America’s Table celebrates our diversity. This event is held each year place at Rice University’s Grand Hall in the student center. This yea the breakfast was held on November 22, 2019.

I was honored to join with a group of Houston community’s leaders: Walat Aqrawi, Peggy Edge, Bishop Michael Rinehart, Jose Luis Lopez, Linda Toyota, Pastor Becky Keenan, Zafar Zaf Tahir, Toni Ramos, Jeron Bradford, Imam Waleed Basyouni, Rabbi Gideon Estes, Artemio Temo Muniz, HPD Chief Art Acevedo, Alison Leland, Anhlan Nguyen, Stephen L. Klineberg, Allan Van Fleet, Michael Nichols, Marcia Nichols, Dorit Haenosh Aaron, Sarah Lee-Anna Hobbs and Emanuelee Outspoken Bean, John Rudley, Judson Robinson Bishop James Dixon and Rabbi Steven Morgen.

Special thanks to Randy Czarlinsky for organization and coordination:

Hanging out with Bishop Dixon.

Sat with Judson Robinson

Congressman Al Green: ” There is room at America’s Table for all of us. We can have without uniformity. We are the keepers of the flame of hope.

Sarah Hobbs is the 2019 Texas Female Vocalist of the Year.

Emmanuelee Ourspoken Bean: “We have the opportunity to build a better humanity. You are a person not people. You are the starving child abandoned in Ethiopia…

Chief Acevedo: “I was a political refugee. I entered school in California in 1969 not speaking a word of English. I was told all Cubans were communists. Because of my experiences in the U.S. I became an officer in 1986…”

My ancestors’ journey to America was different than others. My fourth great grandfather purchased his wife for $1250. Today I am defined not by my European ancestry, who would not want to recognize me, but by my African ancestry. I don’t know that ancestry, because there are no records.

Stephen Klineberg: “We are a free people and we come from everywhere, and nowhere is that clearer than in Houston, Texas….”

Judson Robinson

Conchita and Judson

So happy for Sarah Hobbs who made top ten with her hit Like I Love You. So nice to meet an artist with such an incredible voice, who is also so kind and gracious.

We also launched the Houston region’s “Community of Conscience”, a group of leaders seeking to eradicate the hateful rhetoric that has poisoned our political discourse and spurred violence.

Priests, pastors and preachers, imams, rabbis, ethnic and civic leaders will sat and ate together, reflecting on the values and humanity that bridge our communities.

The entry fee was a timely donation of canned goods or dry food, collected for the Houston Food Bank. The breakfast was standing room only, at capacity.