Martin Luther King on Loving your Enemies

This is a great illustration of how evil gives us an opportunity to reflect God's love to those who persecute us.

from "Strength to Love", p. 56, a sermon called, "Loving your Enemies."

We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering.
We shall meet your physical force with soul force.

Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love you.
Throw us in jail, and we shall still love you.
Bomb our homes and threaten our children, and we shall still love you.
Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you.

But be assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer.
One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves.
We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory.