Comment on Hundreds attend Waller County prayer vigil for Sandra Bland

"If we allow Sandra Bland's death to be another hashtag and another statistic, if we allow her death to make us angry and stressed out, that's one thing," Bishop Vashti Murphy McKenzie told those gathered at the Johnson-Phillip All Faiths Chapel on the campus of Prairie View A&M University, Bland's alma mater. Organized by the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the service memorialized Bland while advocating for transparency in the investigation into the "questionable circumstances" surrounding her death. In organizing the event with the AME Church, Prairie View A&M remained integral to the local social justice movement that has erupted since Bland's death. Championing civil rights and equality, especially for African Americans, is ingrained in the history of the AME Church. During civil rights organizing in Selma, Ala., Martin Luther King Jr.