From the Kairos Center (https://kairoscenter.org/):
The Kairos Center is excited to announce that the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II will be transitioning out of his role as the president of the North Carolina Conference of the NAACP in June, in order to join the growing leadership of the New Poor People’s Campaign. The North Carolina NAACP announced the news in a press release this morning, including details of a press conference to be held next Monday, May 15 at Davie Street Presbyterian Church:
“The North Carolina NAACP State Conference will hold a press conference on Monday, May 15 at 10:00 a.m. at the Davie Street Presbyterian Church, 300 E. Davie Street, to announce that the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II will transition out of the presidency of the North Carolina Conference of NAACP branches in June. Rev. Dr. Barber will entrust leadership of the NAACP in his home state to others in order to help organize a Poor People’s Campaign in Washington D.C. and twenty-five states across the nation. He will continue to serve as pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church in Goldsboro, North Carolina.”
The Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, the co-director of the Kairos Center, will be present on Monday at the press conference. The press release includes a quote from Rev. Dr. Theoharis on the significance of this moment and on the ongoing work of Rev. Barber:
“’Rev. Dr. Barber’s national moral leadership in these difficult days is more important than ever,’ said the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, co-director of the Kairos Center for Rights, Religions, and Social Justice. ‘He is answering a call to carry on the legacy of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther Jr. by building a new Poor People’s Campaign to address rampant militarism, racism and poverty in our day and to build a movement of millions,’ she said.”
The press release also contains a great description of the New Poor People’s Campaign, to which Rev. Barber will now be directing his prophetic leadership:
“Rev. Barber will focus attention on the new Poor People’s Campaign co-led by the Kairos Center at Union Theological Seminary, where Rev. Barber is a distinguished professor of public theology. Throughout 2017 and early 2018 he will lead trainings and organize alongside moral leaders, including poor black, brown and white communities. The forthcoming report, ‘The Souls of Poor Folk,’ co-developed by the Rev. Dr. James Forbes, Rev. Dr. Barber, and noted economists, historians and public policy experts, will explore why issues of poverty have changed or remained the same since the Poor People’s Campaign of 1967/68. In early 2018, moral activists will lead 40 days of simultaneous direct action and civil disobedience in state capitols, Washington D.C. and the U.S. Congress.
‘Fifty years ago, Dr. Martin Luther King called for a radical ‘revolution of values’ inviting a divided nation to stand against the evils of militarism, racism, and economic injustice. In the spirit of the Poor People’s Campaign of 1967/68, we are calling for a national moral revival and for fusion coalitions in every state to come together and advance a moral agenda,’ said the Rev. Dr. Barber. ‘There is a need for moral analysis, articulation of a moral agenda, and moral activism that fuses the critique of systemic racism, poverty, the war economy, and national morality in a way that enables organizing among black, brown, and white people, especially in regions where great efforts have been made to keep them from forming alliances and standing together to change the political and social calculus,’ he said.”
The story has already broken in several mainstream media sources, including ABC News and the Winston-Salem Chronicle. ABC reports,
“Barber also leads a nonprofit called Repairers of the Breach and said that group, along with the Kairos Center, Union Theological Seminary and others will lead a movement that will concentrate on 25 states and the nation’s capital where voter suppression, poverty and other problems are prevalent. The groups plan major actions next summer, which would mark the 50th anniversary of the start of King’s campaign in 1968.”
The Kairos Center will continue to report on this important news as it breaks in North Carolina.
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