Guns From City Streets Made Into Garden Tools At UMass Dartmouth Event

DARTMOUTH - Shotguns got a new, healthy target Wednesday at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, inspired by a Bible passage.

"This is a tool change that will do a lot of damage to the care system," said Bishop James Carey, retired bishop of the Connecticut Episcopal Church.

The local chapter of Swords to Plowshares, an anti-gun violence group, held a protest around the campus quads to turn old guns into garden plants. The event is sponsored by UMass Dartmouth Episcopal Campus Ministry and the Leduc Center for Civic Engagement.

Carey, who attended the event, said the organization works with police departments to take guns received through gun take-back programs and turn them into garden tools and jewelry.

The gun was from a take-back program in New Bedford.

New Bedford and Fall River hold regular gun buybacks where people exchange unwanted guns for gift cards. Equipment for Wednesday's event was part of a recent purchase in New Bedford.

New Bedford Police Chief Paul Oliveira said the department presented several dozen buy-back weapons at the event.

"It was really a win-win," he said.

Make a choice to disarm

Later, purchasing and eliminating guns would help make neighborhood homes safer, Carey said. Noting that the majority of gun homicides in the United States are suicides, he said getting rid of too many guns is one way to protect especially curious children and teenagers.

"The whole idea is that we don't have a weapon, so we can leave it," he said.

In addition to the forge, attendees can pick up free gun keys in another effort to promote gun safety.

This led Kerry Olivera and others to use a hammer and an anvil to turn shotgun and gun barrels into shields that could then be used in the garden. Sparks flew as the metal heated and formed in the mobile molds.

Carey said they typically donate new equipment to local community gardens, faith-based groups and youth empowerment and violence prevention organizations.

The Swords to Eagles movement began after the Sandy Hook school shooting. The idea came from an anti-war Bible verse. "They beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into fishing poles.

"Well, that's what we do. Our sword is the weapon of our community," Carey said.

This article originally appeared in The Herald News. At the UMass Dartmouth event, swords were turned into gardening

These men attacked the old man, but they did not know that he was not alone there.