Clergy march to save ‘hurting ’ nation
LaAnthia Washington lost a tooth weeks ago and had a dental appointment Monday. The Forestville, Md., resident sought healing instead at the Ministers March for Justice.
She was troubled by terrorist acts, mass killings and abuse of children. She wrote out a sign quoting the Bible verse from
2 Chronicles 7:14.
“I believe our land is hurting right now,” said Washington, a deacon at her Baptist church. “We’re the people coming together in his name.”
She was part of a crowd of several thousand clergy members from Christian, Jewish, Muslim and Sikh religions who marched on the anniversary of the March on Washington in
1963 and the lynching of Emmett Till in 1955 in Mississippi.
Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech at the march in 1963. Monday’s event began at the King memorial on the National Mall and headed to the Justice Department.
“It’s time for moral leaders of all religions to get rid of their fear and their political laryngitis and stand up together,” said Al Sharpton, who led the march with Martin Luther King III. “We agree that morality must be above party politics.”
Other speakers described reasons for the march broadly as unfinished business, including voting rights, economic opportunity, health care and changes in the justice system.
Emotions ran high as speakers blasted the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., on Aug. 12 and President Trump’s pardon Friday of former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of defying a judge’s order to release from jail people suspected of immi- gration offenses.
The march came the same morning USA TODAY announced the Trump administration would provide surplus military equipment to police departments, a move that rankled the crowd suspicious of police brutality.
Snapping a picture at the King memorial before the march began, Monique Maxwell of Brooklyn, N.Y., said the event provided an important educational experience for her 16-year-old daughter, Nyomi.
The lesson Nyomi drew from the march: If faced with injustice, “do something about it.”