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J.E. Lowery: The Joshua Generation
Written by Dr. Joseph E. Lowery, President Emeritus, The Southern Christian Leadership Conference, USA
Saturday, August 9, 2008
We appealed to people of courage and conscience that we become “the Joshua Generation” that Martin envisioned leading world into a Promised Land where we as One Family Under God would work together to end the barbarism of war, the insanity of racism and the scourge of poverty on our watch.
We held a press conference on July 2 of this year to remind the world that it has been 45 years since Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave the world his immortal “I Have a Dream” speech, during that now “Historic March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.”
It has also been 40 years since Martin told us a day before he was assassinated: “I’ve been to the mountain top and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you but we as a people will get to the Promised Land!” When he said “we as a people,” he meant not just black people or white people, not just Jews or gentiles, but people of every race, creed, ethnicity, and color on this planet.
We declared, therefore, that 40 years is long enough for people of every race, creed and color on this planet to wander in the wilderness of hate, terror, and estrangement from one another. We appealed to people of courage and conscience that we become “the Joshua Generation” that Martin envisioned leading the world into a Promised Land where we as One Family Under God would work together to end the barbarism of war, the insanity of racism and the scourge of poverty on our watch.
Together, let us go forth from this place and this time as a “Joshua Generation” of God’s Family to do for the entire world on our watch in the 21st Century, what the nonviolent warriors convened by Dr. King did for America and the world on their watch in the 20th Century. We pledge to take this message to every corner of the earth in the months and years ahead and as we enlist in ever widening numbers people of faith and goodwill in our effort to demonstrate innovative models of cooperative action that concretely advance the work of reconciliation and peace.
God bless you. Peace, shalom, a salaam alaikam.