We can't be dissuaded by those who tell us we are going the wrong way. We have thought and prayed and suffered and tried to live happily in the world as it is and we know we can't, we know we have to journey to a different and better world and we know where it is and we are on our way. Keep walking.
But worse than those who want us to go backwards are those who want us to stop and talk about why we are going so slowly. They say they feel sorry for us, for being so bad at going where we're going to. They say that we'll never get to where we want to be, going so slowly, so the best thing for us to do is to stop and listen to them explain to us how to go faster. Keep walking.
When they say 'stop we'll show you how to build a bicycle' keep walking, when they say 'come back, we'll make you a car or a plane or even a rocket ship to get you where you want to go' keep walking. We can build things while we walk, after all we are walking slowly, we can talk while we walk, we can make plans, we can explore new ideas as we walk and we usually find that the further down the road we get the more we discover about how things work and how to build what we need to get us where we want to go. But we never stop, we keep on walking.
When some people voiced concern that the MLK monument might slow us down by making us complacent, my first reaction was simply that my jaw dropped and my eyes got big. It had never for one split second crossed my mind that anyone on earth would see a monument to Dr. Martin Luther King as a 'mission accomplished' sign. It's as if someone said 'don't build a church until you get to heaven'.
When I look at the faces of Lincoln and King on the Capitol Mall I don't see satisfied men, I see a reminder to keep walking.
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