Angels on the Ground
by: Judi Amey

Saturday Ramblins, Vol. 1, No. 2 (May 23, 1998)

Tribute is due to a ministry, a ministry which, I understand, exists in many cities in the United States and, perhaps, around the world. In my city, the sign of this ministry is an angel, painted on the ground.

The ministers, a group of people, mostly Christians, come from all walks of life and social status. They are joined by faith, concern for the community and a commitment to social justice. They frequently work in neighborhoods " … where angels fear to tread" (Alexander Pope).

They pray for victims of violent death, for their families and friends and for the person or persons who caused the death. In memory of the loved one, an angel is painted on the sidewalk, on the street, in the alley, on the stairway of a church – as close to the sight of death as possible.

Often drugs or gangs are proximate causes of death—but the ministers know that the person is no less loved, valued and missed by family and friends left behind.

If the pray-ers are fortunate, a member of the family or a friend of the victim can attend—at these times a personality is attached to the name. His or her likes and dislikes, interests and pleasures become part of the intercessory prayer:

A high school girl, a student leader, a peer mentor, borrowed a car and drove to a fast-food restaurant. Shot in the drive-thru lane, she was a mistaken identity.

A high school boy, his neighbor's favorite and a promising artist from toddlerhood. Shot as he walked through an alley toward his home, another mistaken identity.

One victim's sister, talked of her dead brother's concern for his nephew, her son, a product of the inner-city. With tears in her eyes, she said that her brother took the boy fishing and talked with him. Because he did that, she said, her son stayed in high school and is now in college.

Sometimes family members choose not to come; other times no one can come, as in the case of a beaten toddler. The only name the coordinator could obtain was that of the child's mother. She was in jail, charged with complicity in the boy's death at the hands of her boyfriend.

In an alley, after the group's prayers were done, high school kids—friends of yet another shooting victim—crowd around the angel face. Some squatted on the ground, more knelt, most standing close behind. The ministers leave, touched by the significance of this grief shared.

Someday, you might pass an angel on the ground. It's symbol, a sign that people care. It's a memorial, marking a life that ended violently. It's a small thing, representing the people who came in peace and love to share in the life and death of someone they probably never knew; they came also to pray for the violence to end and for the Kingdom to come—on Earth as it is in Heaven.

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