American Lit

In Doctor Martin Luther King’s I have a dream speech, he proclaimed, “The hottest place in hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict.” This quote was important to African Americans during the Civil Rights Movement. During the Civil Rights Movement, religious morals kept African American families close. It kept everybody strong through the hard times and made people realize that there is hope. The Civil Rights movement was an extension of church. During the 1960s morals were important to everyone because morals gave them hope to one day reach their dreams. Morals are important to a family and the elders of the family will keep those morals stronger than anybody else. In A Raisin in the Sun, momma is talking to Benetha and she says, “There is always something left to love. And if you ain’t learned that, you ain’t learned nothing. Have you cried for that boy today? I don’t mean for yourself and for the family ‘cause we lost the money.” (Hansberry 145) Benetha was hurting her brother instead of praying for him and loving him in hard times. The elders of the family know what’s going on so they have to be strong and set good examples to the young ones in the family and keep everyone’s hopes up. Religious morals are the best way to go with keeping everyone’s hopes up. Everybody has a dream of being rich and famous, but maybe it’s not our destiny to be rich and famous. God has a plan for us and we are here to live out the plan he has for us. Brain Simmons states in his article The American Dream “While it is not that we can be anything we want to be, it is true that we can be everything God created us to be.” (1) Sometimes we want more than what we really need. Sometimes the little things can go a long way. As human beings we expect a lot more than what we need. We always lose sight of what really matters and god is