No To Death—Yes To Life

On this fourth day of April fifty years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr., was shot and killed by an assassin’s bullet.  Were you there?  Were you there in Memphis that day?  I am not equating Dr. King’s death with the crucifixion of Jesus, but I am suggesting that both died because they confronted the reality and the power of Death. I define this “Death” as anything that contributes or causes the dehumanization of any human being or group of human beings who live in our world.    Racism dehumanizes.  Segregation dehumanizes.  Bigotry dehumanizes.  Poverty dehumanizes. Misogyny dehumanizes.  Hate dehumanizes. War dehumanizes.  Death “lives” off of this kind of stuff!  Death confronts us everywhere and in many subtle forms (both within and without).   This pervasive and seemingly indestructible power—Death—shall not prevail and it cannot finally do us in.  Love at the heart of things will always confront it and rise above it.  This is the meaning of the resurrection—this is the meaning of an Easter faith.  “Go into the world” (where Death dominates and seems to prevail) Jesus encouraged his followers, teaching the world to observe all that I have taught you, “and lo, I am with you always.”

CNN reporter, Eliot C. McLaughlin wrote a  piece yesterday about his meeting with Andrew Young and Jesse Jackson at the former Lorraine Motel in Memphis:  “Jackson wishes his friend were still around to see the victories that his teachings made possible.  But he concedes the 39-year-old Atlanta-born preacher may have accomplished more in death.  ‘The resurrection of the martyr is more powerful than the marcher,’ Jackson said.  ‘Martyrs cannot be arrested.  Martyrs cannot be stoned.  Martyrs cannot be shot.  The resurrection cannot be contained by opinions.  The resurrection is a very pervasive spirit.  In marching, he (King) was limited to finitude.  In his martyrdom he is unlimited.  He is infinite.’”  “O death, where is thy victory?  O death, where is thy sting?”  We shall overcome!  

The task of the Easter faith is to say NO to the power of Death while at the same moment and in the same breath to bespeak LIFE freed from the bondage of death.  The Easter faith “confounds Death…by insistently, defiantly, resiliently living as no less and none other than a human being….” (William Stringfellow)   Our  NO against Death (in whatever guise we see, hear or experience it) IS the YES  for the fulfillment of our human destiny.