I went to the makeshift shelter in our community for Hurricane Katrina evacuees. The number has grown here to 2,200 in one place. Yesterday, it was announced that another 5,000 are expected.
The number of hurting people is overwhelming.
It looks like a battle zone in the relief centers. There is so much need, yet what we are able to do seems so little.
To sufficiently rise to the occasion takes a united effort. I'm afraid the disunity of our community is beginning to reveal the cracks in the dam.
The Red Cross controls the whole process, the overwhelming majority of its staff and leaders are white. The overwhelming majority of the evacuees are Black.
Black agencies such as "Community Action" and other Black community relief groups are excluded from the relief process inner circles.
When that happens it means that big money is being raised, distributed and handled. Whites have a tendency to have a great compassion for the poor when there is money available.
So, most of our churches stand on the sideline doing what they can individually, but are being excluded from the big picture as others "help" our people...for a profit.
Jesus said the "poor you will have you always."
I guess that applies to poverty and disaster scavengers too.
1 comment:
I totally agree with your comments about the Red Cross because they would not allow me as an African American preacher to minister to the evacuees in El Paso, TX. I was turned away from praying for the survivors. White America will never change unless they yield themselves to Jesus Christ.
While living in NY, I worked for the American Red Cross and the organization would never hire African Americans to head key postions. We were only hired to work in their homeless shelters in Brooklyn, New York.
We must pray that they actually spend the Hurricane Katrina money on the evacuees, instead of themselves.
Rev. S. Atkinson
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