[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 90 (Tuesday, June 18, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H6436]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   TOLL INCREASES IN CHURCH BURNINGS

  (Mr. THOMPSON asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. THOMPSON. Mr. Speaker, for 109 years the Mount Pleasant 
Missionary Baptist Church has served the people of the small rural town 
of Kossuth, MS. Today all that remains of that church and the Central 
Grove Baptist Church, another small black church barely 5 miles away, 
is ashes.
  The members of these two churches awoke this morning to find their 
names added to the long toll of over 100 heartbroken congregations 
since 1991. Though they rise from their beds surrounded by ruins, the 
people of these two churches did not awake to defeat, but 
determination.
  You see Mr. Speaker, these two Mississippi churches were built years 
ago with old bricks and wood by the sons and daughters of slaves. The 
structures may be burned, but their foundations were laid in the spirit 
of hope, and neither hatred nor evil has the power to destroy them 
forever. It is the spirit of these congregations that will rise, 
steeped in faith, to take up hammers and mortar to rebuild our 
churches.
  Those of you who come in the dark shadows, beware.

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