The national scourge and shame of senseless mass shootings strike us at home here in California, in places with the otherwise bucolic names of Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay.  Again and again, blood has been shed, lives have been lost, and families and communities are devastated.

As a person of faith, I quietly hold the families in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay in the light, and prayer.  Institutionally and organizationally, at The California Endowment, we see clear answers to this national crisis that our nation’s elected leaders are simply unwilling to act upon: affirm the leadership of elected officials willing to act to control unbridled weaponry across the nation, and elect new leaders willing to exert such leadership.

There is simply no clean, elegant, “innovative” way to solve this problem — no killer app, fresh tagline, or clever strategy.  This is about power, voice, coalition building, alliances, movement-building, community organizing, and re-imagined voter engagement – transformative solidarity.

And yes, these answers are the very same constellation of must-dos on the multiple crises affecting our nation: climate change, economic injustice, lack of health for all, the attack on women’s rights, rampant white supremacy politics cloaked as “anti-wokeness.”

The best way to remember and honor the lives lost in this week’s mass shootings, and the hundreds seemingly destined to follow in the year to come, is to go beyond prayer – and this is with people power.

Bob Ross