Season for Nonviolence was established in 1998 by Arun Gandhi, Mohandas Gandhi's grandson, as a yearly event celebrating the philosophies and lives of Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. [1] [2] The idea was developed with the help of Dr. Michael Beckwith and Dr. Mary Morrissey, of the Association for Global New Thought and The Parliament of The World's Religions . [3] [4] Before his 2023 death Arun Gandhi co-chaired the Season along with Rev. Beckwith of the Agape International Spiritual Center. [5]
The "season" begins with the anniversary of the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi on 30 January, ending on the 4 April anniversary of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. It is anchored by a mission, statement of principles, and commitments by participants towards living in a nonviolent way. [6] [7]
Martin Luther King Jr. was an American Baptist minister, activist, and political philosopher who was one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968. A black church leader and a son of early civil rights activist and minister Martin Luther King Sr., King advanced civil rights for people of color in the United States through the use of nonviolent resistance and nonviolent civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of legalized discrimination.
Coretta Scott King was an American author, activist, and civil rights leader who was the wife of Martin Luther King Jr. from 1953 until his assassination in 1968. As an advocate for African-American equality, she was a leader for the civil rights movement in the 1960s. King was also a singer who often incorporated music into her civil rights work. King met her husband while attending graduate school in Boston. They both became increasingly active in the American civil rights movement.
Dexter Scott King was an American civil and animal rights activist, attorney, and author. The second son of civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King, he was also the brother of Martin Luther King III, Bernice King, and Yolanda King; and also grandson of Alberta Williams King and Martin Luther King Sr. He is the author of Growing Up King: An Intimate Memoir.
Kasturba Mohandas Gandhi was an Indian political activist who was involved in the Indian independence movement during British India. She was married to Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, commonly known as Mahatma Gandhi. National Safe Motherhood Day is observed in India annually on April 11, coinciding with Kasturba's birthday.
The Martin Luther King Jr. National Historical Park covers about 35 acres (0.14 km2) and includes several sites in Atlanta, Georgia related to the life and work of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Within the park is his boyhood home, and Ebenezer Baptist Church — the church where King was baptized and both he and his father, Martin Luther King Sr., were pastors — as well as, the grave site of King, Jr., and his wife, civil rights activist Coretta Scott King.
Martin Luther King III is an American human rights activist, philanthropist and advocate. The elder son of civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King, King served as the fourth president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference from 1997 to 2004. As of 2024, he is a Professor of practice at the University of Virginia.
Gandhism is a body of ideas that describes the inspiration, vision, and the life work of Mohandas K. Gandhi. It is particularly associated with his contributions to the idea of nonviolent resistance, sometimes also called civil resistance.
Richard Bartlett Gregg (1885–1974) was an American social philosopher said to be "the first American to develop a substantial theory of nonviolent resistance" based on the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi, and so influenced the thinking of Martin Luther King Jr., Aldous Huxley, civil-rights theorist Bayard Rustin, the pacifist and socialist reformer Jessie Wallace Hughan, and the Peace Pledge Union.
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial is a national memorial located in West Potomac Park next to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It covers four acres (1.6 ha) and includes the Stone of Hope, a granite statue of civil rights movement leader Martin Luther King Jr. carved by sculptor Lei Yixin. The inspiration for the memorial design is a line from King's "I Have a Dream" speech: "Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope." The memorial opened to the public on August 22, 2011, after more than two decades of planning, fundraising, and construction.
Michael Bernard Beckwith is a New Thought minister, author, and founder and spiritual director of the Agape International Spiritual Center in Beverly Hills, California.
Seven Social Sins is a list by Frederick Lewis Donaldson that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi published in his weekly newspaper Young India on 22 October 1925. Later he gave this same list to his grandson, Arun Gandhi, written on a piece of paper on their final day together shortly before his assassination. The Seven Sins are:
Clayborne Carson is an American academic who was a professor of history at Stanford University and director of the Martin Luther King Jr., Research and Education Institute. Since 1985, he has directed the Martin Luther King Papers Project, a long-term project to edit and publish the papers of Martin Luther King Jr.
Willie Christine King Farris was an American teacher and civil rights activist. King was the sister of Martin Luther King Jr. She taught at Spelman College and was the author of several books and was a public speaker on various topics, including the King family, multicultural education, and teaching.
"I Have a Dream" is a public speech that was delivered by American civil rights activist and Baptist minister Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. In the speech, King called for civil and economic rights and an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the speech was one of the most famous moments of the civil rights movement and among the most iconic speeches in American history.
Martin Luther King Jr., an African-American clergyman and civil rights movement leader, was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968, at 6:01 p.m. CST. He was rushed to St. Joseph's Hospital, where he died at 7:05 p.m at age 39. He was a prominent leader of the civil rights movement and a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who was known for his use of nonviolence and civil disobedience. James Earl Ray, a fugitive from the Missouri State Penitentiary, was arrested on June 8, 1968, at London's Heathrow Airport, extradited to the United States and charged with the crime. On March 10, 1969, he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 99 years in the Tennessee State Penitentiary. He later made many attempts to withdraw his guilty plea and to be tried by a jury, but was unsuccessful. Ray died in prison in 1998.
Arun Manilal Gandhi was a South African-born Indian-American author, socio-political activist and son of Manilal Gandhi, thus a grandson of nationalist leader Mahatma Gandhi. In 2017, he published The Gift of Anger: And Other Lessons From My Grandfather Mahatma Gandhi.
The Association for Global New Thought (AGNT) is an organization of ministers, lay people, heads of other New Thought organizations, and people of all faiths dedicated to "conscious co-creation". Its New Thought member churches and centers number between 600 and 700, and include Unity churches, Religious Science, Divine Science centers, and nondenominational New Thought spiritual communities.
The history of the 1954 to 1968 American civil rights movement has been depicted and documented in film, song, theater, television, and the visual arts. These presentations add to and maintain cultural awareness and understanding of the goals, tactics, and accomplishments of the people who organized and participated in this nonviolent movement.