Churches must work to address racial divide
SHREVEPORT, La. — Bishop L. Lawrence Brandon, pastor of Praise Temple Full Gospel Baptist Cathedral here, stands behind the motto, "We're better together."
Brandon recently participated in a session aimed at formulating solutions to the nation's racial divide. The event, "The Reconciled Church: Healing the Racial Divide," took place at the Potter's House in Dallas on the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday.
"I was very excited to be invited to attend the Reconciled Church and to attend the closed session between pastors across America," Brandon said. "I was able to meet and greet several pastors from mega churches — from San Diego to Miami."
The session was spearheaded by Bishop Harry Jackson, international presiding bishop of the International Communion of Evangelical Churches and founder of High Impact Leadership Coalition.
"We have been guilty of not dealing with the race problem ourselves," said Jackson. "We are part of the problem, and that's really the first step."
Jackson was in Ferguson, Mo., when the grand jury made its decision in the Michael Brown case.
"I was in Ferguson when they they blew up everything during the riots and I really felt as I do now that the church has to get its act together," Jackson said. "At the time you had a lot of law and order folks and you also had the people of color who are obviously justifiably upset at the death of this young man but the reality is, the problems go deeper."
Jackson said the decision to have the session stemmed from the Michael Brown and Eric Garner cases.
"We felt we needed to have a forum ... and we needed to be somewhere away from Ferguson, away from Staten Island, and not have the baggage of those places," he said.
Jackson said the session was a coming together of who's who in the Christian world.
"We have to stop the madness in terms of race problems within the church," he said. "We're divided on so many levels but we also believe there are some people who are doing practical work."
Healing the racial divide in the nation is possible by following specific steps of unified action, which Jackson refers to as the Seven Bridges to Peace.
"We have seven bridges to peace and essentially these bridges are places where churches can work together to solve this problem," Jackson said.
Brandon said it's important to be proactive instead of reactive when such incidents happen.
"Of course, with these incidents we're reacting," he said.
In the hours after the grand jury's announcement it wouldn't indict police officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown, the world watched as crowds hurled bottles, looted liquor stores and set the city on fire.
A proactive approach, he said, would be to encourage churches to adopt schools.
"If we could really work with the children we can make some differences in their future," Brandon said. "We also talked about providing jobs. If you lose hope, you have positioned yourself to either harm yourself or hurt someone else. I believe in exposing all people, but especially our children, to bigger and better. Even in Ferguson, this man had dreams. He was planning to go to college but he was in a situation that did not have to happen."
Bishop Michael Duca, of the Catholic Diocese of Shreveport, said before racial divide can be healed, the issues causing the divide must first be addressed.
"I believe the answers are going to be in equal education for all of our children, in providing opportunities for employment and the opportunity for upward mobility within our culture," he said. "And ultimately, we have to make sure everyone has a feeling of hope for their future."
Duca said years ago in the Catholic church, documents came out on social justice that included some of the basic rights of every human being, which are the rights to private property, the right to employment and the right to education.
"The right to those things that make life as a human being enjoyable, or profitable," Duca said. "I have a feeling so many of our people are getting locked out of the hope for those things."
When you lose hope, Duca said, you have no reason to try.
"Without hope you have despair and we as churches need to make sure that we are not working against those things," he said. "We should be trying to find ways in which we can work toward it."
Brandon said there seems to be a disconnect among pastors, adding that insecurities can cause the divide.
"Just because we assemble, that doesn't mean we assemble as one," he said. "Even with marches and rallies, we assemble but we're not assembling as one. And I'm tired of rallies. I'm tired of marches. I want to see results."
Brandon emphasized that he will attend meetings as long as there are results.
"If we have an action plan or take action steps or even acknowledge there are challenges, I can accept that," he said. "But coming back and reading the minutes of the last meeting and discussing the next meeting and drinking coffee — I don't believe in killing time."
Duca said, "It's not about talking unless we're really going to work toward providing and supporting the initiatives that will make those things happen."
Although Brandon agrees there is a perception that the faith community is mostly silent when it comes to racial issues, he said there are those who are making noise.
"I tell our church we never want to appear to be angry black people but instead, intelligent black people," he said. "And there's a way to handle that. There's a way to handle situations and challenges. It's about helping our people and educating the community."
Lonnie Hamilton, psychology instructor at Southern University at Shreveport, said the church's role during times of racial divide is that of encouragement.
"In some areas the church does not go out vocally in the streets, because we are nonpartisan," said Hamilton, who also is pastor of New Boggy Baptist Church in Bethany. "When we see incidents like in Ferguson or Eric Garner, who was choked to death, our members suffer from that. So when they come to church on Sunday morning, they need to hear a word of encouragement."
Hamilton said regardless of what some people might think, pastors are preaching about such issues.
"I say to my members that God is always going to protect his people," he said. "We don't have a Martin Luther King now but we still have leadership coming out of the churches."