Beaufort residents gather for prayer, love and community

As the sun set over Beaufort’s Washington Street Park on Saturday, community leaders, residents and members of law enforcement gathered for a prayer/love rally.

Recent events involving police brutality against African-Americans, shootings targeting law enforcement officers and other violence in the world has struck a nerve with the city’s residents.

Rose Bing, founder of the nonprofit organization Seeds of Greatness, organized the event for people to join together in unity. Bing held a similar event in December of last year after several shootings and murders plagued the community.

But this vigil, according to Bing, is different. She said the reason behind the rally is more than just fighting against the violence and murders in Beaufort.

“This is for ... the black men that were killed by police officers and for the police officers that were killed in those needless murders,” she said.

Bing said seeing the shootings of young black men and police officers on the news made her sad, and she always turns to prayer as a solution. She wanted to hold the rally to allow her peers the same option.

“To me, anything in my life, I go to prayer,” she said. “And I know, I as one, there’s not a lot that I can do to change things, but I know I can pray, and I know that prayer changes things.

“And that’s why my focus is to get the people together. They can prayer together, sing God’s word, just get together and enjoy God and pray that he’ll heal our land.”

It’s not about skin color or nationality, Bing said. You don’t even need to pray; it’s all about coming together.

“Unity can solve a lot of issues,” she said.

Beneath a basketball hoop, April Gary, born and raised in Beaufort, began the rally with a welcome song she had written herself.

Gary said the goal of the rally was to “be proactive” so that recent instances of violence in the country won’t happen here in the Beaufort community.

Her brother is a black police officer who’s made an effort to educate those in his community about law enforcement and the most recent instances of police officers shootings African-Americans. Gary said she worries about her brother and knows he could be hurt as well.

“It hurts,” she said. “It hurts on both parts.”

Gary was joined by other members of the community in song, speech and prayer. Several members of law enforcement were present — some for support and others to speak — and even Beaufort Mayor Billy Keyserling said a few words.

“The tide is rising, but we can’t let those who belong here be washed away with the sea,” he said, to a crowd of onlookers. “We’re one big family in Beaufort, and we have to keep it that way.”

Keyserling said he was asked by Bing to join the rally and work toward open discussion.

“I think we’re a very civil place,” he said. “Our police officers know many people in the community.”

Charles Squires, the community projects coordinator for the Beaufort County Police Department, attended the rally Saturday night for that very reason.

Squires participated with his fellow officers to “be with the community ... and interact with the community.”

“I can only speak for the officers I work with — that we care about the community and a majority of us became police officers to help people, not harm them or make things worse,” he said.

Both Bing and Keyserling said they would plan more community events like the prayer rally in the future.

This story was originally published July 30, 2016 at 9:33 PM with the headline "Beaufort residents gather for prayer, love and community."