Love Power (Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.)

I am repeating this, because I think our country is in need of reviewing and using Dr. King's and Gandhi's powerful non-violent very effective methods of change.
Which candidate do you think is the most effective at "Love Force"?

"When I speak of love, I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response. I am speaking of that Force which all great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Moslem-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief is beautifully summed up in the first epistle of Saint John: 'Let us love one another; for love is God and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God..'

At the center of nonviolence stands the principle of love. The nonviolent resister would contend that in the struggle for human dignity, the oppressed people of the world must not succumb to becoming bitter or indulging in hate campaigns. To retaliate in kind would do nothing but intensify the existence of hate in the universe. Along the way of life, someone must have the sense enough and morality enough to cut off the chain of hate. This can only be done by projecting the ethic of love to the center of our lives. Christ gave us the goals and Mahatma Gandhi provided the tactics."

Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Coretta, his beloved wife, wrote: "Martin Luther King Jr.'s theological belief in the interdependence , of all life inevitably led to the methods for social change advocate as well as his adversary. Christ gave us the goals, he would often say, and Mahatma Gandhi provided the tactics."

On page 150-151 in hi book Strength to Love, Dr. King writes of his fascination with the Gandhian concept of “Love (Truth) Force” and the great success of non-violent resistence in India. In Montgomery, Alabama in 1954, "as a pastor, at the beginning of the protest, the people called me in to be their spokesman. In accepting this responsibility, my mind consciously or unconsciously, was driven back to the Sermon on the Mount and the Gandhian method of nonviolent resistence. This principle became the guiding light of our movement. Christ furnished the Spirit and motivation and Gandhi furnished the method."Dr. King wrote of his trip to India to: "My privilege of traveling to India had a great impact on me personally, for it was invigorating to see firsthand the amazing results of a nonviolent struggle to achieve independence. The aftermath of hatred and bitterness that usually follows a violent campaign was found nowhere in India, and a mutual friendship, based on complete equality, existed between the Indian and British people within the Commonwealth."

In the next paragraph, "…the nonviolent approach does something to the hearts and souls of those committed to it. It gives them new self-respect. It calls up resources of strength and courage that they did not know they had. Finally, it so stirs up the conscience of the opponent that reconciliation becomes a reality."

Here is more of Dr. King's writing from STRENGTH TO LOVE:

Loving Your Enemies
“Ye have heard that it hath been said,
thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate
thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love,
your enemies, bless them that curse you,
do good to them that hate you, and pray
for them which despitefully use you, and
persecute you; that ye may be children
of your Father which is in heaven.”
Matthew 5:43-45

This command of Jesus challenges us with new urgency. Upheaval after upheaval has reminded us that modern man is traveling along a road called hate, in a journey that will bring us to destruction and damnation. Far from being the pious injunction of a Utopian dreamer, the command to love one’s enemy is an absolute necessity for our survival. Love even for enemies is the key to the solution of the problems of our world. Jesus is not an impractical idealist; he is the practical realist.

Jesus realized that every genuine expression of love grows out of a consistent and total surrender to God. So when Jesus said ‘Love your enemy’, he was not unmindful of its stringent qualities. Yet he meant every word of it. Our responsibilities as Christians is to discover the meaning of this command and seek passionately to live it out in our daily lives.