Spoken Introduction to the Prayer Litany
On August 28, 1963, over one hundred years after the Emancipation Proclamation, approximately 250,000 people gathered peacefully at the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. to demand equal justice for all. The march featured songs and speeches by several notable figures. Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered the last official speech of the day, his “I Have a Dream” speech. The March on Washington was one of several events that helped lead to passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
A Prayer Litany
[The non-bolded sections may be read by the leader or part of the congregation, with the boldface sections read by the entire congregation or part of it. Or the entire litany may be read by one person as a prayer.]
Dear Lord,
We come to you, commemorating the witness of Martin Luther King, Jr.
As in his day, too many people today
live on a “lonely island of poverty
in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity.”
Too many feel like exiles in their own land.
Too many of us live in communities of like-minded people,
segregated from those with different values,
political views, skin color, or financial portfolios.
Sometimes our society’s differences
“degenerate into physical violence.”
Yet you have told us not to drink
“from the cup of bitterness and hatred.”
You have shown us that the freedom of others
“is inextricably bound to our freedom.”
You have called us to work for what is right
until “justice rolls down like waters
and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
You have promised to renew your creation
so that even a place of oppression will become
“an oasis of freedom and justice.”
You have promised to raise up every valley,
make the rough places plain
and the crooked places straight,
and reveal your glory to all.
So help us in our day, Lord,
to “hew out of the mountain of despair
a stone of hope.”
Help us to hear freedom ring
as “all of God’s children … join hands” to sing,
“Free at last, free at last;
thank God Almighty,
we are free at last.”
Amen.
—Quotations are taken from Martin Luther King, Jr., “I Have a Dream,” in A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings of Martin Luther King, Jr., ed. James M. Washington. New York: HarperCollins, 1986.
Bookmark for Future Use
This is the last of five blog posts of litanies developed by Dr. Barbara Bradley Feenstra and Dr. Ronald J. Feenstra for use in worship to commemorate events such as MLK’s birthday (January 15, 1929), Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address (March 4, 1865), Juneteenth (June 19, 1865), July 4/5, and the anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (August 28, 1963). Any of these may also be used during Black History Month. Each litany or prayer is based on documents connected to the event being commemorated.
Other prayer litanies in this series:
A Prayer Litany Based on Martin Luther King’s “Letter from a Birmingham City Jail”
A Prayer Litany Based on Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address
A Prayer Litany Based on the Emancipation Proclamation
A Prayer Litany Based on Frederick Douglass’s Speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”
More from Reformed Worship
A Prayer from Martin Luther King Jr.
A Service in Celebration of Juneteenth