Congregation Beth Israel

                                                   

                                                      https://youtu.be/hih5QqPo8bs

                                              click the link above to hear Richard Bruce speak out after the attack on                                                                    Congregation Beth Israel

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Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville Texas

Yvonnette O’Neal

Sara Ballanger, founder of Capitol Hill Prayer Partners in Washington D.C,  reported on the 

recent shooting at Congregation Beth Israel in Colleyville Texas:

"National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday that the hostage situation at a Texas synagogue on Saturday, January 15, 2022, was an act of "terrorism" and "anti-Semitism." Sara closed her report with this prayer:"Father God, we thank You for the safe release of all four hostages yesterday in Colleyville, Texas. We now ask that You would heal them and their family members from all trauma that they have gone through. And Lord God, we sense that this is not over yet, so we pray that any and all networks that were affiliated with this hostage-taker be discovered, and that any other bombs or explosive devices that have been planted anywhere in our nation be found out. Thank You, Lord, for hearing our prayer, in Your name, amen. "For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor has anything been secret, but that it would come to light" (Mark 4:22). 

(Sara Ballanger, "Capitol Hill Prayer Partners," Sunday January 16. 2022.https://mailchi.mp/798b826fd1cb/legislative-snapshot-sunday-jan-16-2022?e=526f263236)

As an African American Christian leader,  I am responding to this incident on  Martin Luther King Day

2022 to sow peace where there is hatred.

"Instead of meeting force with force, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. stood up in the face of evil and said: "No! We cannot keep doing this to each other. We are not each other’s enemies." He answered Paul’s call to arms: the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the spirit, which is the Word of God: Jesus Christ”

(Br. Jim Woodrum, SSJE, Remembrance of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. – Br. Jim Woodrum https://ssje.org/2014/01/15/remembrance-of-dr-martin-luther-king-jr-br-jim-woodrum/?utm_medium=email&_hsmi=57335797&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-892B9GnFh_JmpXMHoClJT17OUhhTFcaJoUtsMRktKfA2Je_QjhNNtlMvO5OiwAeTiETg9tZJ-r9g_sU09EQYQB-NqqNQ&utm_content=57068092&utm_source=hs_email)

I believe that Americans need to publicly challenge structural 

racism. In the words of Senator Jay Rockefeller:

“I’ve seen a lot of that and I know a lot of that to be true. It’s  not something you’re meant to talk about in public, but it’s  something I’m talking about in public because that is very  true.”

(Jay Rockefeller, Everett,Burgess. “Senators Duel Over Race Card.” Politico. 5.23.14. https://www. politico.com/story/2014/05/jay-rockefeller-john-johnson-race-106983)

I endorsed Jeanne DeFazio’s book Finding a Better Way for shining "the light of Jesus on the darkness of racial injustice.”

(Jeanne DeFazio, Finding A Better Way, Wipf and Stock Publishing, 2021, back cover endorsement)

It is a wonderful scripturally based resource for ministers in this racially turbulent time.  My life

experiences resonate with African American author and educator Julia Davis' words in Finding A Better

Way:

“I have experienced both overt and covert racial prejudice in my lifetime. I am sharing this experience as an African  American because I see the potential in it to bridge the  racial divide.”

(Jeanne DeFazio, Finding A Better Way, Wipf and Stock Publishing, 2021, 16)

Watching the breaking news report on the horrific racial injustice that occurred at Congregation Beth

Israel in Colleyville Texas, I flashed back to my childhood.  I integrated the schools in Mississippi.  This

common occurrence in the racially tense civil rights era did not make breaking news but it taught me how

to stand against structural racism to overcome it. Jeanne DeFazio's chapter, “Multicultural Aspect of

Egalitarian Leadership,” in Spencer and Spencer’s book Christian Egalitarian Leadership  explains:

“Yvonne has developed the ability to reach out in a multicultural church. She has ministered to mayors and members  of Congress and city councils. Yvonnette expounds God’s  word by organizing all-night gospel praise-a-thons at the  Lincoln Memorial, prayer events of Christian leaders from  across the nation at historic churches in the D.C. Metro  Area, and at Wailing Women International Intercessory  Prayer events in key locations in the nation’s capital. Her  civil rights background and the profound influence of Dr.  King has influenced her latest initiative to institute Bible  clubs as electives in U.S. public school systems.”

(DeFazio, “Multicultural Aspect of Egalitarian Leadership,” in Spencer  and Spencer’s book Christian Egalitarian Leadership, Wipf and Stock Publishing 2020, pages 118-119)

In this challenging time, I am asking all Christians to pray daily against racial injustice  putting God in

remembrance of His Word. Revelation 12:11 explains how to overcome the darkness of racial injustice

and shine the light of Jesus: “And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their

testimony.” What is the next step?

"Rejection and hatred will be conquered not necessarily  when we find commonality, but when we learn to value and respect essential differences that exist to make us marvel at what  others have and move us to incorporate those gifts into the canvas of human existence. The Magna Carta of Christian equality is stated in Galatians  3:28: “There is no longer Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor  female, because they are all one in Christ Jesus." 

(Martha Reyes,  Jeanne DeFazio,  Finding A Better Way, Wipf and Stock Publishing, 2021, pages xv, xvi)

About the Author

“As an African American child at the height of the civil  rights movement in Mississippi, Yvonne ONeal was integrated  into all-white schools. This experience taught her to relate to the individual independent of race, color, or creed.  In southeast Washington, DC, as a young adult on staff  at the Frederick Douglass Center and the Fishing School,  her ethnic background gave her the education and social skills necessary to teach the predominately African  American inner-city students how to develop in order to  succeed in a multicultural society." 

(DeFazio and Lathrop, Creative  Ways, Wipf and Stock Publishing, 2013, page 24)

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