Big Bethel AME’s Social Action Sunday Recognizes Juneteenth featuring Keynote Senator Jon Ossoff
“Men’s Emphasis Month presents ‘Men Stepping Up to Serve’ featuring US Senator Jon Ossoff”
Featured keynote speaker for Big Bethel AME’s Social Action Sunday/Men’s Emphasis Month is U.S. Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff scheduled Sunday, June 19, 2022, 10:00am at Big Bethel AME Church where Rev. John Foster, Ph.D. serves as Senior Pastor. Juneteenth honors the end to slavery in the United States and is considered the longest-running African American holiday. On June 17, 2021, it officially became a federal holiday. Senator Ossoff was mentored by late Congressman John Lewis and previously worked as a national security aide in Congress, documentary film producer and as an investigative journalist exposing corruption including ISIS war crimes, atrocities committed by peacekeeping troops, human trafficking, fraud, theft, corruption and corporate abuse. He also helped produce BBC investigations about international war crimes and death squads in East Africa. He graduated from Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service with a Bachelor of Science degree and attended classes taught by former U.S. secretary of state Madeleine Albright and former Israeli ambassador to the United States Michael Oren. He earned a Master of Science degree in international political economy from the London School of Economics in 2013. Ossoff became the youngest member of the Senate elected since Don Nickles in 1980 as well as the first Jewish member of the Senate from Georgia, the first Jewish senator from the Deep South since Benjamin F. Jonas of Louisiana who was elected in 1878, and the first millennial United States senator. Ossoff along with Senator Raphael Warnock are the first Democrats to represent Georgia in the United States Senate since Zell Miller in 2005.
The theme for Men’s Emphasis Month is “Men Stepping Up to Serve.” Topics of concern for the Social Action Committee include reproductive healthcare rights, gun control and voting rights. Social Action Sunday derived from the AME Social Action Commission, the social justice arm of the AME Church. Social action is basic to ministry in African Methodism and organizations are encouraged to recognize various challenges facing their communities and explore ways to find resolutions. The Commission’s work is representative of the ongoing fight for Civil Rights and Social Justice in the world and ongoing efforts to uplift and educate on pressing issues. The AME Church’s founding in 1787 represents the first civil rights movement in the USA. The leader was Richard Allen, a clergyman who later became the first elected and consecrated bishop. He embraced the basic theology of Methodism but rejected the practice of separatism and discrimination against people of color. The second civil rights movement was in 1955 sparked by Mother Rosa Parks, a lifelong AME.
WHO: Big Bethel AME Church
WHAT: Social Action Sunday/Men’s Emphasis Month featuring keynote speaker US Senator Jon Ossoff
WHEN: Sunday, June 19, 2022 starting at 10:00a.m.
WHERE: 220 Auburn Avenue, NE, Atlanta, GA 30303
