January 25, 2010

Baltimore Interfaith Coalition sponsors Vigil Against Violence

Johns Hopkins University chaplain the Rev. Albert Mosley and youth violence prevention expert Philip J. Leaf of the Bloomberg School of Public Health will be joined by faith leaders and members of Baltimore area churches, synagogues and mosques at a Vigil Against Violence set for 7 to 8:15 p.m. today, Jan. 25, at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, 5200 N. Charles St.

The vigil, which will include prayer, sacred readings, reflections, a procession and a collection for victims of the Haitian earthquake, is sponsored by the Baltimore Interfaith Coalition, an organization of faith communities aimed at addressing urban problems ranging from violence and crime to unemployment, education and health care. Members include Johns Hopkins, the Archdiocese of Baltimore, the Baltimore Board of Rabbis, the Muslim Community Cultural Center of Baltimore and the Johns Hopkins Center for the Prevention of Youth Violence, among many others.

The Baltimore Interfaith Coalition has been working from the Bunting-Meyerhoff Interfaith and Community Service Center, located on Johns Hopkins’ Homewood campus, and several university staff members, students and alumni will be involved in the event, including Uma Saini, ESL director and a lecturer in the Krieger School’s Language Teaching Center; 2009 graduate Salman Harani; and Bishop Douglas I. Miles, a 1970 graduate who is pastor of Koinonia Baptist Church.

“The Baltimore Interfaith Coalition represents an important opportunity to provide healing and hope commensurate with the losses that have been experienced in Baltimore over the last two decades, not only through murders but also through death due to drugs, HIV/AIDS and the incarceration of a significant segment of the population,” said Leaf, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for the Prevention of Youth Violence and one of the vigil’s organizers. “The coalition is re-imagining the role that we all need to play to create a successful Baltimore, and to identify and to support those in greatest need,” he said.