{"id":981,"date":"2024-09-20T19:01:23","date_gmt":"2024-09-20T19:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/?p=981"},"modified":"2026-03-30T16:28:30","modified_gmt":"2026-03-30T16:28:30","slug":"dustin-woods-class-visits-site-of-mlk-address","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/2024\/09\/20\/dustin-woods-class-visits-site-of-mlk-address\/","title":{"rendered":"Dustin Wood\u2019s Class Visits Site of MLK Address"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Interior
Interior of Wightman Chapel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Civil Rights Movement has been described as a religious phenomenon. Many of the Movement\u2019s leaders were ministers, and many more people were inspired to participate in the Movement due to their religious beliefs. While religion motivated many individuals to join the struggle for civil rights, most churches were hesitant to support the Movement at an institutional level.<\/p>\n

On April 25, 1957, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. addressed the Conference on Christian Faith and Human Relations co-hosted by Vanderbilt Divinity School and Scarritt College. In his speech, \u201cThe Role of the Church in Facing the Nation\u2019s Chief Moral Dilemma,\u201d King lamented that the Nation had \u201cnot learned the simple art of loving our neighbors, and respecting the dignity and worth of all human personality\u201d and exhorted more than 300 church leaders to realize the Church\u2019s obligation to address \u201cthe plague of racial conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Wood
Wood with the lectern believed to have been used by MLK, Jr.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201c[E]very Christian,\u201d King argued, \u201cis confronted with the basic responsibility of working courageously for a non-segregated society. The task of conquering segregation is an inescapable must confronting the Christian Churches.\u201d King\u2019s speech directly rebuked those who desired distance between the Church and the Civil Rights Movement. \u201cIf we are to remain true to the gospel of Jesus Christ,\u201d King urged, \u201cwe cannot rest until segregation and discrimination are banished from every area of American Life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thanks to the hospitality of the Scarritt Bennett Center, Dr. Dustin Wood\u2019s Rhetoric of U.S. Religion class had the pleasure of visiting the very space where King delivered his momentous message. Wood\u2019s class gathered in historic Wightman Chapel to discuss King\u2019s speech and entertain present-day applications of the address. As his students sat in the pews once occupied by King\u2019s audience, Wood encouraged his class to reflect on the Reverend\u2019s call to love one\u2019s neighbors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Civil Rights Movement has been described as a religious phenomenon. Many of the Movement\u2019s leaders were ministers, and many more people were inspired to participate in the Movement due to their religious beliefs. While religion motivated many individuals to join the struggle for civil rights, most churches were hesitant to support the Movement at…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":984,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[13,3,4],"tags":[5],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/cdn.vanderbilt.edu\/vu-cas\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2024\/09\/20185115\/Wood_Thumbnail_MLKAddressSite.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/73"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=981"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":992,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/981\/revisions\/992"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/as.vanderbilt.edu\/communication-studies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}