MACON, Ga. — On Sunday, the Macon community and leaders from across the state gathered at Mulberry United Methodist Church to support the Jewish community and condemn hatred.
Sunday's service was a reaction to last week's protests by an anti-semitic group in front of Temple Beth Israel,
Around 900 people attended the Service of Love and Unity, according to the Rev. Ted Goshorn with Mulberry United Methodist.
“It has taken an army of volunteers to make this happen. It has taken a community to bring this service together,” he said.
People first heard from Temple Beth Israel President Simon Becker. He thanked everyone for coming and for standing up for the Jewish community.
“Your support serves as an important reminder that our community loves and supports us and that we are safe,” Becker said.
He said the service showed hate has no place in Central Georgia.
“Your presence tells us that not here, not now, not ever will Macon tolerate this kind of hateful demonstration,” Becker said.
U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff attended the service and thanked all the leaders present for the defense of the Jewish community -- both on the weekend of the hateful demonstration and for attending on Sunday.
Ossoff spoke about his relatives who survived the Holocaust and eventually made it to safety in the United States. He said he told the story so people remember the effects of antisemitism.
"It's painful but important to remember that the swastika is not merely a symbol of hate. Hate is an idea or a feeling. The swastika is a symbol of massacre, slavery, medical experimentation, extermination, and genocide," he said.
He said he also told the story because his relatives came to America because they believed it was a land of freedom and tolerance.
"America still is and still represents to the world, the values of universality, of human rights, of tolerance, of love, of kindness. They are the only antidote to the forces of hatred and genocide which have and will throughout human history risen and continue to rise and rise again," Ossoff said.
He said beating the forces of hatred is inevitable but it requires work, faith, and political action. He said that's exactly what the people at the gathering were already doing: coming together.
"People of every background will come to a church to stand behind Rabbi in a synagogue and affirm that we love each other, that we have her back, that we have her congregation's back, that we are willing not just to put into word what our belief in what America is but put it into deed," Ossoff said.
"This right here is what makes America great. This is the community in Macon-Bibb County and Middle Georgia saying that we understand and we believe in and we will fight for and we are committed to the values that all are created equal, that we are out of many one, and that we are one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all," he said.
You can hear the entirety of Sen. Jon Ossoff's speech on the 13WMAZ YouTube page.
Macon-Bibb Mayor Lester Miller also spoke.
"Macon is a welcoming community but there is no place, I repeat no place here, for the ignorance, the hate, the antisemitism directed towards our Jewish neighbors last weekend. No place for discrimination of any kind," Miller said.
Rabbi Elizabeth Bahar spoke about her experience on the day of the hate group's protest and how the community gathered around her and the synagogue. She said she was surprised and thankful for the love of the Macon community.
“What I saw, more importantly, what I felt was that we were not alone, and all of your deeds tipped the scale of what is Macon towards something good," Bahar said.
At the end of the service Temple Beth Israel vice president Mike Kaplan said, “Today I think we’re all Jews."
