Richard Schachet shares his hopes and memories

Martin Luther King Jr. Day always holds special meaning and memories for Rabbi Richard Schachet.

Schachet, 69, recently retired from his post at the Valley Outreach Synagogue in Las Vegas, Nev., and moved to Portland.

While leading studies earlier this month at Beit Am in Corvallis, Schachet took time to share his recollections of Aug. 28, 1963, the day he heard King deliver his famous “I Have A Dream” speech.

“It was an incredible experience. I was there to see history being made,” he said. “When Martin spoke, you listened.”

Growing up in Laurelton, Long Island, Schachet said he quickly became a champion of civil rights.

“I was raised in a family that believed in total equality. It did not matter race, religion, gender or sexual orientation. So it was only natural that as I got older, I would take part in various demonstrations, and align myself with causes.”

Although a self-described mediocre student in high school, Schachet went on to earn undergraduate degrees in business administration and Hebrew education from New York University, as well as a master’s degree in social anthropology.

He earned a doctorate in theology from Princeton University, and a doctorate in rabbinic studies from the Rabbinic Academy. He studied at the Academy for Higher Jewish Learning and Yeshiva and Mesivta Rabeinu Chaim Ozer, getting ordained in May 1965.

Schachet considers himself extremely liberal. He’s been conducting gay marriage ceremonies for 35 years, and draws parallels on the current bans on gay marriages and the previous bans on interracial marriages.

“It’s a question of rights of people. If two people are in love, they’re in love. Why shouldn’t they be married and have equal rights?”

Schachet recalled chaining himself to the United Nations building with other rabbis to protest anti-Semitism in the former Soviet Union.

And he attended a sit-in with King in a Selma, Ala., restaurant in the early 1960s to protest segregation.

Once while riding a bus in Washington, D.C., Schachet caused a scene by sitting in the back of the bus, a section then reserved for blacks.

Before moving to Las Vegas, Schachet served as a rabbi at synagogues in New York, San Diego and Los Angeles.

In Los Angeles, he invited black gospel choirs to sing at his services, which proved immensely popular with the congregation.

In Las Vegas, he marked Martin Luther King Jr. Day by organizing interfaith services with prayer, choral performances, re-enactments of the “I Have A Dream” speech and his own reflections on the March on Washington.

This year he’ll spend the holiday in Portland, where he plans to attend and participate in services.

“All of my civil rights work, be it gay or black/white, is about equal rights for all humanity. No one person is lesser than another,” he said.