KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Volunteers spent Monday lining the grass outside an Independence church with more than 100 crosses in remembrance of homicide victims killed in 2023.
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“We didn’t have enough crosses to put out and that’s not a problem that we want to have,” said Pastor Jonathan Slade of Reach Raytown Church.
Slade and Rosilyn Temple with KC Mothers in Charge said slowing the deadly violence starts with community awareness.
Each cross includes the name of a 2023 homicide victim.
“This was a human being, a person that went to school here, shopped here, lived here, played as a kid,” Temple said.
The crosses represent over 100 stories of those lost to homicide, their lives ended too soon.
“It represents a story, it represents someone who could have contributed to stop this, it represents at the true heart of it, it truly represents decay in our community,” Slade said.
Temple said this problem is something that impacts everyone, not just the loved ones of over 170 people killed this year.
“We want this to stop, this is not normal life, losing your child or loved one by the hands of someone else,” Temple said. “And people in the community going on like it can't happen to you. Well, no one is exempt from this.”
Pastor Slade says it’s time for the community to come together so there isn't a need for crosses in the ground.
“This is something, this isn’t normal and it shouldn’t be normal, but it’s becoming normal and it shouldn’t be,” Slade said. “We have the solution to it and we just have to act upon it. Faith without work is dead.”
