News
As hundreds of thousands of people from the US Gulf Coast have evacuated their homes, fleeing from Hurricane Gustav as they did from Katrina three years ago, US churches keep praying and providing relief. They also denounce underlying social and economic conditions that make for the vulnerability of the region.
"Loving God, we ask that you touch all those who are not only living through another evacuation, but who are struggling with the memories of the last three years," reads a prayer composed by Rev. Dr Bernice Powell Jackson, World Council of Churches (WCC) president from North America and moderator of the US Conference for the WCC.
"We pray for the continued re-building of the churches, the communities and the people of the entire Gulf Coast," says in her prayer Powell Jackson, who serves as Pastor of the historic Beecher Memorial United Church of Christ in New Orleans. The prayer is being shared with the member churches of the WCC in the US.
The systemic violence uncovered by Hurricane Katrina and the churches' support of recovery and pastoral care for the people of the Gulf Coast will be highlighted at the annual meeting of the US Conference for the WCC to be held 2-4 December 2008 in Washington, DC.
"Hurricane Katrina and the continuing scandal of faltering relief efforts on the Gulf Coast have revealed the ongoing and pervasive impact of racism, violence and economic injustice in US communities," says Rev. Phil Jones, co-chair of the US Decade to Overcome Violence committee and head of the Church of the Brethren's Witness and Washington Office.
According to Rev. Dr Angelique Walker-Smith, "the tragedy of Hurricane Katrina was not only the violence of the storm but the violence of poverty and the absence of sound leadership that led to the breaking of the levees". Walker-Smith, who serves as co-chair of the US Decade to Overcome Violence committee, is a Baptist minister and executive director of the Church Federation of Greater Indianapolis.
In August 2005, more than 1,000 people lost their lives to Hurricane Katrina when the New Orleans levee system failed and the ensuing floods devastated the city. Nearly two million people have been evacuated end of August 2008 when the Hurricane Gustav was approaching the Gulf Coast before it lost force and became a tropical storm; they are still waiting for the permission to return home.
Three years after Katrina, US churches still struggle with the devastation and its lingering impact on families uprooted by the hurricane. In August, the US Conference for the WCC encouraged and facilitated the participation of a group of young ecumenists in a week-long ecumenical work camp on the Gulf Coast organized by the National Council of Churches in the US.
Hurricane Katrina left the US Gulf Coast three years ago, but the social and economic conditions that made its impact so deadly seem to be still there. They are testing the commitment and witness of the local churches and people of faith.
Full text of Bernice Powell Jackson's prayer
US DOV Committee Calls for Recommitment to Rebuild New Orleans and Address Issues of Systemic Violence (Feature story, 28 February 2008)