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Morehouse College News FOUNDED 1867
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Institutional Advancement * Division of Communications * 830 Westview Drive, S.W. * Atlanta, Georgia 30314 |
MOREHOUSE COLLEGE INTRODUCES GANDHI CENTER AND "SEASON FOR NONVIOLENCE"ATLANTA, January 24, 2000 - The third annual "A Season for Nonviolence," a 64-day campaign designed to promote the principles and practices of nonviolent community change, healing and empowerment will be observed internationally, January 30 through April 4, the dates Mohandas K. Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. were assassinated. Atlanta activities, which will close the international campaign, culminate on "Millennium Sunday," April 2. They are being sponsored by the Atlanta Task Force for a Season of Nonviolence and the Morehouse College Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel. That Sunday, the 11 a.m. service at the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel at Morehouse, will serve as the symbolic closing of the worldwide project in spirit-based social activism and the launch of the United Nation's declaration for a decade of peace and nonviolence for children of the world. The first decade is devoted to youth nonviolence education. That service will also mark the inauguration of the Gandhi Center for Reconciliation at the College Chapel and a tribute to Dr. King, Gandhi and his late wife, Kastur Gandhi. Government representatives from India will unveil two bronze busts of the Gandhis as a gift to Morehouse College. Honorary degrees will be given posthumously to Mohandas and Kastur Gandhi, and following the service, Coretta Scott King will unveil a 9-foot bronze tablet of the "I Have a Dream" speech in the lobby of the King Chapel. This speech was voted the greatest speech of the 20th Century by 100 American professors. In addition to Dr. King and the Gandhis, both of whose family members will attend, the program will also honor with oil portraits Alberta Williams King, the Rev. Johnnie Colemon, Marian Wright Edelman, Mary McLeod Bethune, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher '63, Dr. Louis W. Sullivan '54 , Dr. Samuel Nabrit '25, Dr. George Washington Carter, the Rev. Jim Lawson, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, the Rev. Wiley Jackson, and Dr. Joseph T. Roberts. The Rev. Michael Beckwith of Agape International Center of Truth of Los Angeles will be the keynote speaker and will be joined by his 135-voice Agape International Choir, and the 38- student orchestra from the Atlanta University Center. The Season for Nonviolence will be launched at 3 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 30 at King Chapel with the viewing of "A Force More Powerful - A Century of Nonviolent Conflict" a documentary narrated by actor Ben Kingsley. The film is the story of nonviolent power overcoming oppression and authoritarian rule in conflict during the last 100 years. The film will kick off a panel discussion featuring several prominent authorities on the principles of nonviolence, in cooperation with the United Nations declaration for a decade of peace and nonviolence. The Gandhi Center for Reconciliation, which will be housed on the Morehouse campus, is co-founded by the King Chapel; the India-American Cultural Association of Atlanta; the Association for Global New Thought; the Foundation for Community Encouragement; the Atlanta Task Force for the Season for Nonviolence; the Fellowship of Reconciliation; the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; The National Youth and College Division of the NAACP; the Agape International Center of Truth; and the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons, of Georgia. The Gandhi Center, which will be constructed behind the King Chapel, will serve as a conference and multi-cultural center where community-based forums will be conducted on a variety of subjects and serve as a living and learning center for international students and resident scholars. "Our goal is to help develop leaders who think differently about problems of oppression and insensitivity which tend to be examined within narrow contexts with little attention paid to their complex and often paradoxical generalities around the world," said the Rev. Lawrence Edward Carter Sr., dean of the King Chapel. One of the most distinguished institutions of higher education, Morehouse College is the nation's only historically black, private liberal arts college for men. Founded in 1867, the College enrolls approximately 3,000 students and confers bachelor's degrees on more black men than any other institution in the world. In addition to offering 36 majors in the humanities, natural and social sciences, Morehouse provides a number of programs and activities to enhance its challenging liberal arts program, including the Leadership Center at Morehouse College, the Morehouse Research Institute, and the Andrew Young Center for International Affairs. Prominent alumni include Martin Luther King Jr., Nobel Peace Prize laureate and civil rights leader; Rev. Howard Thurman, internationally known theologian and author; Dr. Louis Sullivan, president of the Morehouse School of Medicine; Maynard H. Jackson, president of Jackson Securities and the first African-American mayor of Atlanta; M. William Howard Jr., president of the New York Theological Seminary; and Thomas Kilgore Jr., pastor emeritus of Second Baptist Church, Los Angeles, CA. # # # Media Contact: Thonnia Lee |