Freedom

OK, so today is January 21^st but I’m writing this piece on Monday, January 19^th. This is the day set apart as a national holiday marking the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. A remarkable life indeed and one that somehow is so very uniquely American.

In the’ Land of the Free’ Dr. King felt free to pursue what he believed was right and righteous. More so, he believed this pursuit belonged to each of us – black, white, multi-hued, whatever. In fact Dr. King felt this was our rite of passage guaranteed by the freedoms warranted in our national constitution. A rite of passage. What is this?

A ‘rite’ is a ceremonial event in which a person’s transition from one phase of life to another is marked in a public manner. Think wedding, graduation, birthday party, funeral, and the like. Some are very formal and follow long-held social strictures or religious formats. Others are very casual; think birthday parties or anniversaries.

Most of us feel it is appropriate to recognize a person’s achievement or status change. A promotion in career, retirement from a successful career, a birthday, launch of a newly published book or lecture series, or whatever.

In most cultures we celebrate a youth’s transition to adulthood. In the Jewish faith male youth are given bar mitzvah parties following the actual religious ceremony. It is solemn and joyous. It means the youth has moved from an unknowing status of living to one of more awareness and growth potential. It is not the end point, but yet another beginning point. Like graduation ceremonies are termed commencements.

Weddings are similar. From single-hood to partner-hood, weddings mark the commencement of family formation and child bearing potential. Whether through natural birth or adoption family potential begins with the joining of two people. Whether the ceremony is performed in a justice of the peace office or in a cathedral, or in the forest clearing jumping over a stick in front of witnesses, the marriage is real. It is a marked occasion, with witnesses. It has status in our minds as a real transition.

Graduating from the bonds of slavery to freedom or from ignorance to knowing capacity, the rite of passage from within an individual’s consciousness to one of openness and potential is very real.

Often in our noisy society we miss those transitions. We do not take notice of another’s advancement from one stage of life into another stage. Sometimes, regrettably, that transition is missed by the individual himself. He skips the transition. Perhaps forever. We will not know. So many millions of people around us. Who is healthy and advancing in development toward the next phase – on schedule or off? Who has already experienced this change? And at what stage of development are any of us at any given moment?

Fat chance we will know these things. You and I live different lives. We advance our capabilities and capacities at different rates of change. Some of us keep advancing while others are arrested at one phase or another, far short of their true potential.

Dr. King wanted us all to keep growing. He knew we each had potential and promise. He loved knowing that a society has the ability to do the same mainly because it is made up of all of us. More so, he knew the society had a need to do this growing and stretching so its peoples could also experience the emergence of promise and hope.

With a formal rite of passage or not we each have the right to pass from one phase of development to another in our lives. That is the source of our Rights written in the US Constitution. These rights and freedoms are inalienable. They are not given to us by anyone or any government. They are our right to be who we are.  Regardless of ethnicity, bloodline, gender, national origin of birth, or age, we are all endowed with the right to be.

That is the message of Dr. King. That is what his life meant. That is what his life means. It transcends time and era. It is a message for the ages of the ages.

I am free to be me. You are free to be you. And no one can take that away from you or me. Only we can give it up or waste it. Dr. King urges us today not to let that happen.

Each of us has the responsibility to live in freedom and exercise our rights. We don’t need a holiday to remind us of this, do we?

Perhaps so.

January 21, 2015