Kids Need Our Advocacy

There is a reason we, Advent United Church of Christ, are involved in justice ministry.
It is because if we do not raise our voices, know the circumstances, and do the work, our communities will continue to suffer.
In a recent meeting of BREAD clergy, a report was given about at-risk youth in Columbus. BREAD has made justice for at risk youth its focus for 2010, and that issue will be the primary focus at the May 3 Nehemiah Action Rally at Veterans Auditorium.
The report reports that there are three main topics of concern: school discipline policies, juvenile crime and gang activity, and the closing ore recreation centers. The committee reports that:
• In the 2008-2009 school year, 11 out of 15 of the middle schools in the Columbus public school system had more than one suspension or expulsion per student.
• Columbus City schools suspended 4,262 students for missing school (being truant) in the same school year
• 5,900 students dropped out of the class of 2008
• Chronic truants, defined as those who miss 10 or more days of school, are 12times as likely to report having committed a serious offense, 21 times as likely to report having committed a serious property crime and seven times as likely to have been arrested as non-skippers
• Gang members in 2008 accounted for 25 percent of the homicides in Columbus, although they only account for .17 percent of the total population. The average age of a gang member in Columbus is between 13 and 25 years old.
• In 2009 there were 83 homicides in Columbus. Of that number, 46 of the victims were African American males, 21 of the victims were under the age of 25, and eight of them were under the age of 15.
• Almost half of all people arrested or suspected in connection with the homicides were under the age of 25.
There is no time to be silent or complacent. It is our youth who are falling through the cracks, falling into the arms of waiting prisons. Our youth ministry is more important than ever, and should be an arm of outreach as well as an in house operation.
I urge all who care about our youth to work with the Board of Christian Education and the youth advisors to create a ministry that reaches out to youth. Too many young people think that churches are nothing more than clanging cymbals, disinterested and disconnected from them and their issues. If anyone wants to work along with me on the BREAD committee on these at-risk issues, please see me, but we have an obligation as well to create and develop a youth program that helps youth and pulls them from lives that will lead to their destruction.
The BREAD Nehemiah Action Rally, as mentioned above, will be May 3 at Veterans Auditorium. We in BREAD will be working with members of the Columbus Board of Education to highlight these issues and hold the Board members accountable. If Board members see that Columbus parents and citizens are tired of Board members begging for our votes but not doing the maximum to help our kids, they might be more inclined to get off the fence and work harder.
The Children’s Defense Fund talks about the Cradle to Prison phenomenon. We can clearly see our many of our kids are heading to prison by the numbers in this report. It is up to us to fight for justice for those who cannot fight for it themselves.
Have a good week.
Pastor Smith