Multiple events planned to celebrate King's life and work

The organizer of multiple Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebrations said King’s message is important because the country is more divided after a contentious presidential election.

“Whichever candidate you were for, I’m just saying the way those presidential campaigns were ran and words that came out of people that ran both parties, it’s more un-united than ever,” Debra Mitchell-Braxton said. “I would say in all the years that I’ve done Dr. King events — it’s 32 years that I’ve been doing this — I can say that I don’t see as much harmony and unity. I feel an economic divide, a racial divide.”

Six events will celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day in Cape Girardeau.

The first is the 15th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. birthday extravaganza at 7 p.m. Thursday at Franklin Elementary School.

At 6 p.m. Jan. 15, Great Dimension Ministries Church will host the 27th annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. community celebration program, featuring pastor Larry Barnett from St. John Praise and Worship Center in Pulaski, Illinois.

“What I hope to focus on is the importance of all life and with all the tumultuous situations taking place in our country,” Barnett said. “It’s important to remember to give back to each other and how significant every individual’s life is. Primarily, we want to bring to our consciousness the great sacrifices Dr. King made and the fact that he was focused on equality for all and justice for all.”

The Salvation Army will host the 32nd annual memorial breakfast at 7:30 a.m. Jan. 16, featuring minister JoAnn Pink from St. John Praise and Worship, and the 16th annual humanitarian luncheon benefit, featuring minister Caleb Barnett, also from St. John, at noon Jan. 16.

Mitchell-Braxton would like all the people who attend both events to bring canned goods or nonperishable items to donate to the Salvation Army and food banks in the area.

“We always have several hundred people attend both breakfast and lunch, and I was insinuating that if everybody brought a couple of canned goods, it would not be impossible to be able to reach thousands of canned goods,” she said. “People don’t realize this time of year, all the pantries are barren. ... What people fail to realize is that people have to eat 365 days a year.”

Mitchell-Braxton said Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day was meant as a national day of service, in keeping with King’s message of equality and good will to all people.

“I haven’t seen as much commitment from individual and organizations to ... ensure that there aren’t people out there without food and shelter,” Mitchell-Braxton said. “You can see that all over the United States with the amount of homeless people we have and the amount of people that don’t have the proper clothing and proper health care. It’s a change in our country.”

The 21st annual youth gala will be at 4 p.m. Jan. 16 at West Park Mall Centre Court.

“I think we’ve perhaps lost sight of the fact that the battle never ended,” Larry Barnett said of civil rights. “The struggle still continues on.”

Southeast Missouri State University will host a celebration dinner at 6 p.m. Jan. 18 at the Show Me Center. Dinner tickets are $20 each and $160 for a table.

Mary Frances Berry is the keynote speaker for the event. She is an author, educator and historian and served as the chairwoman of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. Berry was one of the founders of the Free South Africa Movement, helping to end apartheid.

“The young college students were at the forefront of most of the movements in this country; they were the ones that helped to bring about the change because they were the ones that did the sit-ins and a lot of the marches,” Mitchell-Braxton said. “My goal is to make sure we don’t diminish the meaning of the holiday because this is the holiday where we honor a man and the legacy that brought hope and change to America. He helped us to live by the values of courage, truth, justice, compassion, dignity, humility and above all, service to others.”

bkleine@semissourian.com

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