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'A Cry For Mama' As Worshipers Seek Justice In Greensboro

Jacinta LaFlora joins other singers in a praise song during the 'Cry For Mama' prayer meeting in Greensboro Sunday, July 5. PAUL GARBER/WFDD

Public demonstrations over race and justice continued in the Triad over the Fourth of July Weekend, including a “Cry For Mama” prayer gathering in Greensboro.

On Sunday, in a plaza bordered by Guilford County's former and present courthouses, people sang as they sought justice.

As the music broke, speakers stepped up to the mic and read the names of men and women killed at the hands of police in recent years. Pastor Betina Moffitt read a list of high-profile cases ending with George Floyd.

Moffitt organized the prayer meeting that drew about 50 people to downtown Greensboro Sunday. She says was inspired by the video recording of Floyd calling out for his mother as he fought to breathe under the restraint of a Minneapolis police officer.

“I believe that the community as a whole, whether we're Black or white, Christian or non-Christian, we can't heal without a woman's voice, without a mother," she said.

Moffitt says she has seen other demonstrations and wanted hers to focus on peace, which she says brings people together.

Paul Garber is a Winston-Salem native and an award-winning reporter who began his journalism career with an internship at The High Point Enterprise in 1993. He has previously worked at The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The News and Record of Greensboro and the Winston-Salem Journal, where he was the newspaper's first full-time multimedia reporter. He won the statewide Media and the Law award in 2000 and has also been recognized for his business, investigative and multimedia reporting. Paul earned a BA from Wake Forest University and has a Master's of Liberal Arts degree from Johns Hopkins University and a Master's of Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He lives in Lewisville.

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