A woman pastor was arrested during a peaceful protest in the troubled township of Ferguson, Missouri last night.
Pastor Rebecca Ragland, minister of the Episcopal Church of the Holy Communion, was one of five held after blocking a street outside the police headquarters in freezing conditions. The town is on edge as a grand jury is deciding whether to charge officer Darren Wilson in the slaying of 18-year-old Michael Brown in a case that has exposed fresh strains in often-troubled race relations in the United States.
The protesters waved placards and chanted “Whose streets? Our streets!” and “Killer cops have got to go!”
Officers in helmets and shields were deployed after a commander told protesters not to block traffic.
Ragland told the Daily Mail that she was grabbed and dragged along the ground so roughly that her vest marked ‘Clergy’ was torn off. “I was completely stunned,” she said. “All I can tell you is what my body experienced. My mind at that point was just in shock. I was grabbed so hard that I fell to the ground. Then I was just being yanked and it was pretty rough. I’m hurting today.”
She said that the group of protesters was dispersing as the police moved in. “I think everybody was completely shocked. We were dispersing at that point. Then they came down so I turned around and I thought, ‘Well I’m a de-escalator so I need to stay at the front.'”
Ragland added: “The clergy want to be compassionate voices to soothe people who are so broken and hurt and to be a voice for the kind of justice that’s actually going to move the polarities to a point where they can heal instead of this place where we’re just shouting and hurting…Read More
Source and Original Content by Christian Today