Bishop William J. Barber II, a moral movement leader and founding director of Repairers of the Breach, which trains social justice leaders, addressed Battell Chapel during Yale’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration event on Jan. 27 — the 25th year this event has been held.
Barber, who is also founding director of the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School and a professor of the practice at the school, delivered a talk titled, “More than a Sermon: Martin’s Last Message to Us Now.” In it, he urged the audience not to approach the memory of King with simple remembrance and reverence, but to recognize the work still to be done.
“[King] had a prescription for America’s ailment,” Barber said. “He said we needed a massive, nonviolent army of love that must come together across all the lines that divide us and build a power that enables us to express our love. He bid us to stand together and to recognize that we were equals before the throne of a loving God and that calls us to love and to stand and to do justice.”
(In an interview last week with Yale News, Barber spoke about King’s legacy and his own work building a grassroots movement of “moral fusion politics.”)
Following the talk, Barber was joined in conversation by the Reverend Eboni Marshall Turman, associate professor of theology and African American religion at Yale Divinity School, who also serves as one of the co-chairs of the Black Theology group of the American Academy of Religion and as the personnel chair for the Society of Christian Ethics.
The event also featured performances by Sharmont “Influence” Little, an activist, actor, and current poet laureate of New Haven, the student a cappella group Shades of Yale, and the singer-songwriter Yara Allen, artist-in-residence at the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy, who led the audience in a call-and-response song. A performance by the Kergyma Choir closed the event.
The Office of the Secretary & Vice President for University Life and the Yale College Dean’s Office were presenting sponsors of the event; the planning committee was led by Risë Nelson, the inaugural director of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility for Yale Library & Collections.
The Battell Chapel commemoration was part of a series of events held on the Yale campus and across New Haven this month to honor and reflect on the legacy of the late civil rights leader.

Shades of Yale, a student a cappella group, performed.

Kimberly Goff-Crews, secretary and vice president for university life at Yale, offered opening remarks.

At several points in the evening, audience members rose to clap or sing along with the performances.

Yara Allen, artist-in-residence at the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy, led the audience in a call-and-response song.

Yale Divinity School Dean Greg Sterling introduced Barber.

Sharmont “Influence” Little, an activist, actor, and current poet laureate of New Haven, read a poem.

In closing, Barber called on audience members to come to the front and join hands in a show of unity.