Bad things keep happening all over. Now Charleston, S.C., is the tragic main event. We need to pray for America. "We must learn to live together as brothers [and sisters] or perish as fools,” as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. eloquently and succinctly put it. I was in route for a prayer vigil and march when I got the call. All eyes are on Charleston. Violence is still looming and lurking.
Friends, this isn't the time for violent riots or race-baiting. It's time for prayer and leadership. Officials including the mayors, the police, the governor, the national guard, Congress, and the president need to pray and enforce peace and justice.
Understand that evil knows no color. My grandmother Alberta King was shot down and killed by a crazed black man while playing the organ in Ebenezer Church in Atlanta in 1974. My mother Naomi King, Daddy AD's wife, was in the ambulance with Big Mama when she died. We didn't riot; we prayed. Decisive prayerful and positive action is needed now! Granddaddy King said, “Pray and forgive."
Pray, don't riot. People are being slaughtered in the womb, in their beds, and for God's sake while worshipping in church. This isn't just about race. It's time for the human race of Acts 17:26 to pray for America.
Dr. Alveda C. King grew up in the civil rights movement led by her uncle, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. She is a pastoral associate and director of African-American outreach for Priests for Life and Gospel of Life Ministries. Her family home in Birmingham, Ala., was bombed, as was her father’s church office in Louisville, Ky. Alveda herself was jailed during the open housing movement. Read more reports from Dr. Alveda C. King — Click Here Now.