The Rev. Jonathan Weaver remembers the slot machines up and down Route 301 in Charles County before they were outlawed in the late 1960s.
“I’m old enough to remember the harm that it created for families,” Weaver said, causing breakups and bankruptcies.
“I even had family members who were affected personally by slot machines.
“What was bad then would be bad now.”
Weaver, of Greater Mount Nebo African Methodist Episcopal Church in Bowie, attended an Annapolis rally Thursday of ministers opposed to slots, one of scores of events that have highlighted the unified opposition of the church community to an expansion of gambling that would occur if voters support the ballot question.
Labor unions, business groups, state employees, police, horse and racing organizations have all lined up to support the state constitutional amendment, authorizing 15,000 video lottery terminals, as modern slots are called, spread over five locations.
They say the money is needed to support education and a better solution than higher taxes.
But representatives of the faith community, particularly the pastors of black churches, have been the most visible and vocal opposition to slots.
The Catholic bishops of Maryland reiterated their long-standing opposition to slots Wednesday, though they called it a matter on which “Catholic voters can legitimately disagree.”
“The common good is not served, and human dignity is not promoted when budget needs are addressed through revenue streams likely to increase burdens on low-income families and expand social ills,” the Maryland Catholic conference said in its position paper.
But unlike some of the opponents in other denominations, the bishops said, “gambling is not intrinsically evil or immoral.”
The Rev. Dean Nelson, executive director of the Network of Politically Active Christians, said no other issue has united the various faith communities as slots has.
“The body of Christ in the state of Maryland is unified,” he said.
“The state has no business in enacting a tax on those who can least afford it,” he said, one of the most common themes of slots opponents.
Several opponents brought up the false promises made for the lottery and the money it would raise, and how it started as a once-a-week drawing and is now a round-the-clock operation preying on low-income families.
“A budget deficit does not justify the destructive forces of legalized slots,” said Harold Johnson, of the Nehemiah Project International Ministries, a nonprofit that works with organizations and individuals to equip them with entrepreneurship training based on the Bible.
He said “the most despicable moment for him” was watching television ads that stated “somehow slots are going to save our schools and reduce our taxes.”
Johnson said slots were likely to do neither, much as the lottery did not reduce taxes or increase aid to education.
