BWAP 2025: Saints and Prophets ~ Will Clancy

I am a member of the Episcopal Church — a Christian tradition that honors saints on an annual calendar, celebrating their lives, their faith, and how they changed the world around them. One such saint on this calendar is Martin Luther King, Jr. When I discovered this my freshman year, it initially struck me as odd. Martin Luther King, Jr. was not like the other saints I knew about. St. Winifred, for example, was decapitated, created a mystical healing spring, and then had her head miraculously reattached. What miracles did Martin Luther King, Jr. perform?

But, after visiting Alabama, I can say there are few things I have ever been more assured of in my faith than King’s sainthood. In Alabama, it felt impossible to escape his legacy. Everywhere we went, we visited sites that King had once been—where he had preached, where he was beaten and arrested, where he marched—and in all of these places, it is impossible to deny the importance of King’s work and the Civil Rights Movement more broadly. Yes, perhaps Saint Winifred’s head was reattached, but Saint Martin Luther King, Jr. led a mass movement that overturned legalized racial segregation, secured voting rights for Black Americans, and changed the hearts and minds of millions of Americans — all while facing overwhelming resistance from the U.S. government. To me, the latter miracles are far more impressive than the former.

To me, King is not only a saint; he is also a prophet. Most of the time, when we think of prophets, we think of ancient times and ancient names: Isaiah, Jeremiah, etc. These prophets, sometimes writing as far back as the 6th or 5th centuries BCE, spoke God’s word to the people of ancient Israel, reminding them about the kind of life God wanted them to live. That feels far away from us now. But I think the message King’s sainthood sends is that God is still speaking through prophets today, calling us to God’s kingdom.

In my mind, King exemplifies that prophetic leadership. When I listen to King’s speeches and read his writings, I cannot help but see King’s vision. This is perhaps most clearly exemplified by King’s most famous speech: the “I Have a Dream” speech at the March on Washington. King’s speech is an exhortation, to respond to God’s call for justice, and to believe that the world can be a more just place. It is a huge ask — to believe that this world, messy as it is, could be made just. It is an exhortation I might not have believed on my own. But when King says it, I can believe it will one day be true. God gave Martin Luther King, Jr. a dream of what this world could look like, and in his life, King shared that dream with the rest of us.

We live in a world which, at times, can feel crushingly mundane and horrifically unjust. But the life and teachings of saints and prophets like King can offer us wisdom for living in a mundane and unjust world. They offer proof to us that God is still speaking to us today. To me, King is that proof, and his dream is not just a dream, but a prophecy of what we could one day see.

Will Clancy (he/they) is a junior studying political science and philosophy.

Photo: A statue of King at Kelly Ingram Park in Birmingham.