MLK Sermon About Courage and Cowardice

Transcript

Paul Tillich has written, ? courage [Crossed out: MS: illegible] is self-affirmation ?in spite of?? that which tends to hinder [Crossed out text: these selves] [Inserted over crossed out text: the self] from affirming itself.? It is self-affirmation [Crossed out: MS: illegible] [Crossed out text: -] in spite of [Crossed out text: -] [Inserted over crossed out text: death] and nonbeing, and he who is courageous takes the fear of death into his self-affirmation and acts upon it. [Crossed out text: Erigh] [Inserted over crossed out text: Erich] Fromm has shown inconvincing terms that the right kind of self-love and the right kind of love of others are interdependent, and that selfishness and the abuse of others are likewise interdependent. Courage, the determination not be overwhelmed by any [Crossed out text: objective] [Inserted over crossed out text: object] [Inserted text after object: ,] however frightful [Inserted text after frightful: ,] enables us to stand up to any fear. Trouble is a reality in this strange medley of life, danger [Crossed out text: looks] [Inserted over crossed out text: lurk] within the circumference of every action, accidents do occur, bad health is an ever-threatening possibility and death is a stark, grim and inevitable fact of human experience. This requires the exercise of [Inserted text after of: a] creative will that enables us to hew out a stone of hope from a mountain of despair. Courage breeds creative self-affirmation; cowardice produces destructive self-abnegation.