The question floated above the event’s mostly white audience: In the time since Martin Luther King’s writing, “The Letter from Birmingham Jail," has anything changed?

Held in the Numen Lumen Pavilion Tuesday, Jan. 19, the event “What does MLK Say to us Today” focused on drawing connections between the plight of African-Americans during the 1960s and today. King's letter served as the historical context for the discussion.

“He was criticized as an outspoken agitator,” said Joel Harter, associate chaplain for Protestant life, and moderator for the event. “But he still wrote the letter anyway, speaking majorly to white Christians.”

Written on April 16, 1963, King penned the letter from the inside a Birmingham, Alabama jail cell. It was a call for the privileged and passive to consider silence as consent in the face of injustice.

Rabbi Meir Goldstein, associate chaplain for Jewish life, and Jamie Butler, assistant director of the Center for Race, Ethnicity, and Diversity Education (CREDE) led the discussion.

“The letter reads much like current news, blogs, Facebook statues and tweets we see in January of 2016," Butler said. "It’s sobering."

Butler said that while today’s racism takes a new, ever-evolving form, King’s message remains prevalent.

“Although the struggle is somewhat different, and in a new presentation, the call for justice and the end of hatred and injustice is the same.”

She continued by reaffirming Harter’s initial point that King was reaching out for white support and those who were afraid to stand up for justice.

“I believe that if Martin Luther King Jr. were alive today, he would be critical of the silent privileged and the silent majority,” Butler said.

Smaller group dialogues followed the initial discussion and were centered around three questions: Who is suffering today? Are we being silent? What can we do about it?

Student activists, including freshman Kendall Kynoch, led many of the smaller dialogues.

While Kynoch said she understands why many people think they are unable to stand up to peers and family members regarding issues of intolerance for marginalized groups, she insisted the fight must be made.

“Sometimes, you need to realize the arguments are worth it," Kynoch said.