12th Interfaith Breakfast Fetes King’s Vision

More than 350 religious and community leaders gathered at Trinity Baptist Church for the 12th annual King Interfaith Breakfast in honor of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

The breakfast, the first King Interfaith Breakfast since the spring riots, focused heavily on the need for Angelenos to live up to the spirit of King’s nonviolent civil rights campaigns and his struggle for harmony among all races and ethnic groups.

“We have tolerated a city where suspicion, hatred and prejudice flourish at the intersections where we collide and crash,” said Rabbi Harvey Fields, president of the Interreligious Council of Southern California. “Dr. King said it all: ‘We shall either learn to live together as brothers and sisters or we shall perish together as fools.’ ”

The two-hour breakfast Wednesday was sponsored by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference of Los Angeles and the National Conference of Christians and Jews, a non-sectarian religious education and training group, and Interreligious Council of Southern California.

Among faiths represented at the breakfast were Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Sikh Dharma, Hinduism, Buddhism and Bahaism. Politicians included council members Mark Ridley-Thomas, Rita Walters and Michael Woo.

The Rev. Dumas A. Harshaw Jr., pastor of Trinity Baptist Church, praised the eclectic gathering and said the event proved that all people can come together regardless of their differences.

“This is what his (King’s) dream was all about,” Harshaw said. “This is what America is all about.”