was there with us.

When you look today at the nation and some of the issues we are battling, how are the religious communities and leadership rising to the challenges?

On so many occasions during the past two years I wished and prayed and somehow want to go back 40 years ago when the ministers, priests, rabbis, nuns, bishops, and others stood up. And sometimes I feel today that maybe, just maybe, the religious leaders are too quiet. They need to make a little noise. Need to push and to pull and [need] to be prophets. You know, Dr. King and others had the ability, had the capacity to rally people, to get people together. I will never forget, after Bloody Sunday in Selma in March of 1965, after we had been beaten and tear-gassed and trampled by horses, two days later, more than a thousand religious leaders — priests, rabbis, nuns, ministers — came there. Not just to Selma, but they got in the streets of almost every city in America, at the Department of Justice, at the White House, preaching the good news.

Today on some of the big issues, moral issues, [it] seems like we been so silent. Somehow we need to find a way to reclaim our position as people of faith. We don’t need to sort of give up, or give out or in, or get lost in a sea of despair, become discouraged; we just need to get out there. When I was growing up, my mother and father and grandparents used to tell us, “Don’t get in trouble. Don’t get in the way.” But during the ’60s, the religious community got in trouble. We got in the way. And it’s time again for the religious community to get in the way. To get in trouble. Good trouble, necessary trouble.