NEWS STORY: Christian Coalition offers reward in church arsons

c. 1996 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS)-The Christian Coalition today (April 22) offered a $25,000 reward to anyone who can prove that racism motivated a series of arsons of African-American churches in the South and called on government officials to strengthen their probes of the fires.”Terrorism practiced against the church-any church-is the ultimate act of bigotry and hatred,”Ralph Reed, the coalition’s executive director, said at a news conference here.”It is a symptom of a deeper evil in our society that we have a moral obligation to combat.” About 23 African-American churches in the South have been victims of arson since January 1995, prompting a number of religious and civil-rights groups to push for resolution of the mysterious series of incidents.

Federal investigators have said they lack evidence to conclude that there is a regional or national racial conspiracy behind the attacks. But many civil-rights leaders and church leaders believe racism underlies the rash of fires.

Christian Coalition spokesman Mike Russell agreed, saying,”We think that there is reason to believe that there could be a link.” If after”a period of time”no one comes forward demonstrating a racially motivated link to the crimes, the Coalition will re-evaluate its plans for the reward money and use it to help the affected churches in some other way, Russell said.

Pastors of three churches damaged or destroyed by fire spoke at the Christian Coalition’s news conference.

The Rev. Daniel Donaldson of Salem Baptist Church in Humboldt, Tenn., recalled the night of Dec. 30, 1995, when the 126-year-old structure went up in flames.”It’s just like someone taking your heart out,”he said.

Reed said the stance of the predominantly white, conservative Coalition differs from that of white evangelicals who remained silent when black churches were burned in the 1960s.”It is to the shame of the white evangelical church that in previous days, when those acts of terrorism were being committed against our brothers and sisters in Christ who were a different color than we were, we simply looked the other way,”Reed said.”Well, at the Christian Coalition, we are sending a powerful message today that those days are over.” The Rev. Earl Jackson, the Coalition’s recently appointed director of urban development, called for immediate congressional hearings on the fires.

Jackson also demanded the dismissal of two Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents who previously were assigned to the arson cases. The U.S. Treasury Department, which oversees the ATF, took the agents off the cases because of their involvement in several allegedly racist gatherings of law enforcement agents known as”Good Ol’ Boy Roundups”that occurred beginning in 1989. But Jackson wants the agents off the ATF payroll entirely.”Those law enforcement officers represent every single American, and if they have a problem with representing Americans of certain color and hue then they shouldn’t be in law enforcement,”Jackson said.”They need to find something else to do.” Darren McKinney, a spokesman for the Treasury Department, declined to comment on Jackson’s statement concerning the two agents, but said the government has worked hard to solve the arson crimes.”ATF alone has 100 agents working these cases throughout the South,”he said.

Responding to the Coalition’s call for a stepped-up investigation into the fires, McKinney said,”Anyone who knows of the resources and the energies that we’ve committed to these investigations could not genuinely declare that we’re not doing all we can.” The news conference did not mark the first time the Coalition has called for hearings on the church attacks. Coalition officials, along with leaders of other conservative groups, such as the Family Research Council and Concerned Women for America, sent a letter in February requesting Judiciary Committee hearings on the church attacks. No firm dates have been set.

In addition, a number of other organizations, including mainline church and civil-rights groups, have been working to help the burned churches.

The National Council of Churches, the Center for Democratic Renewal-an Atlanta-based group that monitors hate crimes-and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference have been soliciting donations to help the churches rebuild.

In a statement, the National Council of Churches, which represents 33 U.S. Protestant and Orthodox denominations, announced that an ecumenical team was visiting Alabama today (April 22) to help support the congregations affected by the fires.

At the Coalition’s news conference, Reed requested that civil-rights groups and other organizations match the $25,000 reward so the total might rise to as much as $100,000.

But some civil-rights leaders said they would continue to use their groups’ funds to help the churches rebuild rather than try to match the Coalition’s reward offer.”While we’re not objecting to anybody offering a reward, we have pressed law enforcement to exercise that responsibility and bring these culprits to justice,”said the Rev. Joseph Lowery, president of the Atlanta-based Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

The Rev. C.T. Vivian, board chairman of the Center for Democratic Renewal, said civil-rights groups have been at work for generations but he charged that the Christian Coalition has”just got on the scene.””What I wish the Christian right would do would be to stimulate a concern in all of its membership and throughout its various church contacts of both rural and urban (communities) … to turn in people that they know are involved”in the fires, he said.

Asked about the Coalition’s emphasis on a reward to catch the arsonists rather than donations to help the churches rebuild, Reed said,”I don’t think it’s an either/or.” The Coalition has donated $5,000 to each of the three churches whose pastors appeared at the news conference and may give more to other churches in the future, he said.

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