Love in Action: Lessons on Love from MLK and Dorothy Day
Love was a central principle in the thought and activism of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Dorothy Day. Both Day and King are exemplary for abiding in Jesus’ greatest commands, to love God and one’s neighbor, and championing social justice causes. Additionally, their activist efforts were concerned with redeeming the enemy; Day’s enemy were countries perpetrating violence, while King’s enemies were white supremacists violently and systemically impeding BIPOC people from civil rights and racial equality. However, Day’s relative privilege allowed her to choose the means and contexts of her love practice via “voluntary poverty,” whereas by being born black King was subjected to an “involuntary poverty” of equality and thus concentrated his love against the immediate racial oppression he and BIPOC people faced.
Both Day and King embraced Jesus’ devotion to social justice, using love as a tool to correct societal injustice. Day’s love was grounded in Jesus’ teaching of the two greatest commandments: love of God and love of neighbor. To fulfill these commandments, Day adopted St. Thérèse of Lisieux’s spiritual practice “the little way.” Day’s “little way” involved steadfast service to all of her House of Hospitality ““neighbors.” Using the Catholic Worker to champion workers’ rights was another “little way” she infused love into broken institutions and individuals”. King applied the Greek concept of “agapic” lovee” in context of Jesus’ two greatest commandments. King described agapic love as “purely spontaneous, unmotivated, groundless, and creative” (King, 18). Only this unconditional and selfless love, expressed through nonviolent resistance, could remedy racial injustice.
Both Day and King accepted Jesus’s call to love and redeem their enemies, utilizing its capacity to transform the enemy. Day interpreted Jesus’ teaching to love your enemies not as a poetic sentiment, but as a literal obligation that necessitated peace-making. Day argued that, “True love is so strong it casts out all fear, even of enemies, and [it is] a force so strong that it can overcome war” (Hill, 68). She understood love’s potency to pacify enemies, realizing the redemptive implication perhaps hidden in Jesus’ clear instruction. Throughout the Civil Rights Movement, King espoused Jesus’ teaching to love one’s enemy. In one sermon King proclaimed, “But if you love your enemies, you will discover that at the very root of love is the power of redemption” (King, “Loving Your Enemies”). King understood that agapic love was both an end to fulfill Jesus’ teaching, but also a means to win over oppressors to the cause of racial equality. Thus, despite withering criticism from other black leaders, King insisted that nonviolent resistance was not only commanded, but also tactically wise.
Day’s relative privilege allowed her to choose “voluntary poverty,” whereas King was subjected to an “involuntary poverty” of equality by being born black. Day chose her impoverishment, sacrificing her luxuries to be in solidarity with the poor she loved. Day became one of the people that she sought to help; King was one of the people that he sought to help. King’s employment and advocacy of agapic love was focused on redressing systematic racism that made the impoverished conditions that Day chose for herself an inescapable reality for nearly all African Americans. He rose above this reality, mobilizing love into a movement dedicated to achieving a new reality of racial equality and economic justice.
A pneumatological understanding of each exemplar’s activism in the context of their respective christian tradition, Day’s Catholicism and King’s Protestantism, is necessary for further comparisons and contrasts. I certainly conclude from my study of these seemingly disparate figures is that defining love outside of it’s very explicit command from Jesus is contextual and adaptable. Love is not contained to a single methodological expression or doctrinal definition. As its source, love is sacrificial and through that costly demonstration of unexpected grace comes redemption. King attacks the state by turning love into a political weapon; Day attacks the state by taking on its injustices to be in solidarity with those who can’t chose. Regardless of method, both figures had championed movements which embodied the love of Jesus Christ and for that courage and humility, they are exemplary.
“And the King will answer them, ‘Don’t you know? When you cared for one of the least important of these my little ones, my true brothers and sisters, you demonstrated love for me.’ Matthew 25:40 TPT
