01/11/2024

Dear Loggers,

You are invited to begin the semester by attending Puget Sound’s 38th Annual Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Celebration on Thursday, Jan. 18, at 6:30 p.m. The event will include a keynote lecture by Dr. Fred Johnson III, our Spring 2024 Swope Endowed Lecturer. Dr. Johnson, the Guy Vander Jagt Professor of History at Hope College, is a scholar of 19th-century United States history, with a particular focus on the Civil War era. His talk, “MLK: The Quintessentially American King,” will invite us to consider that the more perfect union of “We the People” shall only be realized “when the first-class citizenship sought for by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., becomes a reality for all Americans.”

In addition to Dr. Johnson’s address, the event will feature welcome remarks, the presentation of Puget Sound’s annual “Keep Living the Dream” award, and a closing call to action by University Chaplain Rev. Dave Wright. Following the program, all are welcome to attend a reception with Dr. Johnson in the Kilworth Lounge. For more information about this year’s celebration, please contact Margo Palmer at mdpalmer@pugetsound.edu.

The event is hosted by the Office of Institutional Equity & Diversity in collaboration with the Swope Endowed Lectures. The Swope Endowed Lectures are made possible by an endowment established in honor of Puget Sound alumna Jane Hammer Swope, Class of 1942. The lectures invite significant speakers to campus to help the Puget Sound community engage with themes of faith, ethics, values, or religion in society.

The next Swope Lecture is in September, when we will welcome Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass. For more information about the Swope Endowed Lectures, please contact Wright at dwright@pugetsound.edu.

We hope to see you on Jan. 18 at 6:30 p.m. in Kilworth Chapel for this evening of commemoration, celebration, education, and challenge as we engage the complex and powerful legacy of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. In his words, "We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

Together we thrive, fellow loggers!

With much appreciation,

Miriam Chitiga, Senior Director for Intercultural Engagement
Dave Wright, University Chaplain
Margo Palmer, Assistant to the Vice President of Institutional Equity & Diversity