Citing controversial extrajudicial killings and sexual assaults by police officers, a small group of California churches have made a drastic pledge to stop calling the police for help and utilize a more community-based crime fighting efforts.
“We are a church that has witnessed and experienced violence from policing systems. Members of our community have been surveilled, harassed, and sexually assaulted by law enforcement officers,” Nichola Torbett, a lay leader at First Congregational Church of Oakland, said at a press conference last Wednesday.
“We feel like we can no longer tolerate the trauma inflicted on our communities by policing systems. Our love for one another and our faith call us to end our participation in systems that pit the safety of some of us against the safety of others of us,” she added as she called the names of a number of individuals who have died at the hands of police, including Stephon Clarke who died after being shot multiple times in the back by Sacramento police officers last month.
First Congregational Church of Oakland which has been in existence since 1870 has been a Lay Led Congregation since December 2011 where the church has been without a paid pastor. The church…
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