UNC Asheville will host a community reception with Bernard LaFayette, keynote speaker for the 28th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Prayer Breakfast. The reception will be held 11 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 17, at UNC Asheville's Reuter Center. The event immediately follows the breakfast, which will be held at 8:30 a.m. at the Grove Park Inn. The reception is co-sponsored by UNC Asheville's Office of Retiree Services and the Asheville-Buncombe County Martin Luther King Jr. Association. The event is free and open to the public.

LaFayette worked closely with King in the years before his assassination. He directs the Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies at the University of Rhode Island and is chairman of the Rhode Island Select Commission on Race and Police-Community Relations. A co-founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in 1960, LaFayette holds a bachelor's degree from the American Baptist Theological Seminary in Nashville and a doctorate from Harvard University.

During the reception, special guest artists the Mizero Children of Rwanda will perform. This dance and vocal group is made up of more than a dozen Rwandan orphans who demonstrate the country's rich music and dance traditions.

For more information, call the Asheville-Buncombe County Martin Luther King Jr. Association at 828/335-6896.