"‘Do not conform’ is difficult advice in a generation when crowd pressures have unconsciously conditioned our minds and feet to move to the rhythmic drumbeat of the status quo. Many voices and forces urge us to choose the path of least resistance and bid us never to fight for an unpopular cause and never to be found in a pathetic minority of two or three."
"We need to recapture the gospel glow of the early Christians, who were nonconformists in the truest sense of the word and refused to shape their witness according to the mundane patterns of the world."
"I confess that I never intend to become adjusted to the evils of segregation and the crippling effects of discrimination, to the moral degeneracy of religious bigotry, and the corroding effects of narrow sectarianism, to economic conditions that deprive people of work and food, and to the insanities of militarism and the self-defeating effects of physical violence....Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted."
Dr. King's sermon can be found in his book of sermons, Strength to Love, and online at thekingcenter.org