City religious leaders including pastors, ministers, and a leader from three local mosques attended the two days of classes at Mercer County Community College.
TRENTON — Be a presence, not a force.
That’s what 10 city clergy members were told yesterday as they prepared to be a new kind of backup to the Trenton Police Department as part of the new police chaplain program.
The volunteer community faith leaders will check their denominations at the door, and be available to go with officers to homes, hospital rooms, and even crime scenes, to offer a helping hand to those in emotional turmoil.
“Some call it a ministry of presence,” said Daniel Schafer, a minister and retired state constable who ran the course. “It’s just the fact you’re there, to be used as a resource.”
City religious leaders including pastors, ministers, and a leader from three local mosques attended the two days of classes at Mercer County Community College’s James Kerney campus downtown which focused on stress management, ethics, diversity, legal liabilities, substance abuse and death notification. Police Director Ralph Rivera Jr. proudly reviewed his “first class” of clergy recruits and officially handed them their certificates of completion during a graduation yesterday afternoon.
Clergy members of all faiths and from all areas of the city now hope they can be some small part of pushing back against violence.
“I pray that it will happen,” Sheik Shahid Siddiqu said. “I really believe it will happen.” Siddiqu, who said his title of “sheik” is roughly equivalent to a deacon in a Christian church, was at the course representing two mosques in Trenton and one in Ewing.
Schafer has counseled not only victims of crime but officers following line of duty shootings, deaths in the department and other critical incidents. Chaplains are not there to preach in a time of crisis but to offer a non-judgmental resource.
“Cops have an image armor,” Schafer said. “It’s a front, it’s what they put up. It’s an armor that protects them.”
Tuesday’s suicide of Ewing Police Officer Matthew Wallace brought home the gravity of the duties the clergy members would face.
“It’s hard to think when you’re thinking about those guys in Ewing, you know?” Schafer said at one point.
Schafer and Vineland Police Officer Jason Scalzi, a chaplain for his department, addressed an afternoon roll call at Ewing Police headquarters and following the graduation were off to Westampton to help console Wallace’s wife and family.
Many of the course attendees were motivated by the intense violence in the city which led to 20 homicides between Memorial Day and Labor Day this year.
“It’s time for faith leaders to show and tell,” said the Rev. Darrell Armstrong, pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church. “I feel that as a pastor in the city of Trenton I need to lead by example.”
Armstrong said this year he’s presided over the funerals of six or seven murder victims.
“My heart is broken,” he said at the end of classes.
Siddiqu said the rising violence has become a concern for him and deserves a strong response.
“This has to be treated like a disease, and I think the community has a disease of silence,” he said.
“It’s a community problem, it’s not a police problem,” he added.
“Apathy and lethargy is still part of it,” Armstrong said. “But let’s not forget we sit along the steel corridor between New York and Philadelphia. More guns are trafficked here than anywhere else in the state.”
The Rev. William Coleman helped to organize the chaplaincy program after going through the training in Camden. He’s seen the violence in both cities.
“Believe it or not, it’s less intense here, I think,” said Coleman, a retired New York City cop.
Amstrong and others have been shocked by the indifference to life that has punctuated so many city killings.
“That’s evil,” Armstrong said. “And I think the counter to evil is goodness.”
Contact Alex Zdan at azdan@njtimes.com or (609) 989-5705.
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