With anticipation and tensions increasing as a grand jury prepares to announce whether to indict a police officer in the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, many St. Louis-area churches plan to offer protesters and residents shelter and sanctuary if violence occurs.
“We just want to administer to the needs of the people,” Rev. Tommie Pierson of Greater St. Mark Family Church, one of several churches planning to offer shelter to protesters,
told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
St. Mark is located near the area where Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson shot the unarmed Brown, resulting in days of riots and looting.
“It’s important for the community and the rest of the world to know that God is a God of justice, and that it’s critical that we stand up and be part of the solution of our community moving forward,” Rev. Dietra Wise-Baker, pastor of Liberation Christian Church (Disciples of Christ),
told The Washington Post.
The Liberation Christian Church is one of nearly a dozen churches which will keep their doors open around the clock to serve as “sacred spaces,” The Post reports.
The Metropolitan Congregations United, a group of interdenominational regional congregations, are compiling a list of churches which will provide food, shelter and counseling in the upcoming weeks.
For weeks, people from across the region and the nation have been donating items to the churches and supplies for protesters, says the group's spokesman, Rev. Wise-Baker.
“Obviously, we are calling for non-violent protests. But, we believe protesters need space and we want to be supportive of them and the wonderful work they’ve been doing in our community,"
she told KMOX, the local St. Louis CBS News affiliate.
Many have been making plans for weeks on how to respond to the grand jury verdict and the possible unrest which would arise if an indictment is not handed down.
"We know this decision will be a crisis point for our region," said Christ Church Cathedral Dean Mike Kinman. According to Kinman, the Ferguson community has been suffering from a "deep brokenness" since Brown was killed on Aug. 9.
"Even the anticipation of it has put St. Louis in a place of fear, anxiety and high reactivity,"
he told the Associated Press.
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