2025 University MLK Commemoration featuring Bishop William J. Barber II
“More than a Sermon: Martin’s Last Message to Us Now”
Monday, January 27, 2025 | 6:00pm to 7:30pm (Doors open at 5:15 p.m.)
Battell Chapel | 400 College Street, New Haven, CT
This event is free and open to the public, and it will also be livestreamed. Registration is required to attend in person.
The Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II is President and Senior Lecturer of Repairers of the Breach, Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call For Moral Revival, Bishop with The Fellowship of Affirming Ministries, Executive Board Member of the Christian Church Disciples of Christ, and Professor in the Practice of Public Theology and Public Policy and Founding Director of the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School.
He is the author of five books: White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy; We Are Called To Be A Movement; Revive Us Again: Vision and Action in Moral Organizing; The Third Reconstruction: Moral Mondays, Fusion Politics, and The Rise of a New Justice Movement; and Forward Together: A Moral Message For The Nation.
Rev. Dr. Barber served as senior pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church, Disciples of Christ for thirty years, as president of the North Carolina NAACP from 2006-2017, and on the National NAACP Board of Directors from 2008-2020. He is the architect of the Forward Together Moral Movement that gained national acclaim in 2013 with its Moral Monday protests at the North Carolina General Assembly. In 2015, he established Repairers of the Breach to train communities in moral movement building through the Moral Political Organizing Leadership Institute and Summit Trainings (MPOLIS). In 2018, he co-anchored the relaunch of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival— reviving the 1968 Poor People’s Campaign organized by SCLC, under the leadership of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., welfare rights advocates, religious leaders, and people of all races to fight poverty in the U.S.
A highly sought-after speaker, Rev. Dr. Barber has given keynote addresses at hundreds of national and state conferences, including the 2016 Democratic National Convention, the 59th Inaugural Prayer Service for President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Vatican in honor of Pope Francis’s encyclical “Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home,” and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. In June 2018, he addressed the 5th Uni Global Union World Congress with representatives from more than 25 countries.
Dr. Barber is regularly featured in media outlets such as MSNBC, CNN, the New York Times, Washington Post, and The Nation magazine. He is a Senior Fellow with the Kettering Foundation, was named one of 2020’s 100 Entertainers and Innovators by BET, and was a 2019 recipient of the North Carolina Award, the state’s highest civilian honor. He is a 2018 MacArthur Foundation Genius Award recipient and a 2015 recipient of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Award and the Puffin Award.
Dr. Barber has had twelve honorary degrees conferred upon him. He earned a Bachelor’s Degree from North Carolina Central University, a Master of Divinity from Duke University, and a Doctorate from Drew University with a concentration in Public Policy and Pastoral Care.
Intro video – https://vimeo.com/849784134?share=copy
Rev. Marshall Turman
The Reverend Eboni Marshall Turman is the associate professor of theology and African American religion at Yale University Divinity School in New Haven, CT. She co-chairs of the Black Theology group of the American Academy of Religion and serves as the personnel chair for the Society of Christian Ethics. Her research interests include varieties of 20th century US theological liberalisms, most especially Black and womanist theological, social ethical, and theo-aesthetic traditions. She is a recipient of the Inspire Yale award, and the Yale University Bouchet Faculty Excellence award for research and teaching. In addition to several journal articles and book chapters, she is the author of Toward a Womanist Ethic of Incarnation: Black Bodies, the Black Church, and the Council of Chalcedon. She is completing her next book titled, Black Woman’s Burden: Power, Violence, and the Scandal of African American Social Christianity; and has begun working on her third monograph tentatively titled Loves the Spirit: The Womanist Theological Idea.
Sharmont “Influence” Little
Shades of Yale
Shades of Yale is a co-ed a cappella group founded in 1988 to celebrate music of the African Diaspora and African-American tradition. It is Shades’ objective to offer a unique, musically excellent, and spiritually enriching performance experience at Yale University and beyond. Drawing from the diverse backgrounds of their members and the oral traditions of Black people everywhere, Shades strive to authentically portray the true depth and complexity of the Black experience. In addition to mastering their style of music, shades developed an appreciation of its history and roots in order to educate audiences about their music’s lineage.
Kergyma Choir
The Kergyma Community Choir has engrained its footprint as one of those Gospel choirs who consistently embody a dynamic presentation and the distinguished charisma of a great Gospel Choir. The Connecticut-based aggregation of singers was founded in 2001 by Gwendolyn Williams and Arnold Johnson. With over two decades of unity, Williams and Johnson confidently take on the charge of keeping our Gospel choir relevant and thriving throughout the Christian music industry. Kergyma was featured in the Netflix hit series “SEVEN SECONDS” featuring Russell Hornsby and award-winning actress and director Regina King. They also received two 2018 Rhythm of Gospel Awards for Best Community Choir and Best Product Packaging. Singing is not the only focus of Kergyma; the group proudly maneuvers professionally through the Gospel music industry with results that have grown their ministry as a 501(c)3 organization. Kergyma has expanded music and ministry to work with other entities to bring life-changing assistance and services to their community that they live and work in.
A theomusicologist, singer, songwriter, poet, and musician, Allen is a native of Rocky Mount, NC, who serves as National Director of Theomusicology and Cultural Arts with Repairers of the Breach and Poor People’s Campaign. As an artist-in-residence, Allen teaches students about movement music, creating and implementing music in moral fusion movements. Following in the footsteps of song leaders who came before her, she improvises within a broad tradition of movement music. Allen has led and taught music in churches, cathedrals, rallies, college classrooms, and at the Vatican. Ms. Allen engages audiences of singers and non-singers alike to create “Justice Jump-in Choirs” that infuse gatherings with the sounds of freedom. She has trained organizing committees in more than 35 states.
Together with Center Director, Bishop William J. Barber, II, Ms. Allen has launched a new podcast, “A Breach Repairers Song,” an immersive series soundtracking the marriage between music as an art form and music as a tool for activism.