January 13, 2026 • 37 mins
Rev. Al Sharpton has marched, ministered, and mobilized for over 50 years, but his calling began long before the cameras.
In this special episode leading up to MLK Day, Sharpton joins hosts Martin Luther King III, Arndrea Waters King, Marc Kielburger, and Craig Kielburger to reflect on the legacy that shaped him – and the work still ahead.
Sharing stories of meeting Dr. King as a boy, learning resilience from his mother, and the women whose names history often leaves out, Sharpton opens up about the families he’s stood beside, the faith that’s fueled him, and the promise that drives everything he does.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- Why faith—not strategy—sustains a movement
- How action carries legacy forward
- What it means to show up for the next generation
Don’t miss an episode—subscribe now to catch new releases every Tuesday.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
And it flashed across the bottom of the screen. Doctor
Martin Luther King, Junior has been shot and killed and nothing.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
From marches to microphones.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Because when Colin took on knee, he took it for
the families and miss Frilling.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Reverend al Sharpton has carried doctor King's dream through the decades.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Doctor King gave me a purpose and a mission, and
your mother fine tuned my personality so I could be
better at doing.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
And paid the price for never backing down.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
I've been stabbling the march and didn't know if I
was gonna make it. I've been indicted and the only
thing you could do.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
With Reverend Sharpton opens up about the early days, the struggles,
the lessons, and the people who shaped him.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Think about that woman telling me, don't let that kid down,
And I think all of us need to be able
to step back and realize that somebody depending on us
not to let them down.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Join host Martin Luther King the Third, Andrea Waters, King,
Mark Kilberger, and Craig Kilberger for a deeply moving conversation
about courage and conviction.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
As we honor the life and legacy of doctor.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
King, are we closer to the dream or are we
drifting further away?
Speaker 1 (01:16):
So you learn not to celebrate too much, and you
learn not to get too broken arder on the bad day.
Get me.
Speaker 5 (01:27):
Welcome to my legacy. Today's guest is a towering figure
in civil rights, a spiritual leader, and one of the
most influential voices in justice for our lifetime. Reverend Al Sharpton,
Reverend Sharpton, we are indeed honored to have you with
us today, Sir. Thank you, Rev.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Well, thank you. I'm honored to be with you.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
Know, Rev. This is extraordinarily special for certainly Andrea and
I our friendship going back many years.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
I want to go back to the beginning.
Speaker 4 (01:58):
You've said they would be noae Al Sharpton without Martin
Luther King Jr.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Rev.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
You met my father as a child, but you said
that it was your mother's reaction to dad's assassination that
profoundly impacted you.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I had grown up in the Church of God in Christ,
and I had become a boy preacher when I was
four years old, actually preaching my first sermon before people
in this large church, and my parents ended up separating
when I was ten, So we moved from this nice
middle class home in Hollis Queen's and ended up in
(02:43):
the projects, just my mother and sister and I. I'm
twelve years old. And she took me to the Bishop,
Bishop Washington, and he said to me, you met doctor
King and the Fruitom Riders had a rally here. I said,
I said, yeah, I remember meeting Man Uther King. He said, well,
that's the kind of movement you need to be it.
(03:04):
And he brought me over to Reverend William Jones house
and talked to Reverend Jones about me being involved. And Rev.
Jones said, I know to do it, and we'll make
our youth director of the chapter. So that's how I
got involved in the chapter of selc Breadbasket in New York.
A couple of months later, we were sitting in the
(03:28):
living room watching black and white TV. Wasn't no color
TV there, and it flashed across the bottom of the screen.
Doctor Martin Luther King, Junior has been shot and killed
in Memphis, and my mother broke down start crying like
it was a member of our immediate family. And I
had met doctor King. I was then getting involved in
(03:51):
the chapter, but I felt she was Why was she
reacting so personal? And my mother said, you would have
had to have been growing up sitting in the back
of the bus on not being able to go to
a restaurant or not even user Tarlet downtown Dothan, where
I visited where she grew up to understand what Doctor
(04:12):
King met. And it really moved me that my mother
was this mood, and so I started taking more seriously
going to the Breadbasket meetings. And then Nina Simone came
out with a song that was a track on a
film call from Montgomery to Methods, and the song was
what are we gonna do now? The King of Love
(04:33):
is dead? And I remember the lyrics. Keith turned the
other cheek. He pleaded love your neighbor was his plea
what are we gonna do? And I felt that at
thirteen years old, she was singing to me, and I
felt indicted. And I decided then that despite the fact
I knew all the big creatures in New York and
(04:54):
I was known to them as a boy preachering and
everybody was saying, we're gonna put you in seminary, We're
going to get you whatever church you on that I
wanted my ministry to be like Doctor King. Your father
was the reason I did not pursue that Adam Clayton
Bower route of getting a big church, going to Congress.
I wanted to be in the movement. I felt Nina
(05:15):
Simone was indicting me, and I felt that if what
my mother would weep for meant so much to her,
what your father did, I believe that that was my calling.
That's why it was such important to me when I
started working closely with you, and then you got me
closer with your mother, because I was grounded in that,
(05:38):
you know how with Thurman, who you knew and studied,
knew his work, used to say that that a man
must choose and deal with his foundation. He says, it's
a strange freedom. This is the strange freedom to be
(05:58):
adrift in the world. Men that have no sense of
being anchored to anything. And your father's work and SCLC
and to work of your mother and work you and
I and Andre have done together has kept me anchored.
So even when I later got to know James Brown
and Michael Jackson and others, I was anchored and I
(06:20):
would always stand in the movement because of the work
of your father.
Speaker 6 (06:24):
One of the things that I have always greatly admired
and appreciated about you is how you have always, I
don't even say lifted up acknowledged the strength and power
of women. You know you talked about you know, Martin's mother,
Karreta Scott King, and I know how much you acknowledged
(06:45):
her strength and power.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Rev.
Speaker 6 (06:48):
I know that one of the first ways that you
became active in politics was as the youth director for
Shirley Chisholm's nineteen seventy two presidential campaign. For those who
may not know, she was the first black woman elected
to Congress and also the first black candidate to ever
run for president. So you've always embraced women, and you
(07:11):
have a course to wonderful daughters Dominique and Ashley. Was
that just organic for you or was it your mother's example.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I think a lot of it was my mother, and
a lot of it was the church in the sense
that Bishop Washington was an outlier and let women preaching
our church when most churches then, including churches of God
in Christ, didn't believe in That.
Speaker 6 (07:33):
Was this in the fifties, late late fifty I was
baptized at three years old and fifty eight, and the
lady that preached at night.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Was a lady named Madame Emily Bram So it wasn't
strange to me to see women in leadership. But then
when I started getting a little just a little older,
and my father left and bands and my mother took
care of us. I would tell people when I started
(08:04):
getting involved in movement eleven and twelve, you don't understand
that my mother is the only reason that I had
clothes away to school. What are you talking about? Women
got to step back and my mother hadn't stepped up.
I remember we couldn't pay light and gas bills. I'd
do homework a candlelight for about six seven months, and
(08:24):
my mother said, boy, I don't care if we get
a flashlight. You're gonna do your work. You're gonna be
able to go to school where I couldn't do an alabima.
So I couldn't let nobody tell me what women wouldn't do,
because if it wasn't for a woman, I'd have been
in the streets having done something else. She kept me
in the church. She would scrub flaws, even though she
was on welfare. She would do domestic work so i'd
(08:46):
have a little suit to wear to preach at When
I'm a kid, I'm a boy preacher. So by the
time sixty eight comes and the year doctor King was killed,
an assembly woman in Brooklyn's running for Congress in nineteen
sixty eight, and they brought in a guy who was
(09:07):
nationally known who ran against her on the Republican ticket,
named James Farmer. He was at a corps and they
said Nixon sentiment and everybody was going, oh wow, James
Farmer is gonna be the Congress Congress. The assembly woman
running against him was Shirley chishom and I remember Shirley
(09:28):
Chisholm came by to our church and bich Washington like
James Farmer, but they let hers speak and she had
this kind of fire in her that reminded me of
my mother. And I went and started, to the chagrin
of Bitch Washington working in her campaign. I'm all of
thirteen years old. I couldn't vote at that time. Voting
(09:49):
was twenty one years old. And we became close, and
I would remember undergoing in rooms where she won she
beat James Farmer. I remember we going rooms and all
of the preachers and the leaders that day we can't
no woman lead us. And I think it was because
of my resentment of that that made me always got
(10:12):
in my way to say, no, we can't have this,
because if it wasn't for my mother, I wouldn't have
ever made it. And Shirley Chisholm embraced me. And I
remember in nineteen seventy two when you mentioned a running
for president. That was a year I was a youth
coordinator and they had the National Black Political Convention in Gary.
(10:34):
They didn't even invite her, and she was running for
president because many of the leaders had already made their
deals with George mcgoverett, who became the nominee, and they
kind of respected Missus. King was there and Betty Shabaz
was there, but they didn't invite Shirley. So I saw
the massagyne all of my life, and I always was
(10:58):
committed that I was gonna be one that would very
clearly stand against that and uh and later as as
as Martin and I started working together and he got
his mother to come up and do how first National
Action Network dinner, and I remember how strong and regal
she was. She was the only one that could really
(11:20):
talk to me about things that I guess everybody want
to talk to me about. She says, you said this,
that and the other. Why did you say that? I said, well,
you know, I was angry, and I was first surprised
she knew some of the.
Speaker 7 (11:33):
Crazy stuff I you said, And I said, she said, yeah,
but don't you know, if you're going to be in
Martin's tradition and you grew up in it, sometime we've
got to check what we say.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
I say, yes, ma'am, and she cites something else. And
she was always real gentle but regal about it. And
I always say that I give her credit. She people
talk about I saw the mainstream missus King had a
lot to do with me starting to say yeah, because
I would tell her, so, ah, they down south, I'm
up north, this the urban way. But she said, no,
(12:07):
there's another way. Or do you want the crown or
do you want the crowd? And I remember her seventieth
birthday at the Soul Food restaurant there Martin with his
scheme and had me sit next to her birthday dinner,
and she looked at me, she says, I'm glad you
flew down for my birthday, and I'm glad you're doing
(12:29):
better talking about and there would not have been a
movement had it not been for Kretascot King because and
I don't say that because I'm talking to you. I
say that all the time because she was the rock
that doctor King leaned. Imagine, with all of the craziness,
the threats they trying to scandalize him, if she had
(12:53):
been weaker, it would have turned the whole movement round.
And she held a lot of pain for us and
never got the credit for it. Still does it to
my because if you look at how people operate today,
if Missus King just did one interview, just did one
(13:13):
wayward word about the work or what doctor King had
gone through and put her through, it would have turned
the whole movement around. She never said anything to hurt
the movement and was on the front line. She was
on the front line against the one Vietnam before he was.
She was standing up for a lot of issues. She
was more progressive than some of the button down preachers
(13:36):
in the Southern Christian League. You cop.
Speaker 5 (13:39):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just might tap
that button and stay connected to conversations that count. Now
back to my legacy, and you.
Speaker 6 (13:51):
Talk about mothers, and one of the things that I
always like to remind people when we were together, because
sometimes people see you and Martin, you know, just on
stage or programs or the three of us or different configurations.
But this is a real relationship to us, and each
(14:11):
time there is probably no greater pain than when your
mom transitions. And for ever, for each one of us,
we were there for each other, you know. Of course
Rev came down with when your mom transitioned. We went
not to the big, fancy service, but we went to Dothan, Alabama,
(14:38):
in that little small church when your mom's funeral service.
And then of course when my mom transitioned, we asked
my sisters and I asked you to actually deliver her
her eulogy. So we all have been there for each
other doing the most trying of time time and for that,
(15:02):
I know I'm personally eternally grateful.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Now it's really family because you end up with kindred
spirits because you've been close enough to my case. They
see what they went through. I said many years ago
when we started doing the marches in Washington, I said,
do you know the burden it is? And wake up
every morning and every city in the world has your
(15:27):
father's name on there, and the expectations they put on
you and you didn't ask for that. That's what Martin
has to do every day, and then one hundred marries
into that. I mean, why would you marry into that
kind of frushet unless you call to do it, and
then the burden on Yolanda. So I think people see
(15:47):
the celebrity part of it, but it's the knowing that
every day, in every way, people are trying to dig
up some ways to undermine the movement and undermine the
legacy for their own political reasons and all they don't
see the pressure. And you got to be able to
have people around you that absorb that, which is why
I would say to him, no, let me handle that.
(16:09):
You you should have to handle it, because he got
enough stuff just waking up every day being Mantin Luther
King the third and being married to Martin Luther King
the third and then be an activist in your own right.
You'all got enough to worry about. And I and my
thing was, I want to be the brother that understands
how you have to help bed at birth because it's
for all of us, and any anybody else could have
(16:31):
walked away to stay in the movement. Keep drum made
you going and all that it only God's annoying would
make you do that.
Speaker 5 (16:39):
For our listeners who can't see Martin's eyes a little
bit welling up in tears and hearing Rev's comments, it's
really very endearing. Your work has been deeply influenced, of course,
by your faith, and you've said that your ministry is
inseparable from your activism. And what way has your faith
helped to shape not only your activism and what you
(17:03):
fight for, but also how you choose to lead.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
My faith has been the basis of me doing what
I do. When I started preaching, it didn't make sense
for boy to preach. When I got older, it didn't
make sense for a twelve year old kid to be
in civil rights, and on and on and on. And
when I started National Action Network, we had two hundred dollars.
(17:27):
I never knew we build. What we built is faith.
Faith is not what you can calculate. Faith is not
what you can have at the end of a long
way laid our strategy. Faith is when it doesn't make sense,
but you believe that God put it on your heart
and He'll make a way. And he will. And when
(17:48):
doctor King and doctor Avananthon and them call a boycott Montgomery,
Alabama in fifty five, just a couple of months after him,
until it being killed. There's no way of knowing that
they would win. They stepped out on faith. Real leaders
in the movement for social change are really people of faith,
because if you go with is strategic and makes sense,
(18:11):
you will never change society. You've got that people that
bleed bigger than what they're facing. So the core I've
been stabbling the march and didn't know if I was
gonna make it. I've been indicted, I've been all of that,
and all only thing you could do is faith. If
you stand up there and they charging you with stuff
(18:32):
you know you didn't do, only faith. James Brown can't
help you. Now. The more you get involved, the more
their forces are gonna come after you. But you gotta
know there's a force stronger in there. And that's why
the King movements and Doctor King's teachings meant so much
to me, because you've got to put what the cause
(18:55):
is ahead of what the popularity may be in any
given day of unpopularity. And if you do that, you've
done your part. God to do the rest. That ain't
my business. My business is the stand up. God's business
is the hole yup? You know, rev.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
When we think about faith, and particularly at this particular.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Time in our nation and world's history, it is.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
Sixty two years since Dad shared his dream at the
Lincoln Memorial for our nation and world. Are we closer
to the dream or are we drifting further away?
Speaker 1 (19:42):
I think that we are in a cycle that keeps
going around. I was saying in the past that we're
moving away from the dream, and then we'd see some
progress and we'd say that we're achieving the dreams. Some
people said when Barack Obama's extra present, we're Achievement's dream.
(20:05):
Others when Kamradhist became vice pear with achievements dream, But
that wasn't a dream. The dream was changing the world
for all of us. And the old I've gotten, the
more I understand that it's not everybody's dream. So you've
got to fight the non dreaming spirit and to keep
(20:29):
the dream alive, the dreamers alive as long as it's
in the light and the heart of the dreamers. So
our job is to be the custodians of the dream
in good times and bad times, because if it was
gonna be an ending utopia. It would have happened in
the Bible all the way through four thousand years after Moses,
(20:51):
they crucified Jesus. So we've just got to be resolved
that it's our job, is centered for what's right, and
let God bless it and the next generation continued it going.
So we have a lot of people that are full
of materialism, UH, that are full of militarism. You always
(21:11):
quote your father, and they must face the dreamers. That's
why we're going to Wall Street this year. We go
other places. We're dealing with with you and Andrea, dealing
with what's going on with the UH, the UH, the
changing of where they're setting up congressional seats. We must
represent the dream. We should never wait on the never
(21:33):
connezans of the Pharaohs to to to UH to affirm
and actualize the dream. That ain't their job, it's our job.
And UH. I think it's symbolized you know, I'm deeply
a Baptist preacher, symbolized by Jesus. The choice was you
can come down off the cross, deliver yourself, and Jesus
(21:55):
wouldn't come down though he could have. And I think
our challenge is even in a day that voting rights
and inequality economically and all is all of the day.
Will we come down, will we join the others in
our anger, lose our footing, which is what your mother
was on me about, or will we represent what is right?
(22:18):
Because there will not be a resurrection if you cannot
endure through a crucifixion. You've got to go through the
crucifixion to get to the resurrection.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
Rev.
Speaker 8 (22:27):
Just love that analogy of having to endure to get
to the resurrection.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
Rev.
Speaker 8 (22:31):
You've been involved with an incredible degree of love and
attention on so many issues, but I want to draw
one to the issue of police brutality and standing with
families among their darkness moments from Brianna Taylor to George
Floyd to many others. Why is that important to you
from a perspective of a leader for civil rights but
(22:52):
also wise in perspective to you as a humanitarian, as
a preacher, And how do you help those families turn
that type of true grief into purpose.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
One is that when society becomes to where those that
are supposed to be your protectors against unlawfulness and disorder
become unlawful themselves, the very fabric of society is torn apart,
and I saw in these police cases people losing faith.
(23:27):
Once you lose faith in the guys, they're gonna protect
you from the unlawful. The rest just continues, unraveling your
faith in society as a whole. So when I started
hearing about these cases, I would respond, but I would
also respond as a mediciner. One of the first things
I would say is, well is the family able to bury?
(23:52):
The people? And National Action Network in many cases, some
of which you name, paid for the funerals and all
why Because I didn't want to see the hustlers, which
some did, get online and have these fundme accounts and
the family not be taken care of. How did I
know that most of these families couldn't afford the funeral.
I'm talking about the funeral, Some couldn't afford suits to
(24:14):
go to the funeral. Because I grew up that way,
and I knew if I had gotten killed before I
was twenty one, somebody would have to raise money for
my funeral. So I came from that, and that's why
a lot of the families bonded with me, because I
understood them. And the lawyer is gonna get a thirty money.
We ain't getting a third of the insurance money or
the thirty money when to settle. We never asked even
(24:37):
for them to give us the money back that we
invested in the funerals. The other thing is they need
pastorial concern right to this day. I talked to these families.
I called them on their birthdays, We talk on holidays.
They come and give me. They need rent money, some
of them all of that because they need to be
(24:57):
in many ways. The examples that you could could stand
up and fight and win, which we did in some
cases George Floyd, those police went to Jailer's already example.
And I remember that I learned that from the King movement.
What stimulated the Montgomery bus boycott was the killing of
(25:18):
Emma til and Missus Parks say, and we can't keep
taking this. So WHATIRCLC did different than other civil rights
groups is we're taken incident, whether it's Immatil Jimmy Lee
Jackson and marrying in Alabama, and use an incident to
build a movement, to dramatize the movement. And that was
one of the specialties of doctor King. Dramatize the movement
(25:42):
around that and knowing you're gonna have backlash. In nineteen
sixty three August twenty eight, they had the big march
on Washington. I Have a Dream, but each speech was
much more depth in that. But don't forget two three
months later they bombed the church in Birmingham and killed
four girls. So there's always gonna be a step forward
and a step backwards, and you got to have enough
(26:02):
faith to endure it. Because today's victory, there's gonna be
a backlash. And I think that that is why it's
so important to call what I do as a minister
meet mark, and I've been on many occasions, and then
Andrea will try to temple us down and say, man,
this is great. We did wonderful. And Andrew said, yeah,
let's see what that backlash is gonna be. Because you
(26:24):
know it's gonna be backlash. But your faith sustains you
as well as it keeps you level headed in the
time of victory. So you learn not to celebrate too much,
and you learn not to get too broken out on
the bad dad with cheap going.
Speaker 6 (26:41):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just mine. We're
sharing real stories, heart won wisdom and unforgettable lessons that
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Speaker 2 (27:00):
Now back to my legacy.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
Reverse we reflect. You have advised presidents, You've marched in
every state, stood with people at their times of the
most desperate grief. You have faced the worst challenges, and
you've talked about the need to shift from moments to
movements and what as you reflect on this incredible career
(27:24):
and this incredible journey, have been your greatest lessons on
how we sustain movements.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
I think that you've got to always measure your movements
by did you move the dial for the least of these?
And you're gonna be dead longer than you're gonna be alive.
I tell myself every day, So do you lead a
footprint and the stand and made a difference or did
(27:52):
you just get a lot of publicity? And so what?
It won't matter. Two weeks after you go on, they'll man,
they'll cry and h then then move on to the
next thing. And that's why how many years later are
we talking about doctor King. I mean, there's some people
that never lose their value because the Bible says that
(28:17):
He that love finds it themselves shall lose themselves. He
that lose it themselves for my sake shall find himself.
You gotta get lost in something bigger than you, and
if you do that, you will find who you are.
And that's what has been my guiding principle, that if
it's about me, then it's not gonna last anywhere. I'm
(28:39):
only fooling myself. But if it's about something that will
be here, a movement or feeling of brief one hundred
years from now, then that will mean that my life
meant something. There's no way out of known twelve years older,
I could build national action. Everbod I'd have a TV
show or radio show. If there's one scripture that's got
(28:59):
in me. See keep first the Kingdom of Heaven and
its righteousness, and all these other things will be added,
not the primary thing, their additions, and they'll come and go.
God will bless you as long as you bless God.
Speaker 8 (29:14):
I love that quote and I just want to say
it again for our viewers and listeners, the concept of
that you'll be dead longer than you'll be alive. And
I just want to say thank you for bringing wisdom
and perspective like no other speaking wisdom perspective. Craig has
three boys, I have two girls, and of course you
know Yolanda, who you know you adore. In terms of
that next generation, young people today are losing hope. Young
(29:37):
people today are addicted to their phones. Young people today
are seeing what's happening and are disconnected. What do you
say to the young people who are losing hope? Give
them a pep talk, like, give us some wisdom and
some words I can say to my kids, Craig's kids
and Ulanda who are seeing this world just going up
in flames and feeling disconnected. And what do we say
to them?
Speaker 1 (29:57):
I'll say, first of all, what they're seeing is real.
They're not wrong about what they see. But then the
question is what are you going to do about it?
And you have more to work with than any generation
before you do you realize and I tell them this
that Mahatma Gandhi never knewhere the cell phone was, Martin
(30:20):
Luther King didn't have email or Instagram. You got more
to work with and doing nothing with it. So yes,
your analysis is right. Well, your actually has to change
this because people would far less than you change the
world in which they live and made your life better,
(30:41):
and you need to quit just the what doctor King
would call it paralysis of analysis, and say, this is
what we're going to do. We should be using all
that's available for good rather than talk about how bad
things are real.
Speaker 4 (30:56):
One question I think about and often.
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Just for any and all of us, but is there.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
One piece of not just advice, but what has been
or is there someone what is the greatest thing if
you could say that for now, that or advice that
someone gave you, And did it come from just a
person who none of us would know, or did it
(31:27):
come from someone who is well known.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
I was on the road late nineties, early two thousand
and we landed in New York airport coming home. It
was about midnight and was walking through the airport. He
were very few people there, and this woman was walking
from a distance. She had a little young guy looked
maybe in is maybe twelve thirteen years old. And the
(31:54):
woman said remand Shopton And I said, yes, no'am, how
you do it? And because of the airport it's like midnight,
she says, can I introduce you to my son? And
I said, oh, okay, what's your name? He told me
Sikar's hand, she said, and she could tell I was
trying to rush past her, but she wouldn't have it.
She made me standing, and she says, you know, he's
(32:17):
too young to have known a lot of the people
that I grew up in my doctor King and even
Malcolm x An kling Pole. She says, you're one of
the few people now he knows, she says, and she
looked at me almost like your mother that she says,
I hope you will never let him down. And for
(32:38):
whatever reason, that woman shook me. And a lot of
times when I've gone to the White House to talk
to Obama, when I've gone to other places, and when
I go in thirty rour Felt then to do my show,
I think about that woman telling me, don't let that
kid down. And I think all of us need to
be able to step back and realize that something is
(33:00):
depending on us not to let them down. And that's
what motivates me. It's easy to get caught up in
the glory and do davs and the money, but then
at the end of the day, some kidders say, yet
it was just another one using us for their own glory.
I don't want to go out like that.
Speaker 6 (33:17):
It's really hard to put into words what REV has
meant to us as a family, to the Black community
at large, and to every person that believes in the
concept of the beloved community, no matter your color, your gender,
(33:38):
who you love. I think we don't take enough time
to slow down and say thank you, so thank you
for all of everything that you do and continue to
do that the world knows. But most importantly, there's so
many things that we know. There are so many people
(33:59):
that you've had helped that we know that the world
doesn't know, and we thank you for that.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
People believe they know.
Speaker 4 (34:09):
The story where they see the glory, They feel like
they see the glory, but they don't fully know the story.
And I think that's what we're attempting to insinuate.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
I mean, when you.
Speaker 4 (34:23):
Not just change the lives of families through a court case,
those court cases sometimes last for years. What people don't
know is how on a daily basis, you're constantly in
touch with these folks, not.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
Just talking to.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
Them, but literally helping them, putting money in their pockets
taken care of. When you think about that, a family
oftentimes is in poverty, who or and that's not a
reflection of who they happen to be, that happens to
be their circumstances. And yet the kind of help you
(35:06):
give over and over and over and over, you know
I mean, and you keep doing it, it's really helping
to transform lives in a phenomenal way. So you know,
from the bottom of our hearts, we must say just
thank you, and it is an inspiration even to us,
(35:30):
all of us as human beings get tired, but somehow
we have to find that deepness inside to not just overcome,
but to stay sustaining, to fortify, fortify, and then go
back out the next day and fight the battle.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
And that's what you demonstrate.
Speaker 4 (35:51):
We thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you well.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Thank you. And I couldnt put in words how much
you and Honya and your loandamein to me. I'd always
be grateful that you brought me in the family. I
say that Doctor King, who was a seminal figure in
my lifetime. Doctor King gave me a purpose and a mission,
(36:16):
and your mother fine tuned my personality so I could
be better at doing it. So when you see me
leaving a marge helping a family as the doctor King
influence when you see me on MSNBC and my verbs
agree as Coretascott King. Thank y'all, this was good.
Speaker 2 (36:39):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3 (36:41):
If you enjoy today's conversation, subscribe, share, and follow us
on at my Legacy Movement on social media and YouTube.
New episodes drop every Tuesday, with bonus content every Thursday.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
At its core.
Speaker 3 (36:55):
This podcast honors doctor King's vision of the beloved community
power of Connection.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
A Legacy Plus studio.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
Production distributed by iHeartMedia creator and executive producer Suzanne Hayward
co executive producer Lisa Lyle. Listen on the iHeartRadio app
or wherever you get your podcasts
And it flashed across the bottom of the screen. Doctor
Martin Luther King, Junior has been shot and killed and nothing.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
From marches to microphones.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Because when Colin took on knee, he took it for
the families and miss Frilling.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Reverend al Sharpton has carried doctor King's dream through the decades.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Doctor King gave me a purpose and a mission, and
your mother fine tuned my personality so I could be
better at doing.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
And paid the price for never backing down.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
I've been stabbling the march and didn't know if I
was gonna make it. I've been indicted and the only
thing you could do.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
With Reverend Sharpton opens up about the early days, the struggles,
the lessons, and the people who shaped him.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Think about that woman telling me, don't let that kid down,
And I think all of us need to be able
to step back and realize that somebody depending on us
not to let them down.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Join host Martin Luther King the Third, Andrea Waters, King,
Mark Kilberger, and Craig Kilberger for a deeply moving conversation
about courage and conviction.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
As we honor the life and legacy of doctor.
Speaker 4 (01:10):
King, are we closer to the dream or are we
drifting further away?
Speaker 1 (01:16):
So you learn not to celebrate too much, and you
learn not to get too broken arder on the bad day.
Get me.
Speaker 5 (01:27):
Welcome to my legacy. Today's guest is a towering figure
in civil rights, a spiritual leader, and one of the
most influential voices in justice for our lifetime. Reverend Al Sharpton,
Reverend Sharpton, we are indeed honored to have you with
us today, Sir. Thank you, Rev.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Well, thank you. I'm honored to be with you.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
Know, Rev. This is extraordinarily special for certainly Andrea and
I our friendship going back many years.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
I want to go back to the beginning.
Speaker 4 (01:58):
You've said they would be noae Al Sharpton without Martin
Luther King Jr.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Rev.
Speaker 4 (02:03):
You met my father as a child, but you said
that it was your mother's reaction to dad's assassination that
profoundly impacted you.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I had grown up in the Church of God in Christ,
and I had become a boy preacher when I was
four years old, actually preaching my first sermon before people
in this large church, and my parents ended up separating
when I was ten, So we moved from this nice
middle class home in Hollis Queen's and ended up in
(02:43):
the projects, just my mother and sister and I. I'm
twelve years old. And she took me to the Bishop,
Bishop Washington, and he said to me, you met doctor
King and the Fruitom Riders had a rally here. I said,
I said, yeah, I remember meeting Man Uther King. He said, well,
that's the kind of movement you need to be it.
(03:04):
And he brought me over to Reverend William Jones house
and talked to Reverend Jones about me being involved. And Rev.
Jones said, I know to do it, and we'll make
our youth director of the chapter. So that's how I
got involved in the chapter of selc Breadbasket in New York.
A couple of months later, we were sitting in the
(03:28):
living room watching black and white TV. Wasn't no color
TV there, and it flashed across the bottom of the screen.
Doctor Martin Luther King, Junior has been shot and killed
in Memphis, and my mother broke down start crying like
it was a member of our immediate family. And I
had met doctor King. I was then getting involved in
(03:51):
the chapter, but I felt she was Why was she
reacting so personal? And my mother said, you would have
had to have been growing up sitting in the back
of the bus on not being able to go to
a restaurant or not even user Tarlet downtown Dothan, where
I visited where she grew up to understand what Doctor
(04:12):
King met. And it really moved me that my mother
was this mood, and so I started taking more seriously
going to the Breadbasket meetings. And then Nina Simone came
out with a song that was a track on a
film call from Montgomery to Methods, and the song was
what are we gonna do now? The King of Love
(04:33):
is dead? And I remember the lyrics. Keith turned the
other cheek. He pleaded love your neighbor was his plea
what are we gonna do? And I felt that at
thirteen years old, she was singing to me, and I
felt indicted. And I decided then that despite the fact
I knew all the big creatures in New York and
(04:54):
I was known to them as a boy preachering and
everybody was saying, we're gonna put you in seminary, We're
going to get you whatever church you on that I
wanted my ministry to be like Doctor King. Your father
was the reason I did not pursue that Adam Clayton
Bower route of getting a big church, going to Congress.
I wanted to be in the movement. I felt Nina
(05:15):
Simone was indicting me, and I felt that if what
my mother would weep for meant so much to her,
what your father did, I believe that that was my calling.
That's why it was such important to me when I
started working closely with you, and then you got me
closer with your mother, because I was grounded in that,
(05:38):
you know how with Thurman, who you knew and studied,
knew his work, used to say that that a man
must choose and deal with his foundation. He says, it's
a strange freedom. This is the strange freedom to be
(05:58):
adrift in the world. Men that have no sense of
being anchored to anything. And your father's work and SCLC
and to work of your mother and work you and
I and Andre have done together has kept me anchored.
So even when I later got to know James Brown
and Michael Jackson and others, I was anchored and I
(06:20):
would always stand in the movement because of the work
of your father.
Speaker 6 (06:24):
One of the things that I have always greatly admired
and appreciated about you is how you have always, I
don't even say lifted up acknowledged the strength and power
of women. You know you talked about you know, Martin's mother,
Karreta Scott King, and I know how much you acknowledged
(06:45):
her strength and power.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Rev.
Speaker 6 (06:48):
I know that one of the first ways that you
became active in politics was as the youth director for
Shirley Chisholm's nineteen seventy two presidential campaign. For those who
may not know, she was the first black woman elected
to Congress and also the first black candidate to ever
run for president. So you've always embraced women, and you
(07:11):
have a course to wonderful daughters Dominique and Ashley. Was
that just organic for you or was it your mother's example.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
I think a lot of it was my mother, and
a lot of it was the church in the sense
that Bishop Washington was an outlier and let women preaching
our church when most churches then, including churches of God
in Christ, didn't believe in That.
Speaker 6 (07:33):
Was this in the fifties, late late fifty I was
baptized at three years old and fifty eight, and the
lady that preached at night.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Was a lady named Madame Emily Bram So it wasn't
strange to me to see women in leadership. But then
when I started getting a little just a little older,
and my father left and bands and my mother took
care of us. I would tell people when I started
(08:04):
getting involved in movement eleven and twelve, you don't understand
that my mother is the only reason that I had
clothes away to school. What are you talking about? Women
got to step back and my mother hadn't stepped up.
I remember we couldn't pay light and gas bills. I'd
do homework a candlelight for about six seven months, and
(08:24):
my mother said, boy, I don't care if we get
a flashlight. You're gonna do your work. You're gonna be
able to go to school where I couldn't do an alabima.
So I couldn't let nobody tell me what women wouldn't do,
because if it wasn't for a woman, I'd have been
in the streets having done something else. She kept me
in the church. She would scrub flaws, even though she
was on welfare. She would do domestic work so i'd
(08:46):
have a little suit to wear to preach at When
I'm a kid, I'm a boy preacher. So by the
time sixty eight comes and the year doctor King was killed,
an assembly woman in Brooklyn's running for Congress in nineteen
sixty eight, and they brought in a guy who was
(09:07):
nationally known who ran against her on the Republican ticket,
named James Farmer. He was at a corps and they
said Nixon sentiment and everybody was going, oh wow, James
Farmer is gonna be the Congress Congress. The assembly woman
running against him was Shirley chishom and I remember Shirley
(09:28):
Chisholm came by to our church and bich Washington like
James Farmer, but they let hers speak and she had
this kind of fire in her that reminded me of
my mother. And I went and started, to the chagrin
of Bitch Washington working in her campaign. I'm all of
thirteen years old. I couldn't vote at that time. Voting
(09:49):
was twenty one years old. And we became close, and
I would remember undergoing in rooms where she won she
beat James Farmer. I remember we going rooms and all
of the preachers and the leaders that day we can't
no woman lead us. And I think it was because
of my resentment of that that made me always got
(10:12):
in my way to say, no, we can't have this,
because if it wasn't for my mother, I wouldn't have
ever made it. And Shirley Chisholm embraced me. And I
remember in nineteen seventy two when you mentioned a running
for president. That was a year I was a youth
coordinator and they had the National Black Political Convention in Gary.
(10:34):
They didn't even invite her, and she was running for
president because many of the leaders had already made their
deals with George mcgoverett, who became the nominee, and they
kind of respected Missus. King was there and Betty Shabaz
was there, but they didn't invite Shirley. So I saw
the massagyne all of my life, and I always was
(10:58):
committed that I was gonna be one that would very
clearly stand against that and uh and later as as
as Martin and I started working together and he got
his mother to come up and do how first National
Action Network dinner, and I remember how strong and regal
she was. She was the only one that could really
(11:20):
talk to me about things that I guess everybody want
to talk to me about. She says, you said this,
that and the other. Why did you say that? I said, well,
you know, I was angry, and I was first surprised
she knew some of the.
Speaker 7 (11:33):
Crazy stuff I you said, And I said, she said, yeah,
but don't you know, if you're going to be in
Martin's tradition and you grew up in it, sometime we've
got to check what we say.
Speaker 1 (11:45):
I say, yes, ma'am, and she cites something else. And
she was always real gentle but regal about it. And
I always say that I give her credit. She people
talk about I saw the mainstream missus King had a
lot to do with me starting to say yeah, because
I would tell her, so, ah, they down south, I'm
up north, this the urban way. But she said, no,
(12:07):
there's another way. Or do you want the crown or
do you want the crowd? And I remember her seventieth
birthday at the Soul Food restaurant there Martin with his
scheme and had me sit next to her birthday dinner,
and she looked at me, she says, I'm glad you
flew down for my birthday, and I'm glad you're doing
(12:29):
better talking about and there would not have been a
movement had it not been for Kretascot King because and
I don't say that because I'm talking to you. I
say that all the time because she was the rock
that doctor King leaned. Imagine, with all of the craziness,
the threats they trying to scandalize him, if she had
(12:53):
been weaker, it would have turned the whole movement round.
And she held a lot of pain for us and
never got the credit for it. Still does it to
my because if you look at how people operate today,
if Missus King just did one interview, just did one
(13:13):
wayward word about the work or what doctor King had
gone through and put her through, it would have turned
the whole movement around. She never said anything to hurt
the movement and was on the front line. She was
on the front line against the one Vietnam before he was.
She was standing up for a lot of issues. She
was more progressive than some of the button down preachers
(13:36):
in the Southern Christian League. You cop.
Speaker 5 (13:39):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just might tap
that button and stay connected to conversations that count. Now
back to my legacy, and you.
Speaker 6 (13:51):
Talk about mothers, and one of the things that I
always like to remind people when we were together, because
sometimes people see you and Martin, you know, just on
stage or programs or the three of us or different configurations.
But this is a real relationship to us, and each
(14:11):
time there is probably no greater pain than when your
mom transitions. And for ever, for each one of us,
we were there for each other, you know. Of course
Rev came down with when your mom transitioned. We went
not to the big, fancy service, but we went to Dothan, Alabama,
(14:38):
in that little small church when your mom's funeral service.
And then of course when my mom transitioned, we asked
my sisters and I asked you to actually deliver her
her eulogy. So we all have been there for each
other doing the most trying of time time and for that,
(15:02):
I know I'm personally eternally grateful.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Now it's really family because you end up with kindred
spirits because you've been close enough to my case. They
see what they went through. I said many years ago
when we started doing the marches in Washington, I said,
do you know the burden it is? And wake up
every morning and every city in the world has your
(15:27):
father's name on there, and the expectations they put on
you and you didn't ask for that. That's what Martin
has to do every day, and then one hundred marries
into that. I mean, why would you marry into that
kind of frushet unless you call to do it, and
then the burden on Yolanda. So I think people see
(15:47):
the celebrity part of it, but it's the knowing that
every day, in every way, people are trying to dig
up some ways to undermine the movement and undermine the
legacy for their own political reasons and all they don't
see the pressure. And you got to be able to
have people around you that absorb that, which is why
I would say to him, no, let me handle that.
(16:09):
You you should have to handle it, because he got
enough stuff just waking up every day being Mantin Luther
King the third and being married to Martin Luther King
the third and then be an activist in your own right.
You'all got enough to worry about. And I and my
thing was, I want to be the brother that understands
how you have to help bed at birth because it's
for all of us, and any anybody else could have
(16:31):
walked away to stay in the movement. Keep drum made
you going and all that it only God's annoying would
make you do that.
Speaker 5 (16:39):
For our listeners who can't see Martin's eyes a little
bit welling up in tears and hearing Rev's comments, it's
really very endearing. Your work has been deeply influenced, of course,
by your faith, and you've said that your ministry is
inseparable from your activism. And what way has your faith
helped to shape not only your activism and what you
(17:03):
fight for, but also how you choose to lead.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
My faith has been the basis of me doing what
I do. When I started preaching, it didn't make sense
for boy to preach. When I got older, it didn't
make sense for a twelve year old kid to be
in civil rights, and on and on and on. And
when I started National Action Network, we had two hundred dollars.
(17:27):
I never knew we build. What we built is faith.
Faith is not what you can calculate. Faith is not
what you can have at the end of a long
way laid our strategy. Faith is when it doesn't make sense,
but you believe that God put it on your heart
and He'll make a way. And he will. And when
(17:48):
doctor King and doctor Avananthon and them call a boycott Montgomery,
Alabama in fifty five, just a couple of months after him,
until it being killed. There's no way of knowing that
they would win. They stepped out on faith. Real leaders
in the movement for social change are really people of faith,
because if you go with is strategic and makes sense,
(18:11):
you will never change society. You've got that people that
bleed bigger than what they're facing. So the core I've
been stabbling the march and didn't know if I was
gonna make it. I've been indicted, I've been all of that,
and all only thing you could do is faith. If
you stand up there and they charging you with stuff
(18:32):
you know you didn't do, only faith. James Brown can't
help you. Now. The more you get involved, the more
their forces are gonna come after you. But you gotta
know there's a force stronger in there. And that's why
the King movements and Doctor King's teachings meant so much
to me, because you've got to put what the cause
(18:55):
is ahead of what the popularity may be in any
given day of unpopularity. And if you do that, you've
done your part. God to do the rest. That ain't
my business. My business is the stand up. God's business
is the hole yup? You know, rev.
Speaker 4 (19:11):
When we think about faith, and particularly at this particular.
Speaker 1 (19:16):
Time in our nation and world's history, it is.
Speaker 4 (19:23):
Sixty two years since Dad shared his dream at the
Lincoln Memorial for our nation and world. Are we closer
to the dream or are we drifting further away?
Speaker 1 (19:42):
I think that we are in a cycle that keeps
going around. I was saying in the past that we're
moving away from the dream, and then we'd see some
progress and we'd say that we're achieving the dreams. Some
people said when Barack Obama's extra present, we're Achievement's dream.
(20:05):
Others when Kamradhist became vice pear with achievements dream, But
that wasn't a dream. The dream was changing the world
for all of us. And the old I've gotten, the
more I understand that it's not everybody's dream. So you've
got to fight the non dreaming spirit and to keep
(20:29):
the dream alive, the dreamers alive as long as it's
in the light and the heart of the dreamers. So
our job is to be the custodians of the dream
in good times and bad times, because if it was
gonna be an ending utopia. It would have happened in
the Bible all the way through four thousand years after Moses,
(20:51):
they crucified Jesus. So we've just got to be resolved
that it's our job, is centered for what's right, and
let God bless it and the next generation continued it going.
So we have a lot of people that are full
of materialism, UH, that are full of militarism. You always
(21:11):
quote your father, and they must face the dreamers. That's
why we're going to Wall Street this year. We go
other places. We're dealing with with you and Andrea, dealing
with what's going on with the UH, the UH, the
changing of where they're setting up congressional seats. We must
represent the dream. We should never wait on the never
(21:33):
connezans of the Pharaohs to to to UH to affirm
and actualize the dream. That ain't their job, it's our job.
And UH. I think it's symbolized you know, I'm deeply
a Baptist preacher, symbolized by Jesus. The choice was you
can come down off the cross, deliver yourself, and Jesus
(21:55):
wouldn't come down though he could have. And I think
our challenge is even in a day that voting rights
and inequality economically and all is all of the day.
Will we come down, will we join the others in
our anger, lose our footing, which is what your mother
was on me about, or will we represent what is right?
(22:18):
Because there will not be a resurrection if you cannot
endure through a crucifixion. You've got to go through the
crucifixion to get to the resurrection.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
Rev.
Speaker 8 (22:27):
Just love that analogy of having to endure to get
to the resurrection.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
Rev.
Speaker 8 (22:31):
You've been involved with an incredible degree of love and
attention on so many issues, but I want to draw
one to the issue of police brutality and standing with
families among their darkness moments from Brianna Taylor to George
Floyd to many others. Why is that important to you
from a perspective of a leader for civil rights but
(22:52):
also wise in perspective to you as a humanitarian, as
a preacher, And how do you help those families turn
that type of true grief into purpose.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
One is that when society becomes to where those that
are supposed to be your protectors against unlawfulness and disorder
become unlawful themselves, the very fabric of society is torn apart,
and I saw in these police cases people losing faith.
(23:27):
Once you lose faith in the guys, they're gonna protect
you from the unlawful. The rest just continues, unraveling your
faith in society as a whole. So when I started
hearing about these cases, I would respond, but I would
also respond as a mediciner. One of the first things
I would say is, well is the family able to bury?
(23:52):
The people? And National Action Network in many cases, some
of which you name, paid for the funerals and all
why Because I didn't want to see the hustlers, which
some did, get online and have these fundme accounts and
the family not be taken care of. How did I
know that most of these families couldn't afford the funeral.
I'm talking about the funeral, Some couldn't afford suits to
(24:14):
go to the funeral. Because I grew up that way,
and I knew if I had gotten killed before I
was twenty one, somebody would have to raise money for
my funeral. So I came from that, and that's why
a lot of the families bonded with me, because I
understood them. And the lawyer is gonna get a thirty money.
We ain't getting a third of the insurance money or
the thirty money when to settle. We never asked even
(24:37):
for them to give us the money back that we
invested in the funerals. The other thing is they need
pastorial concern right to this day. I talked to these families.
I called them on their birthdays, We talk on holidays.
They come and give me. They need rent money, some
of them all of that because they need to be
(24:57):
in many ways. The examples that you could could stand
up and fight and win, which we did in some
cases George Floyd, those police went to Jailer's already example.
And I remember that I learned that from the King movement.
What stimulated the Montgomery bus boycott was the killing of
(25:18):
Emma til and Missus Parks say, and we can't keep
taking this. So WHATIRCLC did different than other civil rights
groups is we're taken incident, whether it's Immatil Jimmy Lee
Jackson and marrying in Alabama, and use an incident to
build a movement, to dramatize the movement. And that was
one of the specialties of doctor King. Dramatize the movement
(25:42):
around that and knowing you're gonna have backlash. In nineteen
sixty three August twenty eight, they had the big march
on Washington. I Have a Dream, but each speech was
much more depth in that. But don't forget two three
months later they bombed the church in Birmingham and killed
four girls. So there's always gonna be a step forward
and a step backwards, and you got to have enough
(26:02):
faith to endure it. Because today's victory, there's gonna be
a backlash. And I think that that is why it's
so important to call what I do as a minister
meet mark, and I've been on many occasions, and then
Andrea will try to temple us down and say, man,
this is great. We did wonderful. And Andrew said, yeah,
let's see what that backlash is gonna be. Because you
(26:24):
know it's gonna be backlash. But your faith sustains you
as well as it keeps you level headed in the
time of victory. So you learn not to celebrate too much,
and you learn not to get too broken out on
the bad dad with cheap going.
Speaker 6 (26:41):
Scrolling won't change your life, but subscribing just mine. We're
sharing real stories, heart won wisdom and unforgettable lessons that
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Speaker 2 (27:00):
Now back to my legacy.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
Reverse we reflect. You have advised presidents, You've marched in
every state, stood with people at their times of the
most desperate grief. You have faced the worst challenges, and
you've talked about the need to shift from moments to
movements and what as you reflect on this incredible career
(27:24):
and this incredible journey, have been your greatest lessons on
how we sustain movements.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
I think that you've got to always measure your movements
by did you move the dial for the least of these?
And you're gonna be dead longer than you're gonna be alive.
I tell myself every day, So do you lead a
footprint and the stand and made a difference or did
(27:52):
you just get a lot of publicity? And so what?
It won't matter. Two weeks after you go on, they'll man,
they'll cry and h then then move on to the
next thing. And that's why how many years later are
we talking about doctor King. I mean, there's some people
that never lose their value because the Bible says that
(28:17):
He that love finds it themselves shall lose themselves. He
that lose it themselves for my sake shall find himself.
You gotta get lost in something bigger than you, and
if you do that, you will find who you are.
And that's what has been my guiding principle, that if
it's about me, then it's not gonna last anywhere. I'm
(28:39):
only fooling myself. But if it's about something that will
be here, a movement or feeling of brief one hundred
years from now, then that will mean that my life
meant something. There's no way out of known twelve years older,
I could build national action. Everbod I'd have a TV
show or radio show. If there's one scripture that's got
(28:59):
in me. See keep first the Kingdom of Heaven and
its righteousness, and all these other things will be added,
not the primary thing, their additions, and they'll come and go.
God will bless you as long as you bless God.
Speaker 8 (29:14):
I love that quote and I just want to say
it again for our viewers and listeners, the concept of
that you'll be dead longer than you'll be alive. And
I just want to say thank you for bringing wisdom
and perspective like no other speaking wisdom perspective. Craig has
three boys, I have two girls, and of course you
know Yolanda, who you know you adore. In terms of
that next generation, young people today are losing hope. Young
(29:37):
people today are addicted to their phones. Young people today
are seeing what's happening and are disconnected. What do you
say to the young people who are losing hope? Give
them a pep talk, like, give us some wisdom and
some words I can say to my kids, Craig's kids
and Ulanda who are seeing this world just going up
in flames and feeling disconnected. And what do we say
to them?
Speaker 1 (29:57):
I'll say, first of all, what they're seeing is real.
They're not wrong about what they see. But then the
question is what are you going to do about it?
And you have more to work with than any generation
before you do you realize and I tell them this
that Mahatma Gandhi never knewhere the cell phone was, Martin
(30:20):
Luther King didn't have email or Instagram. You got more
to work with and doing nothing with it. So yes,
your analysis is right. Well, your actually has to change
this because people would far less than you change the
world in which they live and made your life better,
(30:41):
and you need to quit just the what doctor King
would call it paralysis of analysis, and say, this is
what we're going to do. We should be using all
that's available for good rather than talk about how bad
things are real.
Speaker 4 (30:56):
One question I think about and often.
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Just for any and all of us, but is there.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
One piece of not just advice, but what has been
or is there someone what is the greatest thing if
you could say that for now, that or advice that
someone gave you, And did it come from just a
person who none of us would know, or did it
(31:27):
come from someone who is well known.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
I was on the road late nineties, early two thousand
and we landed in New York airport coming home. It
was about midnight and was walking through the airport. He
were very few people there, and this woman was walking
from a distance. She had a little young guy looked
maybe in is maybe twelve thirteen years old. And the
(31:54):
woman said remand Shopton And I said, yes, no'am, how
you do it? And because of the airport it's like midnight,
she says, can I introduce you to my son? And
I said, oh, okay, what's your name? He told me
Sikar's hand, she said, and she could tell I was
trying to rush past her, but she wouldn't have it.
She made me standing, and she says, you know, he's
(32:17):
too young to have known a lot of the people
that I grew up in my doctor King and even
Malcolm x An kling Pole. She says, you're one of
the few people now he knows, she says, and she
looked at me almost like your mother that she says,
I hope you will never let him down. And for
(32:38):
whatever reason, that woman shook me. And a lot of
times when I've gone to the White House to talk
to Obama, when I've gone to other places, and when
I go in thirty rour Felt then to do my show,
I think about that woman telling me, don't let that
kid down. And I think all of us need to
be able to step back and realize that something is
(33:00):
depending on us not to let them down. And that's
what motivates me. It's easy to get caught up in
the glory and do davs and the money, but then
at the end of the day, some kidders say, yet
it was just another one using us for their own glory.
I don't want to go out like that.
Speaker 6 (33:17):
It's really hard to put into words what REV has
meant to us as a family, to the Black community
at large, and to every person that believes in the
concept of the beloved community, no matter your color, your gender,
(33:38):
who you love. I think we don't take enough time
to slow down and say thank you, so thank you
for all of everything that you do and continue to
do that the world knows. But most importantly, there's so
many things that we know. There are so many people
(33:59):
that you've had helped that we know that the world
doesn't know, and we thank you for that.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
People believe they know.
Speaker 4 (34:09):
The story where they see the glory, They feel like
they see the glory, but they don't fully know the story.
And I think that's what we're attempting to insinuate.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
I mean, when you.
Speaker 4 (34:23):
Not just change the lives of families through a court case,
those court cases sometimes last for years. What people don't
know is how on a daily basis, you're constantly in
touch with these folks, not.
Speaker 1 (34:40):
Just talking to.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
Them, but literally helping them, putting money in their pockets
taken care of. When you think about that, a family
oftentimes is in poverty, who or and that's not a
reflection of who they happen to be, that happens to
be their circumstances. And yet the kind of help you
(35:06):
give over and over and over and over, you know
I mean, and you keep doing it, it's really helping
to transform lives in a phenomenal way. So you know,
from the bottom of our hearts, we must say just
thank you, and it is an inspiration even to us,
(35:30):
all of us as human beings get tired, but somehow
we have to find that deepness inside to not just overcome,
but to stay sustaining, to fortify, fortify, and then go
back out the next day and fight the battle.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
And that's what you demonstrate.
Speaker 4 (35:51):
We thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you well.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Thank you. And I couldnt put in words how much
you and Honya and your loandamein to me. I'd always
be grateful that you brought me in the family. I
say that Doctor King, who was a seminal figure in
my lifetime. Doctor King gave me a purpose and a mission,
(36:16):
and your mother fine tuned my personality so I could
be better at doing it. So when you see me
leaving a marge helping a family as the doctor King
influence when you see me on MSNBC and my verbs
agree as Coretascott King. Thank y'all, this was good.
Speaker 2 (36:39):
Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3 (36:41):
If you enjoy today's conversation, subscribe, share, and follow us
on at my Legacy Movement on social media and YouTube.
New episodes drop every Tuesday, with bonus content every Thursday.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
At its core.
Speaker 3 (36:55):
This podcast honors doctor King's vision of the beloved community
power of Connection.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
A Legacy Plus studio.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
Production distributed by iHeartMedia creator and executive producer Suzanne Hayward
co executive producer Lisa Lyle. Listen on the iHeartRadio app
or wherever you get your podcasts
Hosts And Creators
Craig Kielburger
Marc Kielburger
Martin Luther King III
Arndrea Waters King
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