Strength of Many On Display for MLK Observance

How does a community and culture of individuals consumed with their own responsibilities and obligations work together toward the shared goal of eliminating hate?

Local civic and religious leaders gathered in Ridgewood seeking an answer in Ridgewood/Glen Rock on Monday for Martin Luther King Day, the 30th annual interfaith observance shared by the two communities. Featuring over a dozen houses of worship, borough and village residents crammed into the pews at for song, prayer and sermons. They later marched the downtown of Ridgewood in the memory of the great civil rights leader.

"Today I want to reaffirm and extend the lesson that Dr. King taught us in word and deed, that we are strongest when we walk together," said Rabbi Neil Tow of the . In his sermon, Tow touched on this year's theme: "The Power of One, the Strength of Many."

Fragmented like individual pieces art, there is little that can be accomplished, Tow said. But a tapestry where the religious identities are forgotten and people are served forms a strong bond, he concluded.

Quoting Heschel, the great Jewish rabbi, philosopher and friend of Dr. King, Tow said God's needs cannot be met in space but hand-in-hand at the community level.

"We must find new ways to work together, to walk together, as we have never done before," Tow said. Those of all faiths and even those without, Tow said, must realize "the conviction that we cannot move forward towards our shared goals if we only elect others to address the problems that we confront."

If that can't be done, "we will walk out of step and end up looking like poorly trained soldiers in the army of justice and peace," he noted. 

There have been accomplishments, according to Tow. The county shelter has been working to root out the causes of homelessness, not treating its symptoms. Schools have been battling the age-old issue of bullying. But ending hate requires more than just education from the schools, Tow remarked.

Added Ridgewood Mayor Keith Kilion: "Today, Dr. King’s principles of creating important changes in our communities, as we strive to sustain the freedom and equality for all residents, continue to be accomplished with the dedicated strength of the many who support these ideals." 

King himself suffered through stabbings, jailings, firebombings before his assassination in 1968. He preached, prayed and focused his work toward uniting, work that speakers said must continue today.

Rabbi Tow spoke of the parallels between the firebombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham in 1963 and the , most recently the firebombing in Rutherford.

"Hatred, we know, does not distinguish colors of skin and religious," Tow said. "As Dr. King said, if anyone of us is enslaved or oppressed, all of us are not free. Instead of molotov cocktails, let us light up the flames of unity and hope and peace. And we will certainly overcome."

Should there be real concerted change, it must not be a token gesture, Rev. John Hartnett or  pleaded to attendees.

Though Dr. King and those involved in the Civil Rights movement may seem like extraordinary figures with accomplishments citizens can't reach today, Hartnett said they were ordinary people with resolve and sacrifice.

"We have not finished because if we look at our world, the fact is the curse of slavery and the racism that went along with it is still very much part of our economy, part of our political life, part of our prison profile population, part of our employment, part of our schools, part of our housing."

We aren't finished! And to think that we are is disrespectful to those who made those great sacrifices," Hartnett said.

Glen Rock Mayor John van Keuran also touched on the need for community strength.

Before the rally through the Ridgewood downtown in the frigid cold, the mayor commented, "I suggest that the way to build the power of one is to preserve and enjoy and focus the strength of our diversity. And as we do, let us lift every voice and walk together.”

In the streets all that could be heard was chanting – "We shall overcome!"