Martin Luther King Day, Adoption, and Brotherhood

A few days ago, I posted this:

I want to expand that thought a little.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the other freedom fighters of the 50’s and 60’s changed America. But it’s even closer to home for me.

Martin Luther King said:

“We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”

“We have flown the air like birds and swum the sea like fishes, but have yet to learn the simple act of walking the earth like brothers.”

“I have a dream that… one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”

Dr. King’s life and words resonate with our family, because his ideology simply reiterates what Scripture has been telling us for thousands of years.

“After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands,” Revelation 7:9

“So Peter opened his mouth and said: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” Acts 10:34-35

“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.” 1 Corinthians 12:12-13

The equality of all races is not a politically correct trend. It is a basic human issue. It is a spiritual value.

For our family, transracial adoption is a way we are able to tangibly live Dr. King’s dream of walking the earth as brothers.

Can I be blunt? We have no desire to whitewash our Black kids. We don’t want to save them from Blackness. They do not need to be rescued by a white family. That type of ignorance makes me sick to my stomach.

Instead, we are honored to have our children’s heritage mingled with our own. Our ideals are reshaped as we welcome their culture into our family landscape. They don’t conform to us. We all conform to each other. Isn’t that what true brotherhood is about?

On this Martin Luther King Day, I am grateful for the legacy and sacrifice of Dr. King. I’m grateful for the words he put around an uncompromisable value. I’m grateful that he helped lead the fight for brotherhood in America. And my heart is full with the brotherhood that we can live in our own home.

I don’t believe the fight is over, but I’m glad someone was brave enough to help it begin.

Thank you, Dr. King.

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