At least two local celebrations are planned in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, as the holiday honoring his memory and life’s work arrives Monday.

For the second year, the Harford Jewish Center/Temple Adas Shalom in Havre de Grace is meeting with another local congregation, Zion Temple Church, to commemorate Dr. King and what he stood for.

The idea came from Rabbi Gila Ruskin, who has been with the synagogue since 2007.

“I had spent two years teaching at the St. Frances Academy in Baltimore and really became very moved by the rapport between the African-American and Jewish communities through the years, and wanted to continue somehow celebrating that relationship,” Rabbi Ruskin said.

St. Frances Academy is a historically black and Hispanic high school in Baltimore.

She also participated in other Martin Luther King Jr. Day memorial programs with churches in the Baltimore area.

With that in mind, in 2009, Ruskin invited the Rev. L. LaMont Turner and his Zion Temple Church congregation for a Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration at the synagogue.

“I really think it’s a time where Jews and African-Americans should come together and realize our common aspirations,” she said.

This year, they will again meet just ahead of the holiday, but this time at the church.

Whereas Rev. Turner gave the remarks last year, Rabbi Ruskin will do so this year.

The ceremony Saturday will start with a havdalah ceremony, which marks the end of the Jewish Sabbath, and will feature the combined choirs of both congregations, readings, liturgical dancers from the church, a children’s choir and refreshments.

The general public is also welcome to the event, which starts at 6:30 p.m.

Rabbi Ruskin said last year’s event was a success, with about 150 people in attendance, and she hopes this one will be as well.

“We had a great turnout. Everybody had a very positive experience,” she said. “It was a very nice feeling to look out there and see people who were African-American and Jewish and Hispanic.”

After last year’s event, the synagogue also formed a choir, which it did not have in the past and which will contribute to this event.

“I heard this song and I knew it was perfect: ‘One Small Step for Freedom,’” Rabbi Ruskin said.

Although the event is in a spiritual setting, Rabbi Ruskin said it is more of a general memorial service.

“It’s more of a tribute and celebration of Dr. King in a religious context,” she said. “We can’t really pray together in a traditional way because we have very different theologies, but we can pray together because we can focus on Martin Luther King’s [vision].”

Lasherra Ayala, administrative assistant at Zion Temple Church, said her congregation is looking forward to another nice event as well.

“We are doing it just in remembrance of Dr. King and the Jewish leaders who served with Dr. King,” she said. “It’s bridging the gap between Jewish and Christian people. It was a very, very successful event last year. We came to find that we do have a lot in common and since then, we have kept in contact with each other and do things outside of this event.”

Breakfast to honor King

Another event is planned at Rooted Bible Fellowship Church in Edgewood.

The Harford County branch of the NAACP will hold its fifth annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day breakfast on Monday.

The breakfast will be from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m., followed by a program until noon.

The event will include NAACP’s Black Youth in Action and will introduce various talents in the community, Jerome Foster, second vice-president of the NAACP branch, said.

There will also be entertainment, a choir and a film honoring Dr. King.

Usually 100 to 125 people attend the the event, Foster said.

The breakfast “is to give recognition to the man who made the day happen,” Foster said.

It is also to make it “not a day where you go out shopping, make it a day where you have appreciation of the past,” he said.

The education systems

Harford County Public Schools and Harford Community College are both closed on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and do not have any special events planned.

He had a dream

Martin Luther King Jr. was born Jan. 15, 1929 in Atlanta, Ga., and became pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Ala., in 1954. He also served as co-pastor at his family’s Ebenezer Baptist Church.

He was on the NAACP executive committee and, in December 1955, led the first major black nonviolent demonstration, a bus boycott that lasted 382 days.

During the boycott, King was arrested and his home was bombed; the Supreme Court declared bus segregation unconstitutional at the end of 1956.

After being elected president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957, King traveled extensively for 11 years and led a large protest in Birmingham, Ala.

He wrote “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” planned drives to register blacks to vote and directed a march on Washington, D.C., where he delivered his “I Have a Dream” address, which looks forward to a society where people are judged not based on “the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Dr. King was arrested about 20 times, named Man of the Year by Time magazine in 1963 and was the youngest man to receive the Nobel Peace Prize, at 35 years old.

He was killed on April 4, 1968, in Memphis, Tenn., where he was to lead a protest march with striking garbage workers.

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