Vincent Harding | |
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| Born | Vincent Gordon Harding (1931-07-25)July 25, 1931 |
| Died | May 19, 2014(2014-05-19) (aged 82) |
| Occupations |
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| Notable work |
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| Movement | Civil rights movement |
| Spouses |
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| Ecclesiastical career | |
| Religion | Christianity (Mennonite) |
| Scholarly background | |
| Alma mater | |
| Doctoral advisor | Martin E. Marty |
| Scholarly work | |
| Discipline | History |
| Institutions | |
Vincent Gordon Harding (July 25, 1931 – May 19, 2014) was anAfrican-Americanpastor,historian, and scholar of various topics with a focus onAmerican religion andsociety. Asocial activist, he was perhaps best known for his work with and writings aboutMartin Luther King Jr., whom Harding knew personally. Besides having authored numerous books such asThere Is A River,Hope and History, andMartin Luther King: The Inconvenient Hero, he served as co-chairperson of the social unity group Veterans of Hope Project and as Professor of Religion and Social Transformation atIliff School of Theology inDenver,Colorado.[1] When Harding died on May 19, 2014, his daughter, Rachel Elizabeth Harding, publicly eulogized him on the Veterans of Hope Project website.[2]
Harding was born on July 25, 1931, inHarlem,New York,[3][4] and attended New York public schools, graduating fromMorris High School inthe Bronx in 1948. After finishing high school, he enrolled in theCity College of New York, where he received aBachelor of Arts in history in 1952.[5] The following year he graduated fromColumbia University, where he earned aMaster of Science degree in journalism. Harding served in theUS Army from 1953 to 1955. In 1956 he received aMaster of Arts degree in history at theUniversity of Chicago. In 1965 he received hisDoctor of Philosophy degree in history from the University of Chicago, where he was advised byMartin E. Marty.
In 1960, Harding and his wife,Rosemarie Freeney Harding, moved toAtlanta,Georgia, to participate in theSouthern Freedom Movement as representatives of the Mennonite Church. The Hardings co-founded Mennonite House, an interracial voluntary service center and movement gathering place in Atlanta. The couple traveled throughout the South in the early 1960s working as reconcilers, counselors and participants in the Movement, assisting the anti-segregation campaigns of theSouthern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), theStudent Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and theCongress of Racial Equality (CORE). Vincent Harding occasionally drafted speeches forMartin Luther King Jr., including King's famous anti-Vietnam speech, "A Time to Break Silence", which King delivered on April 4, 1967, at Riverside Church in New York City, exactly a year before he was assassinated.[6][7]
Harding taught at theUniversity of Pennsylvania,Spelman College,Temple University,Swarthmore College, andPendle Hill Quaker Center for Study and Contemplation. In the months afterKing's 1968 assassination, Harding worked withCoretta Scott King to set up theKing Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta, and served as its first director.[8] During those same months in 1968, he worked with a group of scholars to set up Atlanta'sInstitute of the Black World.[8] He also became senior academic consultant for thePBS television seriesEyes on the Prize.
Harding served as chairperson of theVeterans of Hope Project: A Center for the Study of Religion and Democratic Renewal, located at theIliff School of Theology inDenver,Colorado. He taught at Iliff as Professor of Religion and Social Transformation from 1981 to 2004.
Harding was a devoutChristian and believer in achieving racial and economic equality in the United States.[9] Harding was aSeventh-day Adventist pastor before becoming aMennonite pastor.[10]
In January 2005, Harding remarked at the Christianliberal arts universityGoshen College:
There's a lesson for us: If we lock up Martin Luther King, and make him unavailable for where we are now so we can keep ourselves comfortably distant from the realities he was trying to grapple with, we waste King. All of us are being called beyond those comfortable places where it's easy to be Christian. That's the key for the 21st century – to answer the voice within us, as it was within Martin, which says 'do something for somebody.' We can learn to play on locked pianos and to dream of worlds that do not yet exist.[9]
