Metro Ministers Join Campaign to Support Health Care Reform

Quality Health Care

August 14, 2009  |   |  Link to article

KANSAS CITY, MO - Much of the health care reform debate has centered around a lot of angry people showing up at town hall meetings. But another group of people are trying to get their message heard, and they say that they have a higher power behind their cause.

A group of metro and national religious leaders are coming together to launch a campaign their calling "40 Days of Health Reform," saying that providing health care coverage to more people is not a political issue, but a moral imperative.

Rev. Rayfield Burns of the Missionary Baptist Church says that he recently attended a town hall event, and was dismayed by what he saw.

"People who were there to get information were not able to get information because of the disruption in the crowd, which is disrespectful and a disservice to those people that have come to genuinely find out what the health care reform is all about," said Rev. Burns.

Rev. Burns says that the people who sit in his pews often share stories about not having access to affordable health care. He says that people of faith have a moral imperative to help others.

"18 to 20,000 People die every year for lack of health care," said Rev. Burns. "It is shame on America. We should be better than this, we are better than that."

Some conservative Christian groups, such as the Christian Coalition of America, are speaking out against proposed health care reform, saying that it could lead to things like government-funded abortion.

But The Rev. Jennifer Thomas, the pastor of Immanuel Lutheran Church, has joined other religious leaders in the health care reform campaign, and will join in on an internet forum with President Barack Obama next week. She says that she hopes opponents to the president's health care plan will stop shouting long enough to hear their prayer.

"We're about caring for people, and that they shouldn't be afraid of what change will bring," said Rev. Thomas. "A lot of what I've heard being shouted is fear based on misinformation."