I'd bet my right to vote on it

I received the following email from a fellow Portsmouth resident.

Your recent "Sunday evening musings" rings a bell to what has occurred in communities like mine (predominately African-American). On one hand you have creative leaders and thinkers like Martin Luther King Jr who vehemently believed in non-violent social change. They believed that confrontation was warranted only when those who opposed civil rights for everyone literally stood in their way (i.e. voting poll). The results of their efforts and doctrines are unarguably monumental. On the other hand, you have many of today's leaders, often clergymen, in communities similar to mine that devote far too many resources to personal "blessings" and the hereafter rather than the here and now. I'm still waiting for someone in my community to tell me to "Have an involved day" rather than "Have a blessed day".

The lives of Dr. King, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and according to Christian theology, Christ all represent altruism. Altruism when combined with non-violent social change always has and always will change the world forever and for the better. I'd bet my right to vote on it.

Thank you, Robert. May we, indeed, stand together, involved and, ideally, blessed.