Franklin Graham had some blunt advice on Facebook for those worried about police shootings that have claimed the lives of unarmed black men in places like Ferguson, Missouri.

Obey the police, or else.

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Obeying the police doesn’t heal the long history of distrust and broken relationships between police and minority groups, especially in urban neighborhoods, Smith said. Christians also need to be engaged in Jesus’s ministry of reconciliation.

Smith is among 31 signers of an open letter to Graham, written by a group of African American, Hispanic, and Asian American leaders, many of them evangelicals. The letter has become Sojourners most-viewed post ever, tweeted assistant editor Betsy Shirley.

“As a leader in the church, you are called to be an ambassador of reconciliation,” the letter reads. “The fact that you identify a widely acknowledged social injustice as ‘simple’ reveals your lack of empathy and understanding of the depth of sin that some in the body have suffered under the weight of our broken justice system.”