Stop the Black Male Violence and Incarceration of Black Men

Dear Cascade Patch:

Many of the black residents in Mableton are people who once wanted to live in the Cascade area but could not afford to live there. So we consider ourselves part of your community.

With that in mind, I would like to share this message from a handout that the Cobb County SCLC distributed this past weekend in Mableton and Marietta.

To my brothers and my sisters: it is our children who are dying in the streets of America. It is our people who are filling up the jails.

We have more of our strong black men in jail and on probation or parole than any other race on the face of the planet. We have more of our male population locked up in jail than any other race in the whole world.

Why?

Are we just bad people? Is it the white mans master plan to lock us up and destroy our children as a nation? Or is it the will of God that we forever be slaves in this country which our ancestors were slaves in?

The word of God said in Proverbs 11:19 "As righteousness leads to life: so he that pursues evil pursues it to his own death"

The word of God stands against you. We as a nation of people are killing our own selves, destroying our own children and blaming everyone else for our own destruction; when it's our own hands that is breaking down our own homes.

This is a wake up call to all the young men of America, black men and white men, red men and yellow men, brown men and rich men, poor men and men from distant lands: "the blessings of God are upon the head of the just, but violence cover the mouth of the wicked."

Blood is running in our streets as more men are dying on our streets everyday, than those dying in the war overseas. Death and violence, rape and murder, robbing and killing covers the lives of the poor people living in this country everyday.

God sees our wickedness and the judgments of God is upon us. Today if you hear my voice and harden your heart then the wrath of God almighty is upon you and death is your only reward.

Yet, if you hear my voice and harden not your heart, then life, healing and wealth—large amounts of money, healing and health shall come to you from God—from seen and unseen sources.

Your life shall change in ways you never thought possible and out of your heart shall flow rivers of living waters, bringing healing to your land. My brother and sisters this is the word of God to you today.

If you received one of these letters from Rev. Gantt, today is your day. This is not some church paper looking for your money or your membership.

This is a life line to a drowning nation of black people. If we do not turn around from the direction we going in; then we are lost as a nation of black people.

—Pastor Lionel Gantt, Cobb County Southern Christian Leadership Conference