Surprised by the “not guilty” verdict in the George Zimmerman case, Bishop T.D. Jakes and The Potter’s House of Dallas hosted a panel to discuss it in their Sunday morning service. According to The Christian Post, the panel included legal and psychological professionals, all members of Jakes’ church.
Zimmerman, half-Caucasian and half-Hispanic, was acquitted by a jury in Florida Saturday in the shooting death of black teen Trayvon Martin.
Jakes introduced the panel discussion saying that he “seldom speaks out about a case …” but that he “could not ignore his obligation.”
“I am generally silent because I have an obligation as a pastor to bring you the word of God regardless of what is going on in the times … (but) it would be disingenuous of me to not tell you quite honestly and quite succinctly that I was stunned, shocked, [and] speechless about the outcome of this trial,” Jakes told his congregation. “I think it is an oversimplification of the truth to say this is totally about racism,” he said. “I think that all people should be concerned. All people of all colors should be concerned.”
“Once you redefine something on the books (law), what happens when a woman is going through a parking garage and somebody follows her? And she’s taken some kind of defense training and she tries to defend herself and she gets shot to death,” Jakes insisted. “Now we have a case on the books that defends the one who shot them. … Now you have changed the standard and even if you think it was right in this case, what happens to the precedence that you set for the next case? For someone that has no weapon and tries to fight back, do you get to kill me because I can fight?”
