From the Archdeacon for Mission in the Diocese of NY:
Let Freedom Ring August 28 at 3:00 pm
This past Saturday tens of thousands gathered on the Washington Mall to commemorate the 50th
Anniversary of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. That gathering is part of a weeklong series of events which will culminate on Wednesday, August 28, with a “Let Freedom Ring” Commemoration and Closing Ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. As part of this event, bells will be rung across the nation and in many places around the world at 3 pm (Eastern). Please add your church bell to the chorus.
Here is a link to text and audio of Dr. King’s speech at the 1963 March (“I Have a Dream…”):
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/mlkihaveadream.htm
Here is a link to the Calendar of Events for August 28 which contains a link where you can register your bell ringing:
http://officialmlkdream50.com/august-28/
And this will be the day — this will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning:
My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing.
Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim’s pride,
From every mountainside, let freedom ring!
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.
And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania.
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California.
But not only that:
Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:
Free at last! Free at last!
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!
From Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speech on August 28, 1963, at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom