(CNSNews.com) – During a memorial service for the five slain Dallas police officers who were killed last week, President Barack Obama called on Americans to open their hearts and “stand in each other’s shoes.”
“With an open heart, we can learn to stand in each other’s shoes and look at the world through each other’s eyes so that maybe the police officer sees his own son in that teenager with a hoodie, who’s kind of goofing off, but not dangerous, and maybe the teenager will see in the police officer the same words and values and authority of his parents,” Obama said.
The president and first lady were joined by former President George W. Bush and former first lady Laura Bush, as well as the vice president and his wife in honoring the officers who were murdered during a protest against police brutality.
“With an open heart, we can abandon the overheated rhetoric and the oversimplification that reduces whole categories of our fellow Americans – not just to opponents, but to enemies,” Obama said.
“With an open heart, those protesting for change will guard against reckless language going forward, look at the model set by the five officers we mourn today, acknowledge the progress brought about by the sincere efforts by police departments like this one in Dallas and embark on hard, but necessary work of negotiation, the pursuit of reconciliation,” he said.
“With an open heart, police departments will acknowledge that just like the rest of us, they’re not perfect, that insisting we do better to rout out racial bias is not an attack on cops, but an effort to live up to our highest ideals,” Obama added.