Sweet Jesus, When You Come Again, Do NOT Go To North Carolina. They Are Prepared to Arrest You.
There’s a group of churches in North Carolina who have been taking the suggestion of Jesus of Nazareth very seriously. They feed the hungry.
Every Saturday and Sunday for 6 years, they show up with coffee and sausage biscuits to feed people who need to be fed. They have done this for six years, no problems whatsoever.
But then Republicans take over in North Carolina and you know how they feel about Sweet Jesus. Republicans think Jesus only cares about abortion and guns and stuff. Jesus ain’t worried at all about the least, the last, and the lost. At least not Republican Jesus. Republican Jesus will shoot your ass.
So, they can’t continue to feed hungry people.
If they do, they will be arrested.
On the morning of Saturday, August, 24, Love Wins showed up at Moore Square at 9:00 a.m., just like we have done virtually every Saturday and Sunday for the last six years. We provide, without cost or obligation, hot coffee and a breakfast sandwich to anyone who wants one. We keep this promise to our community in cooperation with five different, large suburban churches that help us with manpower and funding.
On that morning three officers from Raleigh Police Department prevented us from doing our work, for the first time ever. An officer said, quite bluntly, that if we attempted to distribute food, we would be arrested.
Arrested. You know, like St. Paul.
Now, it appears this story has gone viral and people from foreign states have been pitching a fit, too. What this country needs is more people willing to feed the hungry, not more people in prison for doing it. You can follow the story of the criminal feeders at their Facebook page.
Thanks to Bernard for the heads up.
So who they gonna blame for throwing jeebus out of the public square? That’s right,folks. Them damned libruls and the ACLU. Mark my words. The really sad part is that so many nutjob,uneducated,right-wingers will believe them.
1Sooo, lemmee get this straight. Government programs to feed the poor are bad. They lead to dependency and whatnot and anyway that is not what government is for. It should be up to charities and churches and so on to do this so the government is not involved and forcibly taking money (taxes) from people for things that are not the responsibility of government. Okay, gotcha, republicans.
So a bunch of faith-filled people got together and with the help of a bunch of churches (and for all I know temples, mosques and what-have-you) came up with voluntary private charitable contributions of food to feed the hungry at no cost to the taxpayers.
And no. They are not allowed to do that.
Soooo, government won’t feed the hungry and private charities can’t feed the hungry. Okay.
Republicans are monsters.
2But the people getting free food are like moochers, and lazy liberals who would rather take a handout than get a job where they SELL those biscuits, you know, and get their pay in the form of a debit card that costs them $1.50 to withdraw their own money. ‘Cause free enterprise and freedom and Jesus and guns. The GOP has lost it. Done. Finished. They have ruined education, job creation, the will to work, and freedom for women and minorities. If you don’t join their gun loving club, you are a loser. If you don’t support big gas and oil’s money, land, air and water grab, you are a tree hugger. If you don’t support the next war, you are unpatriotic, because those soldiers need to kill, you know, and Blackwater is running low on those billions they stole 10 years ago.
3Now, see, if they had a Gun Show theme everything would be OK!
4If you keep feeding these people the next thing you know they will be wanting to vote!
5I really wonder what kind of entity thought this up and authorized this and why. Apparently the police never told them why they’d be arrested.
6Dear Marion, I am having a hard time figuring it out. My husband suggested encouraging vagrancy and the homeless people to congregate in the public square.
I hate Republicans. I just really hate them.
7The group “Food Not Bombs” used to run into this as well – the excuse used by the police is typically that the organization handing out food lacks food handling permits, etc. However, it’s typically linked to people not wanting to see homeless people in their neighborhoods. After all, if you can’t see it – one can plausibly deny that it’s happening.
The sad thing is that the good citizens phoning in the complaints consider themselves good Christians. They just don’t like Christ’s teachings.
8Look in the background of the picture if you want to see who called for the cops to stop this. Where I’m from 99% of the time when public feeding of the poor and homeless is stopped by the cops its those cute little shops that did it.
9Sooooooo sad.
10It’s law enforcement’s way of turning the homeless into criminals. They’ll ticket the homeless, which costs X amount of $. They have to show up in court, less be branded as a no show. You get the picture.
11On another note, I have been the owner of one of those cute shops. Showing up in the morning w/feces, throw up at your front door is no fun. Kicking the sleeping folks out of your front door space. There are real issues to deal with.
http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/08/25/3135843/police-stop-charities-feeding.html
Article from local paper-someone’s whining, that’s for sure!
12Sigh.
13It is time to go back to that whole “Shunning” thing – the entire state of NC should be Shunned – I know personally I will not drive through/ send money to/ or even acknowledge the existence of this fascist Neo-Nazi state. I’m done with this Crap – this is not a wing – It’s a blight
14I’m reminded of Gandhi’s remark: “I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.”
For “Christians” here, he would mean the ones who yell the loudest about how “Christian” they are and everyone else should be, not the actual Christians like these food-sharing folks.
Well, heck, we can’t have people go around feeding the hungry and caring for the sick. They must be (gasp) Liberals! Burn them! Burn them!
15Also, Nazis.
16Thanks, Aggie, for posting article.
17This got a passing mention on our Winston-Salem news broadcast tonight. No real details, but that’s to be expected since neither guns or gore were involved.
@Litlhorn: There are plenty of us here in North Carolina (my adopted state because of the hub’s job) doing our damnedest to effect change. There are actually formerly R county strongholds which are rising up to fight the current legislature. Don’t give up on us just yet.
18Yeah, it’s a pretty radical act to feed people out in public (like Jesus did). People prefer to have hungry people–who might also be dirty, smelly, mentally ill, or some other horrible (non-contagious) attribute–kept out of sight. It’s especially offensive to rich people to have to look at poor people. Where have I heard stories like this before? Oh yes…from Jesus….
19When someone claims a war on “Christianity” use this as an example to agree with them.
20Republican logic: Don’t feed the pigeons. They’re dirty. The city has an ordinance against that. Don’t feed people either. They’re the same as pigeons. If you don’t feed them, maybe they’ll go someplace else and we’ll have our neat, clean square back to show visitors what a nice city we have. See? Problem solved.
21Doubt not that rwnj love the poor for their social and fiscal policies create so many government dependents on both ends of the scale.
22Um, think Chamber of Commerce members. The public square was supposed to be photographically cute and probably used in brochures and such. The last thing the CofC wants tourists to see are poor, homeless people being fed in the town square. It will give a very poor impression of the town itself. Well, talk about giving a poor impression . . . need I say more?
As an old protester, if the church people show up again, even with a permit, will they still be arrested and hauled off to the local clink? If so, film at eleven. Lawsuits against the town, the police department, and on and on and on. Now there is a never ending impression!
23Sigh. And here I am planning on moving to the Raleigh Durham area of NC. Just going to turn this state blue.
24This is the informative reply I received this morning from a Raleigh City Council member. After reading the link I am left confused about the roll the council holds in relation to city administration, I think the council is wondering the same thing.
Thank you for your e-mail. As you may have already been made aware, the Council had no knowledge of the Parks Department and RPD’s intervening in this matter. I believe the following Indy blog post sums up what has happened and what is in progress by the Council:
URL=http://www.indyweek.com/citizen/archives/2013/08/25/feeding-the-homeless-in-moore-square-barred-by-raleigh-cops-mayor-and-council-scrambling-to-find-out-why
I feel confident that the majority of the Council understands the seriousness of the matter and will act accordingly. The Law and Public Safety Committee will take up this issue on Wednesday, August 28 at 3pm.
Thank you again for bringing this to my attention. Also thank you for your service to those less fortunate in our society
Have a great week!
Sincerely,
25Thomas Crowder, City Councillor, District D
City of Raleigh
I’d like to comment on this but my head just exploded. I’ll try to piece it back together and return later.
If you don’t hear from me again, it means I moved to NC & can be found beating the city council over their heads with their Bibles.
26Its a nationwide thing that happened in city councils to combat OWS. Their cover is health & sanitation of food vending.
27Well, this .his interesting. I went to a German magazine website and lo and behold, NC made it into that magazine. For those of you who can read German, here is the website. Congratulations to NC, you are now the laughingstock of the world. I have to do this more often.
28http://www.stern.de/panorama/north-carolina-priester-hilft-armen-polizei-droht-mit-knast-2053928.html
North Carolina is on my list of states to avoid right next to Arizona.
29To Bernard Terway:
30So now we are “the laughingstock of the world.” Have you forgotten Jesse Helms??? We have a great deal of experience being “the laughingstock of the world.” As a North Carolinian I offer my most humble apologies to the generous religious people who were helping the poor and hungry.
*chuckle* I remember being the laughingstock of the world when Bill Clinton was in office and we were perceived as having a national Puritan hissy fit over his peccadillos. I was embarrassed. This is different – I am ashamed’
31Arrested. For feeding. THE HUNGRY! If I couldn’t afford food, I wouldn’t want the few people willing to help me arrested! Seriously?
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