April 2 Lecture At Duke To Call For Rethinking the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Message
DURHAM, N.C. - Rather than trying to fulfill the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s vision of a "beloved community" that renders race, class and gender invisible, Christians should embrace such differences, said Marcia Y. Riggs, who will deliver the 2002 Martin Luther King Jr. Lecture at Duke Divinity School.
"This whole vision of transcending race has put us into a color-blind notion of race that doesn't allow us to embrace differences and to love each other for who and what we are," said Riggs, an associate professor of Christian ethics at Columbia Theological Seminary in Decatur, Ga. "We've been trying to make race invisible when it is a reality."
In her King lecture, Riggs will draw upon a variety of historical, sociological and theological sources to critique King's vision of "beloved community" and reinterpret it in light of the realities of race in the 21st century. The lecture, titled "In the Balance: Womanist Reflections on Beloved Community," will be held at 2 p.m. April 2 in York Chapel in Duke Divinity School. The lecture is free and open to the public.
Sponsored by the Office of Black Church Studies and the Black Seminarians Union at Duke Divinity School, the lecture is the opening event in a two-day program honoring King. All events are open to the public.
Daphne Wiggins, assistant professor of congregational studies at Duke Divinity School, will serve as guest preacher at a 7 p.m. April 2 worship service at Nehemiah Christian Center on North Mangum Street in Durham. On April 3, Riggs will preach at two worship services: a 10 a.m. service at York Chapel on the Duke campus and a 7 p.m. service at Nehemiah Christian Center. The evening service will be preceded by a community dinner at Nehemiah; tickets are $5.
Riggs is regarded as a leading figure in the emergence of womanist theology in the United States. Womanist theology seeks to empower African-American women through a re-examination of their role and place in the world that God has created.
Learning to embrace the tensions created by race, class and gender differences will not be an easy task, Riggs acknowledged. "The challenge, though, is to learn to live into these tensions and conflicts in a way that will be creative," she said.
Riggs is the author of several books on ethics and womanist theology, including Awake, Arise and Act: A Womanist Call for Black Liberation and Can I Get a Witness: Prophetic Religious Voices of African-American Women. An ordained minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, she has served various churches as assistant or associate pastor and co-founded Transforming Ministries, an independent ministry in Stone Mountain, Ga.
Established in the late 1970s, the divinity school's King lectures focus each year on preaching as an instrument of social change. For more information, call Rodney Sadler in the Office of Black Church Studies at (919) 660-3444.