Religious leaders ask after Wis. shooting: 'What will we do from this day forward?'
Aug. 26, 2012: WEST CHESTER — Hundreds of people – including local representatives from many religious faiths – drew Greater Cincinnati’s Sikh community into a warm embrace Sunday, 21 days after a gunman killed six at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wis.
In kind, the congregation of the Guru Nanak Society’s temple on Tylersville Road eagerly grasped the opportunity to teach the barefoot or sock-wearing visitors about their religion, which started about 500 years ago in northern India.
The Sikh religion (pronounced seek) is distinct from Islam and Hinduism, although many Westerners are confused by the fact many Sikh men wear turbans.
“I bring our feelings of sorrow and solidarity,” said the Rev. Louis Gasparini, director of Hispanic Ministries for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, who said it’s important for citizens to stand together “so that all people can worship freely.”
“God has brought us together,” added the Rev. Aaron Greenlea, representing the Baptist Ministers Conference of Greater Cincinnati and Vicinity. “Now what will we do from this day forward?”
“Our hearts go out to those who were slain,” said Rabbi Shena Potter-Jaffee, bringing condolences from the Greater Cincinnati Board of Rabbis. She noted that the Hebrew word for peace, shalom, shares roots with the language’s word for wholeness, shalem.
She expressed hope for increased familiarity among religions “that brings a bit of shalem and shalom into this world.”
Imam Ilyas Nashid of the Cincinnati Islamic Community Center said people of his religion believe the human community “should be viewed as a single body” and that, when one part hurts, the whole body suffers. “Today we are gathered as living proof into this maturation of this noble idea,” he said.
Also speaking were representatives from the Hindu Society of Greater Cincinnati, the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Ohio, the United Church of Christ, the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance of Greater Cincinnati, the Association of Unity Churches of Greater Cincinnati and the Metropolitan Area Religious Coalition of Cincinnati.
Officials from the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigations, as well as local police, also spoke during the service.
“The gathering we have here is overwhelming … and we thank you from the bottom of our heart,” said Dr. Satinder Singh Bharaj, president of the Guru Nanak Society, whose congregation was pleased to show off its $2.2 million “gurdwara” – the religion’s word for an educational center that includes its version of a church, temple or mosque.
Even young children, who are treated as equals with adults in the religion, were happily educating visitors about their customs and religious rituals.