MLK Day Reflection for LGBTQ Justice in the Black Church

Like her parents� faith, the Kings� eldest daughter Yolanda�s faith in the civil rights movement drove her passion for LGBTQ justice. �If you are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender, you do not have the same rights as other Americans,� she said at Chicago�s Out & Equal Workplace Summit in 2006. �You cannot marry. … [Y]ou still face discrimination in the workplace, and in our armed forces. For a nation that prides itself on liberty, justice and equality for all, this is totally unacceptable.�

While King would undoubtedly shake his head in disbelief concerning his brethren, he would applaud the stance the NAACP took on marriage equality. In quelling the tension between black civil right activists and ministers of the 1960s who still vociferously state that marriage equality for LGBTQ Americans is not a civil right, the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc. marked the 40th anniversary of Loving v. Virginia (when the U.S. Supreme Court in 1967 struck down this country�s anti-miscegenation laws as unconstitutional) by stating the following concerning same-sex marriage: