A crowd estimated at 500 people attended a peaceful demonstration on the campus of Loma Linda University in support of Black Americans victimized by systemic racism. The event, which was co-sponsored by the Black Health Professional Student Association and the School of Medicine, started at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, June 2, and ended long before the countywide 6 p.m. curfew.
The event highlighted the racial and cultural diversity of the university as students, faculty, and community members of many different races dressed in black to mourn the death of George Floyd and express their solidarity with similar events transpiring across the United States.
The Loma Linda event was respectful and apolitical, yet earnest. The only law enforcement officials in attendance were members of the university security department. Many attendees carried signs expressing their support for the Black Lives Matter movement. One of them quoted the late Bishop Desmond Tutu in saying, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”
Highlights of the event included poignant remarks by representatives of the student association, a memorial service in which guests kneeled in silence for 8 minutes and 46 seconds — the amount of time racist police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on the neck of George Floyd — and an impassioned prayer by Campus Chaplain Dilys Brooks, MDiv, MS, MA. Brooks prayed for healing and justice and reminded members of the audience to channel their outrage into activities targeted to end unjust practices and racism.
Calvin Thomsen, PhD, MDiv, assistant professor in the LLU schools of Public Health and Religion, found the event meaningful and timely.
“It was a moving time to remember and reflect,” Thomsen said. “There were photos of a number of Black Americans whose lives ended unjustly. It was designed to remind us that this has happens too often in the United States. They challenged us to take our experience and turn it into action.”
In a memo sent June 1, LLUH President Richard H. Hart, MD, DrPH, reflected on the tragedy of recent events. “To see a plea for breath and life itself from George Floyd, and a long line before him, is painful to watch,” Hart observed. “That this occurred by a member of law enforcement makes this injustice even more heartbreaking.”