Faith Always Wins.
That’s the name of the foundation the Corporon family set up following the deaths of family patriarch William Corporon and his grandson Reat Griffin Underwood, who were brutally murdered in the parking lot of the Jewish Community Campus on April 13, 2014. A short time later, Terri LaManno’s life was also cut short in the parking lot of Village Shalom. An anti-Semite who has said that he planned to kill Jewish people is accused of shooting all three that day. Ironically, none of the three were Jewish.
Faith Always Wins is not just a name to the Corporons, it’s a way of life. {mprestriction ids="1,3"}Faith guides the path every day for Mindy Corporon, William’s daughter and Reat’s mother. Under the guidance of Faith Always Wins, and with the help of an army of volunteers, seven days of events, fittingly called SevenDays Make A Ripple, Change the World, begin on April 7 and concludes on April 13 — the one-year anniversary of that tragic day — with a walk from the Jewish Community Campus to Church of the Resurrection. The community is invited to participate, in one day of kindness or all seven. (See Page 9 for a complete list of SevenDays events.) The foundation, and all the activities, are intended to spread the message that faith and love win over hate.
Strength from Faith
Mindy Corporon is a managing member and co-founder of Boyer & Corporon Wealth Management, LLC and serves as its chief executive office. She’s had an accomplished career, including being named one of the Kansas City metro area’s 25 “Women Who Mean Business” in 2010, before she was thrust into the public spotlight following the tragic deaths of her father and her oldest son, who was just 14 years and a freshman at Blue Valley High School.
Corporon said the foundation, and the upcoming SevenDays, all started because people were so taken aback by how she handled the tragedy.
“When they ask why and how, I always answer that it comes from faith. I know they are in heaven. I hear from them,” she said in a recent interview from her Overland Park office.
A member of the Church of the Resurrection, where the last SevenDays event will take place, she mentioned that she just experienced a really sad day on her grandmother’s birthday. Corporon said she heard from her grandmother from heaven.
“I heard her say to me, ‘I have him (Reat),’ ” Corporon said. “I had a really tearful day because I knew she had him and I didn’t. I know that they are in heaven. I know that they are OK. I know that they are happy and busy and that we have a mission.”
Her mission is to talk about how faith is the underlying theme of the foundation and the activities the SevenDays steering committee has planned. People of all faiths are working on these activities and have supported her and her family through the past year. Following that day she said their Jewish friends, and even Jewish people she didn’t know, offered immediate support.
“It’s not that they came first, they came faster and harder,” she said. “I think that the Jewish community felt guilty, felt sad and felt angry that because of their faith we were caught in the crossfire. So when I say they came harder and faster, they did.”
Corporon said by saying that, she doesn’t mean that the Christians didn’t support them, because they did, just “with a different feeling.”
“Both communities have really wrapped their arms around us,” she said.
The foundation
Because she’s in the financial business, Corporon said she is very knowledgeable about charitable giving.
“So when my own family members were killed it was super easy for me to say these are the charities that I want money to go to. I say easy and then we named five.”
To simply things, the family met with a representative from the Greater Kansas City Foundation to discuss Faith Always Wins. They opened a general fund, created a mission statement and put together a board of directors to help make financial decisions.
“We wanted to have other people oversee what we were doing and what was going on,” she said, noting that the finals of KC SuperStar, the singing competition Reat had planned to audition for the day he was killed was coming up. The Faith Always Wins foundation provide an avenue for KC SuperStar supporters to make a memorial donation in Reat’s name.
SevenDays
Faith Always Wins is contributing $10,000 to SevenDays. Faith Always Wins is also trademarking SevenDays brand so the foundation owns that name.
The original idea for seven days of events came from Corporon’s mother, Melinda Gordy Corporon.
“From the beginning she very much wanted us to do a seven days of kindness type event. I think it came from the fact that they were killed on Palm Sunday and Easter was seven days later and I just think it had so much meaning to us.”
Mindy Corporon said she really wanted to focus on only one event, and her first thought was a concert. Then the idea of the songwriting competition was brought to them by the RRACE Foundation. (See Page XX.)
“The Othmers (RRACE’s founders) brought it to us and I felt like it wasn’t my place to say our foundation should oversee this or do that …. They’ve always been very gracious about remembering that it was our family members that were killed. We brought Jim LaManno in very quickly so he could be part of it and help make decisions, so he’s on the committee as well.”
“I think that the SevenDays program is a fitting tribute to Terri, Bill, and Reat,” said Jim LaManno. “It is a way to always remember our loved ones lost so senselessly. If we can prevent one life from being lost rooted in hatred, then we have done our job.”
There are 22 people, including many from the Jewish community and a large group of teens, on the SevenDays steering committee planning the events. Early on in the process Corporon said they hired a branding company, Whisky Design, which has helped them pull together the name, logo and theme. Harvest Productions was also hired to run the events along with the committee.
It’s the theme of the events that excite Corporon the most.
“The theme is giving our community the opportunity to learn about other religions and cultures in a safe, comfortable environment,” she said, noting the committee put a lot of thought into where the events would be held.
“We want people to be comfortable going. For instance the Interfaith Council presentation is being made at Leawood City Hall. It’s not a religious location because we wanted Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims to not feel like we were forcing them into a synagogue or a church and we wanted people from different faiths to feel comfortable, so it’s a completely non-denominational city location and that was by design.”
“We want to make sure it’s comfortable and open and safe for people.”
Corporon said she is especially impressed by the members of the youth board. Jake Goldman, a youth board leader, said he is proud of the active role he and the others have taken.
“We believe that the youth in our community are those that are capable of changing. We hope that the entire metropolitan community is able to do random acts of kindness throughout the week and beyond. SevenDays has the opportunity to change our community, our country, and our world. We have turned an atrocious tragedy into an event that could make positive ripples across the world,” Jake said.
Peace Walk
Perhaps the activity getting the most attention so far is the Peace Walk. Milton Brod, who is co-chairing the walk along with Kim Galbraith, predicts 1,000 people will walk from the Jewish Community Campus to Church of the Resurrection. (See Page XX for more details) With a little less than two weeks to go before the walk, 750 people had already pre-registered. There is no registration fee for the walk, which is just short of a 5K (3.2 miles).
“The concept of the walk is diversity joining together. We are one community and we’re going to stand up together,” Brod said.
The Jewish co-chair said he has mixed and conflicted emotions about volunteering for SevenDays.
“Working with the team is awesome and it’s similar to a lot of other activities where I’ve been involved with a team. You make new friends, you bond together, you feel a sense of accomplishment,” he said.
“But the conflict is I wish the tragedy had never occurred and I wish we didn’t have to find a way to turn the bad into good. I wish we were just going forward with the good,” he said.
The future
Corporon would like to see SevenDays go to other cities. She had hoped to have two years under their belts before they tried to take it to other cities, but events across the country taking place now may not give them that luxury. For instance, the Anti-Defamation League office in Houston has already approached her about bringing SevenDays there.
One thing is for sure, Corporon believes SevenDays will be on the calendar again next year.
“I think I had so focused on this visual of people walking from the Jewish center to the Christian church that I didn’t realized how blessed I was going to feel when all these people started participating in the days.”
“It’s just so heartwarming to see this. This is awesome. This is amazing and it’s hard to fathom.”{/mprestriction}