Clergy promote racial peace
City hall march promises action
Thursday, April 9, 1998BY JULIE IRWIN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
With area religious leaders behind him, Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk delivers the opening address at a meeting on racial relations.
(Glenn Hartong photo)
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Religious congregations in the Cincinnati area work to address race in myriad ways: In the Vacation Bible School shared by Bond Hill - St. Mark and Deerfield United Methodist Churches. In the Elsie Austin Scholarship Award, which local Baha'is award to a student who has worked to eliminate prejudice. In the Unitarian Universalist training program titled "Weaving the Fabric of Diversity."
To encourage such programs, leaders of 19 local religious bodies marched to Cincinnati City Hall Wednesday afternoon. The leaders -- black and white, Christian and Muslim and Jew -- presented Mayor Roxanne Qualls and former mayors Ted Berry and Eugene Ruehlmann with pledges to work toward improving local race relations.
"I'm really elated to be at this gathering, to see these 19 bodies come together to make this statement," said Senior Bishop Nathaniel Linsey of the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. "So often we sign things and that's the end of it.. . . We must carry the baton and we are going to do it."
Councilman Tyrone Yates holds a microphone for former Mayor Theodore Berry.
(Glenn Hartong photo)
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The afternoon presentation paid tribute to the religious holidays -- Easter, Passover and Eid al-Adha -- being celebrated this week. It also commemorated the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., 30 years ago this week, and the efforts of Cincinnati's religious community to quell unrest at that time.
"As we honor the 30th anniversary of Martin Luther King's death and we look at our own community, we still feel the racial tensions and divisions among us, even though no one could deny we have seen tremendous progress," Ms. Qualls said.
It was Ms. Qualls who asked religious leaders nearly a year ago to address the local racial divide. Clergy resolved not to let the gathering dissolve into symbolism.
"Let us not let this rest and just become a press conference," said the Rev. Damon Lynch Jr., past president of the Baptist Ministers Conference. "Let us go out of this place and tell everyone we meet, "I am your brother.' "
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