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nationally recognized and sought after. Theological educator, ethicists and moral leader Dr robert M. Franklin. Jr . Is the James T. Member to our Laney Professor and moral leadership and senior adviser to the president

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at Emory University this morning. In part one of his curry lecture. Moral age, agency and moral leadership identity. Dr franklin examined identifying traits of moral leaders, people with integrity, courage and imagination who

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serve the common good by leading society forward while inviting others to do the same. We look forward to hearing the second part of his lecture on public intellectuals and grateful for all that he is sharing with us

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today. Uh huh. Mm hmm. Mhm. Thank you for that warm introduction and commend this institution on this very important new testament meant appointment. And we look forward to years of scholarship and teaching ahead

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Bridget, thank you. In the previous lecture, I elaborated my definition of moral agency as a process of living a life of integrity in accord with one's deeply held moral values. This is the foundation for

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moral leadership. The moral agent has an opportunity to respond to the invitation to become a moral leader. But moral leadership involves an escalation of the tension of attention to one's values and imposes unique demands. Moral

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leaders invite people to join them. This is a social investment that many moral agents do not wish or are not able to fulfill, and moral leaders work to serve the common good. The aim of their

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activity transcends parochial boundaries and constituencies. This is similar to the eminent political scientist James MacGregor Burns, who distinguished between transactional leaders and transformational leaders, transactional leaders exchange services for specific desired goods. But transformational leaders

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enter into relationships with their followers that have the effect of elevating the motivations and morality of both parties. It becomes a moral bond where each seeks the good of the other. More importantly, it does not

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depend on the exchange of goods and services, but each party seeks to enhance the life of the other even without the promise of reciprocal benefits. Also, in the previous lecture, we paused at the base

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of the american icon Rush War as an invitation to think about our short lists of moral leaders, and we sought to introduce a paradigm from erick Erickson's developmental psychology to help us think through and think about growth

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through the human life cycle as a way of enabling the leader to evaluate herself or himself. Second, as a way to enable followers to evaluate the leader . and 3rd as a clue about how leaders can

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help others live meaning lives of meaning, purpose and fulfillment. So three roles or functions of that developmental paradigm. In the present lecture, I will propose that the moral leader thinks and acts in particular ways

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that distinguish her from others. The moral leader is a student of the moral life and the just society . These two ancient topics are intellectual preoccupations for him or her For any particular moral leader, the most

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prominent themes that guide their work will vary from person to person, but fundamentally they are or should be thinking about what makes for a personal life of meaning flourishing, purpose, goodness, and righteousness. You

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hear echoes here, Miroslav uh Wolf's presentation uh in that regard, and they should be thinking about and working for the kinds of communities that enable your human flourishing. And so we focus on personal and social

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transformation as a subject matter that preoccupies the moral leader . As we look at Dr King, for instance , we find that he focused on the themes of love, power, and justice, all of which

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he found manifest in interesting ways in the practice of non violence, and particularly through the influence of three of his post college mentors or intellectual influences. Gandhi paul, Tillich and reinhold neighbor. The moral leader

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also undertakes three critical practices. I want to submit that number one, she or he becomes a public intellectual in framing moral issues as moral issues, Framing issues as moral issues. 2nd, the moral leader

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engages in exemplary action, and third, the moral leader builds enduring institutions, invests in and builds enduring institutions, at least those three activities. The moral leader as student of the good life and just society

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. In this lecture, I maintain that moral leaders should have intellectual curiosity and clarity about the moral life and the good community, about individual and social transformation . Although conceptions of a good life and a good

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society will vary, any intellectual system must grapple with the problems associated with power, with balancing conflicting interests in a fair just manner, justice and the role of love, forgiveness, reconciliation, reparation and healing

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. In a good society. We will examine how moral leaders may think about these core ethical issues utilizing the life of martin Luther. King Jr. King was introduced to non violence at a time when he

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was searching for theological and philosophical coherence and alignment between his beliefs and his actions. Nonviolence emerged as the manifestation of a deeper ethical commitment to living a life that does no harm to other creatures. It was

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a theological philosophical and spiritual commitment and not simply a tactical or strategic move. According to his close aides . Wyatt tee walker, now deceased and Andrew Young King sometimes carried a copy of a little book in

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his briefcase titled Love, Power and Justice. While the bible and Howard thurman's jesus and the disinherited were always in King's monogram leather briefcase. The third or fourth book contents often varied and typically between the books

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of reinhold neighbor, Benjamin Mays, the president of Morehouse College at the time and the theologian paul Tillich King grappled with these three concepts long before he encountered the literature of Western philosophy and theology and extensive debates

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about greek understandings of love, eros philia agape. He was the son of a prominent christian plaster, living in a household with parents who inculcated values and practices for his survival as a black boy in the

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south, but also for the young christian gentleman, they hoped he would become King was steeped in the respectability culture of the black bourgeoisie of which the Howard University sociologist E Franklin, Frazier scathingly wrote, recall

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Frazier's sharp observation and I quote, because of its struggle to gain acceptance by whites, the black bourgeoisie has failed to play the role of a responsible elite in the negro community. End quote, although this

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was not the case for king's own father and grandfather , who used their elite status to resist racism and demand equal treatment before the law. While organizing wealth building strategies, as I reflect on pivotal events in

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the childhood and youthful development of martin King. in light of Eriksson's eight stage model, I am intrigued by an experience that King wrote about in his autobiography , a quote him at length here, since many

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have not seen or don't know that King wrote an autobiography, he writes from the very beginning, I was an extraordinarily healthy child. It is said that at my birth the doctors pronounced me a 100% perfect

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child. From a physical point of view what a claim, right? I hardly know how an ill , I hardly know how an ill moment feels, I guess the same would apply to my mental health

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. Yeah, but soon, external reality set in that this is my note, external reality set in . He continues, my mother confronted the age old problem of the negro parent in America, how to

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explain discrimination and segregation to a small child. She taught me that I should feel a sense of somebody nous, but that on the other hand, I had to go out and face a system that stared

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me in the face every day saying you are less than you are not equal to. She told me about slavery. I was about six years of age From the age of three, I had a white

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playmate who was about my age. We always felt free to play our childhood games together. He did not live in our community, but he was usually around every day. His father owned a store across

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the street from our home At the age of six , we both entered school, separate schools. Of course, I remember how our friendship began to break as soon as we entered school. This was not

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my desire, but his, the climax came when he told me one day that his father had demanded that he would play with me no more. I never will forget what a great shock this was to

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me. I immediately asked my parents about the motive behind such a statement. We were at the dinner table when the situation was discussed and here for the first time I was made aware of the existence of

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a race problem. I had never been conscious of it before. As my parents discuss some of the tragedies that had resulted from this problem and some of the insults they themselves had confronted on account of it

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. I was greatly shocked and from that moment on I was determined to hate every white person As I grew older and older, this feeling continued to grow . My parents would always tell me that I should

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not hate the white man, but that it was my duty as a christian to love him. The question arose in my mind, how could I love a race of people who hated me and who had

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been responsible for breaking me up with one of my best childhood friends? This was a great question in my mind for a number of years. End, quote, pardon that long quote, but you get

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an important slice of kings psyche in that king's quest for intellectual coherence of his faith and his practice are evident here. The quest, the hunger. How do I reconcile grandma mama tells me to love.

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I know that I'm being hated and so is the psychosocial wound he sustained as a child. King struggled with the theological claim that faithful christians are to love others, including their enemies. He noted that whites

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and others also worshipped in christian spaces. But as he saw their possession of liberty, privilege and power corrupted their christian ethics, how could such pure motivation , like love be negated by the presence of power

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and privilege? And when two or more powerful people groups are into these clashed, neither willing to yield , how could justice and reconciliation ever be achieved? Love, Power and justice. My point is that

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the encounter with love, power and justice is the key organizing features of King's thoughts. Theology and ethics was not simply an intellectual exercise. The issues and questions rose from his existential situation following the important revisionist

00:15:00.110 - 00:15:18.290

work on the civil rights movement by the now deceased theologian James H cone. A proper understanding of any theological concept should begin with its actual sits in labour nor the situation in life not. It's abstract,

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non historical formal meaning. Comb insists that we always interrogate all of our texts who wrote this book, this article, this brief this paper. What were what are their investments and interests in the political,

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economic, cultural status quo? Are they ultimately seeking to legitimize it, ignore its discrepancies or deconstruct and challenge injustice, inequality and past wrongdoing. King was a product of a proud black family, black church

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, black community and educational institutions and respect by that starting point is crucial to appreciating the genius of his later achievements, notwithstanding his comfortable position in the nurturing black middle class milieu intellectual doubt stalked and seized him

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. He wrote, the church has always been a second home for me, as far back as I can remember. I was in church every sunday. My best friends were in sunday school, and it

00:16:37.200 - 00:16:52.150

was the sunday school that helped me to build the capacity for getting along with people. I guess this was the inevitable was inevitable since my father was the pastor of my church. But I never regretted going

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to church until I passed through a state of skepticism in my second year of college probably happened for a lot of us seated here. The lessons which I was taught in sunday school were quite in the fundamentalist

00:17:07.540 - 00:17:22.870

line. None of my teachers ever doubted the infallibility of the scriptures. Most of them were unlettered and had never heard of biblical criticism. Naturally, I accepted the teachings as they were being given to me

00:17:22.880 - 00:17:41.630

, accepted the biblical studies uncritically until I was about 12 years old. But this uncritical attitude could not last long. Some new testament professors must feel that way King continues for it was contrary to the very

00:17:41.670 - 00:17:59.130

nature of my being. I've always been the questioning and precocious type. At the age of 13, I shocked my Sunday school class by denying the bodily resurrection of Jesus doubts began to spring forth. Unrelentingly

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end, quote. I hope this brief treatment will invite greater curiosity in King's focus on the inter relatedness of love, power and justice. And perhaps you'll be intrigued to go and read his autobiography and how

00:18:15.350 - 00:18:37.080

is rooted in this emotionally wrenching and deeply personal group , personal and group experience in american discrepancies between a rhetoric and reality. Many other excellent biographies and studies investigate this dimension of King's life. One thanks to

00:18:37.080 - 00:18:52.960

the work of taylor branch, David, Garrel, Clayborne, Carson, louis, baldwin, many, many others, noting the discrepancies of a self described christian nation. I'm struck by an appreciative of the

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Franciscan theologian. Richard roars haunting words and I quote , unfortunately, Christianity has not always had a positive impact on Western civilization. And the people that has colonized or evangelized, so called christian nations are often

00:19:11.850 - 00:19:30.220

the most militaristic, greedy and untrue to the teacher we claim to follow. Our societies are more often based not upon the servant leadership that jesus modeled, but on the common domination and control model that produces

00:19:30.220 - 00:19:48.310

racism. Classism, sexism, power seeking and income inequality. End quote, of course, the theologian Howard thurman, who after graduating from Morehouse actually taught at Morehouse for a while, He returned to Morehouse

00:19:48.310 - 00:20:06.320

after his grad school years at Rochester Theological Seminary and Haverford Benjamin Mays, who studied at Bates College in Maine and return and to Morehouse. He wasn't himself a graduate of Morehouse and George Kelsey who taught on

00:20:06.320 - 00:20:26.040

the faculty. This was years before King came upon the work in person of paul Tillich, a challenge of those tender years, the childhood trauma of being wrenched away from his friend six years old, He's

00:20:26.040 - 00:20:44.940

12 or 13 and Sunday school intellectual doubt now being articulated clearly and aggressively, and now we jump ahead beyond college. What happens Tillich, as you know , was a successful german theologian until he got on

00:20:44.940 - 00:21:03.460

the wrong side of Adolf Hitler 1933 Tillich was dismissed from his teaching position at the University of Frankfurt, Coincidentally, that summer 1933, Reinhold neighbor, one of America's most influential theologians, was visiting Germany that

00:21:03.460 - 00:21:22.490

same summer and was impressed after he met Tiller Tillich , now looking for a job, neighbor invited Tillich to come to union theological seminary where Tillich then joined him and taught from 1933 to 1955. Thereafter,

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Tillich went on to spend seven years at Harvard and then concluded his career. Well, until he died four years later at the University of Chicago. His most influential book, even as he recognized it was

00:21:38.320 - 00:21:52.960

what he called his masterpiece, titled The Courage to Be You've read it if not, make it a present to someone the courage to be, but the one book that captivated King most about til IX corpus

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of writings was the 1954 volume, a collection of lectures titled Love, Power and justice, reconciling protestant christian thought and existential philosophy. Tillich wrote and I quote, doubt is not the opposite of faith,

00:22:15.920 - 00:22:32.900

It is one element of faith, end quote that quote alone might help us better appreciate white King of all of theologians out there. King would later choose to write an entire dissertation on paul Tillich and comparing

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til IX understanding of God to that of the personal ist theologian and philosopher at boston University, Henry nelson , Weisman King and Tillich shared a correspondence. I was looking just last night at the wonderful letter,

00:22:48.820 - 00:23:02.950

martin, Luther King wrote to paul Tillich in uh in 1950 for this is a year before Rosa Parks sits down, soaking, nobody knows who young Martin King is. He's writing a dissertation and he's pastoring

00:23:02.960 - 00:23:17.070

a church or preparing to assume a pulpit in Montgomery Alabama until it is giving the Gifford lectures at the University of Aberdeen, he's in Scotland. The letter finally catches up with him a couple of weeks later

00:23:17.080 - 00:23:27.890

, Tillich writes back to young Martin King, I would love to meet you. However, I am here for a period and then I'm going to be traveling more well, ultimately, um, in response

00:23:27.900 - 00:23:42.690

till it died in the intermediate Venning period and uh , and King until it never got together. It was just so busy actually. Years later, just never were able to meet. But king commented at

00:23:42.690 - 00:24:02.910

the time of Philip's death, October 1965. He helped us to speak of God, God's action in history in terms which adequately express both the faith and the intellect of modern humans end, quote Kings,

00:24:02.910 - 00:24:17.860

doubts at intensified at Morehouse College when he was a student there from 1944 1948 we have pictures of young martin King seated on the front seat, front row of the chapel. As we're gathered here. I

00:24:17.860 - 00:24:29.790

always think about those occasions, Who knew what would come from this? This young man, he arrived at college at the tender age of 15 due to World War Two and all of the younger people,

00:24:29.790 - 00:24:48.110

younger men, since more houses an all male college and across the street Spellman, all women's colleges sister institution. So Benjamin Mays, the creative recruiter negotiated and they managed to enable the brightest and most promising

00:24:48.110 - 00:25:00.630

high school students in their junior year to skip the senior year and make that their freshman year at Morehouse . Well, Kings doubts intensified at Morehouse. You've heard a little about them here, one thinks about

00:25:00.640 - 00:25:19.470

ericsson's idea that adolescence and young adulthood are times for working out one's identity and a larger sense of purpose at Crozier theological seminaries can graduate from Morehouse in 1948 goes on to Chester pennsylvania Crows er Theological Seminary.

00:25:19.480 - 00:25:34.480

That institution later moved to Rochester. So some of , you know, Colgate Rochester crows er uh divinity school, but that's where in seminary he encountered the thought of Frederick Nietzsche. I appreciate it. Professor

00:25:34.480 - 00:25:55.230

Wolves characterizations of the challenge that Nietzsche has posed to clearly generations of theologians believers as well as philosophers. To put books in particular by Frederick Nietzsche, the genealogy of morals and the will to power King.

00:25:55.230 - 00:26:11.390

Biographer john ans bro notes that king was disturbed by niches attack on Hebrew christian ethics as a glorification of weakness. So Nietzsche argued that we may define goodness as everything that heightens the feeling of power in humans

00:26:11.400 - 00:26:27.520

. The will to power is good power itself, and that we may define as bad whatever is born of weakness. Happiness is the feeling that power is growing and that resistance is being overcome. You can

00:26:27.520 - 00:26:44.890

see why Adolf Hitler would have read Nietzsche and found in him a powerful voice and guide. He contended that Christianity with its active pity and called for empathy with all the people who were broken and and and

00:26:44.890 - 00:27:00.200

weak, it was more harmful than any vice, since it made an ideal of anything that contradicted the instinct for the strong self pity, he argued, deprives us of the strength that is the essence of

00:27:00.200 - 00:27:17.380

life in the genealogy of morals need to charge the jews and christians, driven by hatred and resentment against the noble and the powerful, had developed what he called a slave ethic. That ethics celebrated love and

00:27:17.380 - 00:27:33.810

compassion for the poor, the poor, powerless, the suffering, the six ugly as a substitute for the noble morality of the ancients which had promoted the robust ideals of power, so affirmation, health,

00:27:33.820 - 00:27:51.150

perfection of body and beauty in the will to power . Nietzsche attacked the christian duty to love all humanity as a glorification of weakness. He saw this love as favoring those who were down and out, rather

00:27:51.150 - 00:28:08.930

than promoting the the folk virtues of pride, splendid anim al Itty. The instincts that rejoice in war , conquest, deification of passion, anger, revenge , cunning, adventure and knowledge. The Greeks through

00:28:08.930 - 00:28:26.560

their drama and olympic games showed us noble examples of human fulfillment and the romans through their empire with paved roads and vast military projected control order and the beauty of power to the ends of the known world.

00:28:27.240 - 00:28:45.060

This is where niches heart was. Why shouldn't those values now order modern europe modern Germany? It's chilling to see how this outlook has come to pervade much of the political and ideological landscape of contemporary America.

00:28:47.840 - 00:29:11.840

Instead, jesus and the Christianity's that followed him extol the virtues of modesty, reverence, resignation, moderation , piety, leniency and the like. And this stirred niches contempt profoundly. But for King following these

00:29:11.850 - 00:29:29.120

arguments, these dialogues. College student in the morning , reading christian theology in the afternoon, reading Nietzsche , you go back to the, to the dormitory , you've got a headache. one biographer characterized it

00:29:29.130 - 00:29:48.850

this way King had as a seminarian had about concluded that jesus ethical message of turning the other cheek and loving your enemy is effective only in conflicts among individuals , not in resolving conflicts among groups and nations.

00:29:48.440 - 00:30:07.220

That was this resting holding position, waiting for a better answer. In the midst of this crisis, young martin king heard a sermon. Bye Mordecai. Wyatt johnson, maybe a name you've never heard of

00:30:07.230 - 00:30:26.500

before. Dr Mordecai. Wyatt Johnson, also a Morehouse graduate. Okay. Would become the first african american President of Howard University in Washington, D. C. And was among the early Americans of any

00:30:26.510 - 00:30:44.770

ethnic group who traveled to India and met with Gandhi face to face. Howard Thurman was the first in 1936, Mordecai followed. And because Mordecai would become a university president had enormous appeal and influence and began

00:30:44.770 - 00:31:02.730

to give sermons on meeting Gandhi and the power of Nonviolence. As Gandhi lived it out to transform India . King did what any good student does. After hearing a powerful lecture or sermon, he read several

00:31:02.730 - 00:31:17.890

books on Gandhi, john and bo reports that and I quote this reading soon restored his original faith in the power of love. When love pervades nonviolent methods , far from being a symptom of weakness, it

00:31:17.890 - 00:31:37.210

is a potent force for social transformation. Love could be a social force. Years later in describing the Montgomery bus boycott, the revolution that rosa parks and the women of Montgomery drove forward, he explained that

00:31:37.210 - 00:31:56.020

christ had furnished the spirit and the motivation, but Gandhi provided the method. Although King had read plato , the theologians like Anders Nygren and ethicists like paul Ramsay on eros philia and agape, he said,

00:31:56.030 - 00:32:13.660

he wrote, and I quote Gandhi was probably the first person in history to lift the love ethic of jesus above, mere interaction between individuals to a powerful and effective social force on a large scale. End

00:32:13.660 - 00:32:36.780

quote Gandhi, as you know, was assassinated in 1948, the year of India's independence from Britain. The year martin King graduated from Morehouse. So Gandhi was long gone by the time young Martin King was

00:32:36.780 - 00:32:57.740

in a position to travel to India. Indeed, just a few years after his graduation from college and then seminary There, he was in 1955 in Montgomery Alabama, 1959 King was, did travel to India

00:32:57.740 - 00:33:13.940

and spent a month traveling throughout the subcontinent, meeting the disciples of Gandhi who are now running that newly independent nation. The important point is that King emerged from seminary with a renewed sense of love as a

00:33:13.940 - 00:33:30.460

social force, which as a, as a soul force, which could be a social force. Coherence was dawning for King King, a christian had found in a hindu Gandhi a new way to think about

00:33:30.460 - 00:33:45.420

how to resist and reject the inner violence of the spirit martin marty, the church historian and on my dissertation committee at Chicago often underscores this fascinating move that here King is a christian, but he finds his

00:33:45.420 - 00:34:01.040

social method of change in this hindu Gandhi. Even this intellectual move was a bit risky. In a conservative christian culture. Few people who sat in those black churches or any of the interracial marches in the

00:34:01.040 - 00:34:17.650

streets who listened to King preach about nonviolent, few of them knew that King was doing something interesting. He was fusing hindu and Eastern thought and practice into his social gospel Christianity. But King regarded this as

00:34:17.650 - 00:34:36.350

a deeper understanding of truth. Indeed, truth could not be contained in any single religious tradition. Truth is a force that manifests itself everywhere. That's why one needs to examine concepts like truth. Non violence

00:34:36.350 - 00:34:54.000

, love, power and justice comparatively, but also from a deeper, perhaps the deepest conceivable perspective. Far deeper than sociology. His college major at Morehouse or social science, Natural science, Comparative religion and

00:34:54.000 - 00:35:10.800

the Light. King discovered that he needed that branch of philosophy which itself philosophy adama logically, is the love or friend of wisdom, philia friend and Sophia wisdom phileo Sofia philosophy, that branch of philosophy known

00:35:10.800 - 00:35:28.030

as ontology, the study of being itself, the nature of existence. It's no surprise then, to discover that paul Tillich wrote a book that refuted niches critique of christian love as a glorification of weakness And

00:35:28.030 - 00:35:46.200

the title of the 54 book as you know, love, power and justice. But the subtitle many do not know ontological analyses and ethical applications. King knew about ethical applications of love from the amazing parents

00:35:46.200 - 00:36:04.200

, church members, all the people who lived the christian faith in a racist society. But this this ontological analysis that perspective on love was new and exciting and a much needed gift for him from Gandhi to

00:36:04.200 - 00:36:19.700

Tillich. What did King learn from Tillich? We know what he learned. We know that he learned a great deal from Gandhi, but what did he need from Tilling Love has within it? A special

00:36:19.700 - 00:36:42.400

capacity, a mysterious power, the ability to suffer and to forgive for the benefit of others. The common good Stilic wrote in his magisterial two volume, systematic theology. What Miroslav take least acknowledged that systematic

00:36:42.400 - 00:37:04.210

theology was very important for many more generations of people . He wrote All Love except a copy is dependent on contingent characteristics which change and are partial, such as repulsion and attraction, passion, and sympathy.

00:37:04.220 - 00:37:25.380

A gap is independent of these states. It affirms the other unconditionally. It is a gap that suffers and forgives. It seeks the personal fulfillment of the other end quote. Although King had already seen the

00:37:25.380 - 00:37:44.540

mysterious qualities of love and his parents and the dignified black folks who surrounded him and were his exemplars. He yearned for formal and rigorous intellectual presentation of these ideas and he found some of that in paul taylor

00:37:45.730 - 00:38:04.990

1963 when he sat in a Birmingham jail alone without paper without books, without a pen before his lawyer could smuggle in a newspaper and a pin. King had only himself, his education, his breadth and

00:38:04.990 - 00:38:24.570

depth of learning, his memory, his imagination to draw from. He had no conversation partners. Well correct that he now had jesus Gandhi thurman and Tillich helping him think through the nature of love, power

00:38:24.580 - 00:38:42.790

and justice. This is a high stakes environment. A seminar of one in a jail cell. I would illustrate Tillich perspectives on those these three ideas in this way, largely from his own words, Love

00:38:42.800 - 00:39:06.890

is the drive for the unity of the separated paul . Tillich love manifests its greatest power where it overcomes the greatest separation mm Power is the drive to actualize potential potency against the counter force of negation. Til

00:39:06.890 - 00:39:27.240

IX is using some of nature's language terms common in german philosophical systems, Justice is establishing and preserving the order that love seeks in reuniting that which is separated . Justice should however, be creative, adaptive and

00:39:27.240 - 00:39:51.730

needs loves reuniting restorative energy to fulfill itself. Justice establishes a new baseline. But Love transcends justice aims higher reaches farther and thereby fulfills the demand of justice against nature. Tillich proclaimed that love should be the

00:39:51.730 - 00:40:08.100

foundation of power and that christian love must be, must be united with power in order to accomplish its twofold goal of negative, of negating what is against love and of saving the soul of those who act

00:40:08.100 - 00:40:25.000

against love. King understood that power was fundamentally the focus of politics. The ancients had lofty understandings of the role of politics in the laws. Plato suggested that, quote, politics is the highest form of

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the art of caring for souls and true justice aimed for harmonizing the rhythm and meter of the polis the city with the movement of the soul and the stars . But in modernity, more utilitarian understandings of power

00:40:43.200 - 00:40:58.330

have taken hold. You know, the imminent political scientist, Harold Lloyd as well, who defined politics as the art of who gets what, when and how. But I'm intrigued by two other definitions of

00:40:58.330 - 00:41:13.820

politics. Again, love power, Justice, power politics wade nobles. The social psychologists who said power is the ability to define reality and compel others to relate to that reality as if it were their own

00:41:15.410 - 00:41:37.250

. And then of course, there was comedian Groucho Marx. Marx is priceless definition. Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies. Indeed

00:41:37.260 - 00:41:54.670

, King understood that oppressed and excluded people needed political goods like voting, running for office, governing and making policy to truly participate in democracy. By the early 1960s, he expanded from political goods to economic

00:41:54.680 - 00:42:15.230

goods. The March on Washington in 1963 was billed as a March for Jobs and Freedom 1968, he defined power is the ability to achieve purpose, the strength required to bring about social political or economic changes

00:42:15.700 - 00:42:35.620

. Want to skip ahead to focus now more centrally on what it is. The moral leader is engaged in the king's is simply a case study. Moral leaders frame issues as moral issues in this capacity the

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moral leader becomes. I'm suggesting something of a public intellectual and a public voice moral leaders as public intellectuals think and communicate ideas strategically to calibrate the moral compass of the nation and to catalyze constructive action. That's

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my more elaborate two summary Noam Chomsky, one of America's well known public intellectuals suggests intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments to analyse actions according to their causes and motives and often hidden intentions

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. They have the power that comes from political liberty , access to information and freedom of expression. I'm gonna move skip over some material that talks about the dumbing down of discourse, political discourse in american life

00:43:35.600 - 00:43:54.010

and the rising biblical illiteracy in the nation, for instance, 1, 2014 Christianity Today report Ed Stetson says Pew Research tells us that 23% of americans didn't read a single book in the last year. That's

00:43:54.020 - 00:44:08.790

three times the number who didn't read a book in 1978. Number growing whether it's the internet, video games, the tv or increased time spent on entertainment and sports, americans are spending less time between the

00:44:08.790 - 00:44:28.750

pages of any book and not just the bible. Another study found that 45% of those who regularly attend church, 45% read the Bible more than than once a week, Only less than half of our parishioners

00:44:28.760 - 00:44:43.870

, only 40% of the people attending are reading their bibles occasionally, maybe once or twice a month, if at all. In fact, 18% of attenders say they never read the Bible. If this is

00:44:43.870 - 00:45:00.550

true, that means there are millions of north americans who lack meaningful awareness and knowledge of religious ideas. Historical importance of the bible as a decisive force in generating Western civilization and its salience as a masterpiece of

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literature and language. Let me skip ahead to the tasks of the moral leader as public theologian and suggest that there are five tasks I invite you to reflect on first the moral leader as public, public intellectual

00:45:22.060 - 00:45:35.940

or public theologian. Take your pick. They addressed the grand questions of human existence. This is a challenge to me. Every time I think about framing a sermon, is there a large question, is

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there some high staked issue underlying? Or is this is this kind of transitory and relatively trivial? And often I catch myself and I said, this is not important enough to be proclaimed as God's word.

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Let me return the great, great questions and issues of life. Public intellectuals and theologians start may start with parochial issues. You can start with the mundane and quotidian, but where do you go next?

00:46:08.760 - 00:46:28.500

They? Re contextualized them into a larger moral drama that invites everyone's interest. King did this as he took the issue of desegregating the buses in Montgomery Alabama after rosa parks's deliberate and defiant moral agency in transgressing

00:46:28.660 - 00:46:46.030

segregation laws. And he placed that incident that morning into the long arc of a conflict between good and evil. Many people outside of Alabama wouldn't have been able to find Montgomery on the map or recall if

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they've ever heard of it. So King made Montgomery a global stage for the moral drama of good and evil. Think about that. Well, you write your next sermon two. They provide compelling responses to

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these large questions they do not seek to answer. I'm not saying they answer the questions they address the questions. Rather, they seek to offer responses. The new testament scholar Gail O'Day said that as we

00:47:22.000 - 00:47:38.730

engage the questions raised in the wisdom literature, for instance, why did the good die young? Why do bad things happen to good people? What becomes of the soul after death? How can belief and

00:47:38.730 - 00:47:59.400

doubt exist constructively simultaneously? She said there's no answer for such questions, but there is a reply stated throughout the hebrew bible and the new testament. The reply is simply, you are not alone as you

00:47:59.410 - 00:48:17.930

face this crisis. Yeah, Way declares I will be with you third, having addressed and framed large and grand questions that are at stake offering their responses . They addressed the public at large the question of

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audience. All rational people, and not simply their own tribe, not just presbyterians. This is part of a project of serving the common good moral leaders , as public intellectuals speak to the whole people,

00:48:37.270 - 00:48:53.710

the unformed but possible community that comes from identifying common ground. And they resist the temptation to sing only the familiar hymns to and with their familiar friends. They seek to d parochial eyes every text by asking

00:48:53.720 - 00:49:15.350

how can we be or become radically inclusive, who is not at this table for they communicate in short form, underscore that short form. This of course , is subjective and the brief sermon rather the and

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this may be controversial to some, but the op ed essay, concise radio commentary, internet commentary, brief sermons seem to be the most adequate genre for our age, Shakespeare told us brevity is the soul

00:49:31.070 - 00:49:46.470

of wit, which I'm defined now. Of course , in in our concession plays our salvation, as our audiences say. Do they get to the point ? Please have something to say, say it well

00:49:46.480 - 00:50:04.360

. And then, as the kids say, then slam shut close. This seems to be especially well suited for our attention deficit audiences, twitter media, culture and even heads of State who are suspicious of

00:50:04.360 - 00:50:29.480

extended coherent sentences. Finally, moral leaders, as public intellectuals seek to catalyze strategic ethical action. One of the Deans of Home Politics, Henry Mitchell says every sermon should invite or prescribe a behavioral response,

00:50:30.760 - 00:50:43.240

not necessarily deciding for christ at that moment. He says, you don't have to close the deal in every sermon. I know that's controversial. Some preachers said that you do, but he says, trust

00:50:43.240 - 00:50:58.170

the Holy Spirit to work with people, give them what they need for that hour. Let them move on. In light of these criteria, I could explore the role of reinhold Niebuhr and how he illustrates

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this nicely. I don't have time to do that now, but that would have been the next move and let me begin move toward a conclusion. I think the one thing that I highlight in the neighbor

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life and ministry was his wonderful um serenity prayer. You all know it 1941 alcoholics anonymous adopted that prayer . He was proud that prayer he said might outlive all of his theology and all of his, his

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thick books. God grant me the serenity to accept the things. I cannot change courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference there again concession short, pithy and powerful and of course

00:51:49.410 - 00:52:05.760

neighbors words in that prayer have transformed the world and certainly the lives of many, many people. Finally King in that letter from Birmingham jail, I've already urged to go back and reread it if you haven't

00:52:05.760 - 00:52:27.120

before do read it. That in writing that letter as a kind of model of public intellectual expression, King decided not to keep silent in the face of the moderate churches relative silence. But instead he as

00:52:27.120 - 00:52:44.660

those set of Winston Churchill, he weaponized the english language he was able to imagine and think and write this way because enduring institutions had invested in him. You've heard already more than you want to about Morehouse

00:52:44.670 - 00:52:57.410

. But there will be more tomorrow. Yeah. In this lecture, we've entertained the notion that moral leaders become public intellectuals as they must appeal to the common good. That's part of the burden. That

00:52:57.420 - 00:53:07.800

how do you you can talk about common good, but if it isn't fair, how do you search for common ground? A question raised by many of you during our last Q. And A. I

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think that's part of the challenge. We almost have to go out and help construct it in dialogue, but framing conversations so that they can be productive. Finally, this is a dimension of leadership that we

00:53:21.940 - 00:53:42.310

found present in Gandhi King, Mother Teresa, Congressman Barbara Jordan and Senator john McCain. Finally, moral leaders build and invest in institutions that live beyond their own lives. One section I skipped over is that

00:53:42.310 - 00:53:58.540

they also teach us how to die with dignity and that notion of living a life that is exemplary, but also a death that can be exemplary, a death of dignity. I'll leave discussion for these other

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matters until our conversation tomorrow. Ultimately, the institutions that moral leaders established support and invest in represent a key way in which they serve the common good far beyond the limits of their personal lives. Thank you