The Rev. James Lawson, who invited Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to Memphis 51 years ago, will speak at Memphis Cares 2 on April 7 at Crump Stadium. The event recalls the first Memphis Cares, held three days after King's assassination.

Every three months or so, 50 people who comprise the MSCC board of directors file into a room for their quarterly meeting. They include law enforcement and criminal justice leaders as well as people from business, faith, nonprofit and grassroots sectors.

Playback Memphis was life-giving to this band of 14, who were “voluntold” to participate in what most would deem a crazy idea – bringing police officers together with those who had spent their lives running from them.

In Memphis, new immigrants make up just over 5 percent of the metro population, but account for 9 percent of the area's business owners.

Bill Russell and Bob Cousy saw each other as brothers, not just athletes. Their relationship reflects a standard our society has yet to attain.

Jared Rawlings' essay was one of two chosen from 2,000 submitted by students from 16 schools in the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office Every Day in School program. He was named an ambassador in the national Do the Write Thing Challenge, an anti-violence essay contest.

With this entry, McKenzie Leaks was named an ambassador in the national Do the Write Thing Challenge, an anti-violence essay contest. Her essay was one of two chosen from 2,000 submitted by students from 16 schools in the Shelby County District Attorney’s Office Every Day in School program.

'I can predict that when the Memphis River Parks Partnership’s work on Tom Lee Park is complete, few will look back and long for the flat field that we experience today.'

Discriminatory laws will only set the tone for continued discrimination – up to and including targeted violence. These proposed laws are a distraction from Tennessee priorities like good schools, healthy environments and safe communities.

'I’m pretty certain it was that Memphis grit and grind that I wasn’t always so comfortable with that helped me earn a license as a locomotive conductor at nearly 40 years old.'

Motivated by the fact that the majority of Tennessee’s third-grade students can’t read or do math on grade level, a bipartisan group of legislators has committed to exploring policy improvements for students prior to third grade.

Here are 20 songs from the Memphis music catalog that will improve your commute one day this week.

John will be lamented and loved as a survivor and casualty of addiction, a saint and sinner, a gentle and tormented soul whose life and death, head and heart, darkness and light were a parable, a revelation, a psalm.

The beauty of Tom Lee Park is the unobstructed expansiveness of it all. It could certainly use some improvements, but keep it simple. Let this park be a park. 

Addiction is an illness. Mental health conditions are illnesses. No judgment, shame or feelings of guilt are needed from us; only love, support and treatment.

'I don’t know where Rashad is. I don’t have a heaven or a hell to put him in. But I believe that he experienced heaven on earth in my classroom.'

'Ministers and those in other healing professions are called to use their own woundedness in the healing of others. At times, such openness can become an occupational hazard – becoming overwhelmed by the exposure to such pain.'

As written, the Tennessee bill prohibits abortion as early as six weeks, before many people even know that they’re pregnant. Similar versions of this bill have been declared unconstitutional in other states.

Because the legalization movement has made marijuana sound healthy, more people are using it. Daily intake nearly tripled from about 3 million users in 2005 to more than 8 million in 2017. 

Every Friday at The Way, John Kilzer would greet those who were new to recovery, who were afraid and alone, with these words: “We are going to love you, and there ain’t nothing you can do about it.”

Instead of trying a new, unproven program with dubious accountability to the taxpayers who are funding it, why don’t we double down on the initiatives that are already working across the state?

"I am a scientist at a world-class institution where a lack of power is unimaginable, but Venezuela's blackout is affecting me personally. Fear, uncertainty, helplessness is what the outage has generated in all Venezuelans."

A teacher's dilemma: "I felt the tension rise in me, the tension of being told 'no,' and I felt the clear choice to either escalate the situation or to draw near to the student."

The global governing body of the United Methodist Church reaffirmed its position on traditional marriage, including prohibition on ordaining LGBTQ+ people as pastors and prohibiting LGBTQ+ people from being married in the church. "This decision has caused much despair among people I love and respect," a pastor writes.

The City of Memphis uses some creative methods to fund projects such as Union Row and The Fairgrounds youth sports complex, and those methods are often misunderstood, says a city deputy chief operating officer.