Prayers, politics and Coretta Scott King

Re “A Eulogy for King, a Scolding for Bush,” Feb. 8

I was inspired by the Coretta Scott King funeral. The Republicans who complain about politics intruding on the service must have missed the point of her life. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy is one of nonviolence and civil rights; it puts President Bush’s war on terror and his budget priorities to shame.

Kudos to Jimmy Carter and the Rev. Joseph Lowery for speaking truth to power. Coretta King wouldn’t have had it any other way. The struggle is not over, and the post-9/11 reality has drifted far from King’s dream. Perhaps history would be different if Republicans spent more retreat time at the King Center and less time with Karl Rove. My prayer for America is that the King legacy inspires our leaders to “think different” about Iran.

WILLIAM WHITAKER

Los Angeles

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As a minority and follower of King’s message, I was appalled to see the funeral of the first lady of the civil rights movement turn into a political circus. At a time when Coretta King should have been eulogized, some took the opportunity to make political statements directed at Bush. It was a disgrace to the memory of the Kings.

Martin Luther King Jr. once said: “Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man’s sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.” Coretta King’s funeral appeared to exemplify this “hate” in various forms, and I, as a minority, was embarrassed by it.

ORLANDO V. GRIEGO

Carlsbad