"If it weren't for the mentorship and guidance from people like my mother, James Brown and others, I ..." — Al Sharpton

One of the reasons I get so much joy out of my own children's childhoods is that I'm having my first childhood myself.

My ordination in the Church of God in Christ was at age 9, and I later became a Baptist minister, which I am today.

James Brown became my father. He would talk to me the way a father talked to a son. He became the father I never had.

It seems some have chosen to ignore or have simply forgotten the big-picture vision promoted by Dr. King and his kin.