You cannot fight a battle you don’t think exists.”
-John Eldridge
Most of us live in peaceful neighborhoods, where gunshots don’t awaken us in the night, but just because we don’t hear the gunshots, doesn’t mean they are not being fired.
As I was driving north on College Avenue on Saturday, I was stopped by a line of cars following a hearse. The funeral procession was incredibly long. After seven or eight minutes, I swung into another lane and turned hoping to find a clear path home, but the procession had turned as well and once again, I was stopped. Literally hundreds of cars went by. I called out to someone stalled in the procession nearby and they held up a flyer with the name Albert Germany in large type. I offered a quick word of condolence as they drove off.
Albert Germany, Jr. was killed on June 12, around 5:30 pm. Police have arrested Dallas M. Jones and charged him with murder. I doubt I would ever have heard the victim’s name if I had not been in that spot at that moment. Yet the community that knew him was filled with sorrow. His death is now a number in the annals of statistics that record city gun violence and two more families are shattered.
This battle exists. This battle rages. When we allow ourselves or others to remain cloistered in bastions of ignorance and passivity, we are forgetting that our brothers and sisters do not sleep peacefully at night.
UNITE INDY is on the front lines, working with police and others who know that gun violence is an infection that mainly kills the poor and despondent among us. We cannot be like Saul—waiting for others to fight his Goliath. We must be David, believing we can win, and standing up for those who cannot fight. This is not peace time. There is a battle in our own city we can’t afford to lose.
Blessings,
Jim
“…With God, all things are possible” – Matthew 19:26
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