A Letter from the Beloved Community

Dear Martin Luther King Jr., 

A year ago, 200 hundred kids across the country came together with the hope of building a better democracy. As young people, we realized that the ways of the past weren’t going to be the solution to a brighter future. We approached democracy reform differently, centering our conversation around building a community and seeing self-development as the key to unlocking the dream that you spoke of not too long ago. In our quest to reform democracy, we realized that we needed to empower and embolden our communities while changing our systems. It’s no coincidence that we stumbled into the importance of the Beloved Community - a community built on love, restorative justice, and equity.

No question, the foundation of the Beloved Community is love. At first glance, it seems as if there is no space for love in politics and revolutions. Looking inside our broken community, we can’t seem to find it. It has no home on the House floor as we debate behind steadfast party lines or in crowded streets full of tear-gassed protesters. Love looks frivolous and an idealistic discussion when lives are on the line and futures are being compromised.

As we reconcile with the ways to drive the future forward, we can’t help but think of one of your quotes; “Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.” 

Our ambitions to address our current challenges can’t be achieved by employing the weapon that drove us apart in the first place; we can’t heal our broken country and community with anything but love. 

Love means hoping for the best, seeing the beauty in one another: it’s the first step towards camaraderie. As young black women, loving a country that betrays that love in more than one way isn’t easy. When people ask how someone denied their humanity can love their country -- the answer is in the love they have. A love that is cognizant, not blind, of our flaws and fractures. Love that respects our history and our wrongdoings gives us the privilege to be optimistic for the future because we are loving our nation fully, not an illusion of perfection.

How we love is personal and specific. But in our Beloved Community, love is not passive and it does not stand back. We all do it differently; which is magical in its own way. Love was in the nurses that went to work each day of the pandemic, in the state representatives who pushed tirelessly for their constituents, the students who stayed indoors, and the teachers that rallied behind them from home. It isn’t romantic dinners or stuffed animals on Valentine's Day. We already love in our own ways. We just wonder if we can all realize that we love our country in ways that feel small but powerful enough to withstand what feels like endless chaos. Love has seen us through one of the most transformative eras of our history, it not only has a place in the conversation, but it’s worth bringing to the forefront every day. 

The idea that we could somehow grow to love each other while the atrocities of our history stampede into the future like unresolved ghosts make restorative justice synonymous with a loving future.

Justice, in all its importance, is steeped in a negative connotation. While it inspires hope, accountability, and necessity in some; it bodes vengeance, retribution, and the potential to stand trial before an unforgiving jury. Being on the right and wrong side of history might just be what divides us to the point of no return. 

But moving forward without addressing our past means breaking the community with a finality that’s difficult to reverse. With our present-day polarity and the shape-shifting force of racism, restorative justice feels like an unattainable fantasy. You saw that our right to live peacefully was a threat and your dream to build a better vision caused riots. It is still causing riots today. 

But we've had the privilege of coming across the impossible before; we found a Beloved Community. Civics Unplugged has shown us that your vision wasn’t impossible or rare. Seeing that the impossible is plausible can only mean that restorative justice is feasible. 

This dream is a reality, but only with the help of a Beloved Community. The task overwhelms an individual’s mind and would be flawed if only for a collective few; success requires millions to rally and thousands to believe. 

Restorative justice is accountability; it means difficult conversations and staying true to the promises of the Constitution. To transform justice from the idea of an unpleasant necessity to a practice of protecting our community, it all needs to take place within the safety of the Beloved Community. You put it perfectly, “Love is the only thing that can turn an enemy into a friend.” But as we struggle to see the Beloved Communities that exist, can we begin the trek towards restorative justice in a way that promises to heal for the generations of the past, present, and future? Success means vulnerability and honesty that only thrive in the communities we aspire to be.

Equity is threaded through the ideas that tie the community, love, and restorative justice together. Many of us define equity as the fair — as opposed to equal — distribution of resources: giving the most to those who need the most.

After millennia of marginalization, we have to pair good intention with restorative action to put people on the same playing field. Equity is the thoughts, actions, and goals for the Beloved Community.

At your 1964 Nobel Lecture, you spoke about the importance of equity and giving more to those who need more. You preached:  

“The rich nations must use their vast resources of wealth to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled, and feed the unfed. Ultimately a great nation is a compassionate nation. No individual or nation can be great if it does not have a concern for “the least of these.””

Being compassionate to all means being equitable. It means supporting and funding those who have not been and are not given opportunities. It means investing in young people, LGBTQ+ folks, people of color, and immigrants that have chosen to build their future in our community. Our commitment for the least of these should be tangible action because our inaction speaks volumes.

We called for equity this summer with a resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement; not because other lives don't matter, but because we have seen an explicit attack on Black people’s humanity in the United States. We must share a concern for the least of these.

And countless individuals and organizations are claiming to share a concern for the least of these. They have made statements condemning racial injustice and posted black squares.

That is not equity. 

You told us that equity isn’t about any of us. It isn’t about good PR. It uses one’s privilege to develop the underdeveloped, school the unschooled, and feed the unfed. We are called to be compassionate and courageous in righting the wrongs of generations past and present. 

So how do we start that journey? We have to intentionally listen to and support those who we haven't listened to and supported. 

We have to not only be actionable but vulnerable to the prospect of failing forward. We have to let go of what we think is right — and become servant leaders to the least of these, sparking the most change. We have to enkindle their light and potential. 

And it isn't just giving money. It is also donating our time, energy, and hearts. It is listening lovingly and intentionally. It creates space at the table and moves those tables so that many stakeholders and communities can be engaged

The concept of a Beloved Community can become less of a fantasy and more of a reality. It becomes a list of goals set within the next decade. It’s embodied in people and conversations and spirits and moments to learn, unlearn, and lean into what our full potential has to offer. Before your time, you gave us the vision to believe in what felt impossible -- reminding us that what we need may not be easy to articulate or feel like a far fetched dream. But far-fetched dreams are what build the future. 

With love from Civics Unplugged’s Beloved Community, 

Chabu Kapumba and Zo? Jenkins