Funeral services were held Wednesday for minister and community activist Reverend Robert L. Harris, pastor of Tabernacle Community Baptist Church.

The Reverend Harris was heavily involved in the community championing causes dealing with social justice and civil rights.

The Reverend Harris pastored Tabernacle Community Baptist Church since September 1977. During these 30 years under his pastorship, the church created numerous outreach ministries such as a food pantry, prison teaching ministry and evangelism ministry.

As an expansion to the church’s vision, Tabernacle established a foreign mission ministry to aid war-torn Liberia in West Africa. With an increase in Bible-based teaching, the vision was further expanded through the Church School, the Neighborhood Outreach Ministry, the community Job Club program, implementation of a tutorial program and the establishment of a partnership with MATC that lead to the creation of the GED/Adult Education program at Tabernacle. There is also a reading program for children and youth, as well as various church remodeling projects.

From 1997 to 1999, Harris served as president of Milwaukee Inner-city Congregations Allied for Hope (MICAH).

MICAH is a multicultural, interfaith organization committed to addressing justice issues that impact the community by empowering people to organize and take action in resolving critical issues as well as political and social imbalance.

The Reverend Harris led MICAH in a time of growth, welcoming many new congregations from the North Side, East Side, South Side and the suburbs. Reverend Harris led MICAH to some of its most significant victories. On his watch, MICAH won $5 million per year in the state budget for Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse (AODA) treatment in Milwaukee County.

This funding continues to help thousands of low-income people each year. It was under the Reverend Harris’ leadership that MICAH won a huge increase in funding for the SAGE program, which reduced class sizes for children in kindergarten through third grade.

MICAH members who had the privilege to work with Reverend Harris remember him as a truly caring man, who treated everyone from the Governor to the Mayor to the newest MICAH Core Team member with great respect and kindness.

Though he was thoughtful and considerate, Harris was a strong, focused leader for MICAH, who knew how to maintain order and discipline. (Under his leadership, Board meetings seldom lasted more than an hour!)

The Reverend Harris’ most notable trait, however, might have been his sense of humor. He brought a real sense of joy to MICAH, and everywhere he went. His was the joy of a man of deep faith, who knew that today’s struggles were just steps on the road to the greater life he now enjoys.

The Reverend Harris was also one of the founding members and first president (2000-2002) of the southeastern regional WISDOM organization. WISDOM is a social justice organization comprised of four other social justice organizations that includes 90 congregations. Like MICAH, WISDOM focuses on social justice issues, particularly criminal justice reform.

David Liners, executive director of WISDOM who worked closely with the Rev. Harris, said the minister was a kind yet no-nonsense individual with a "tremendous sense of humor who could find humor in even the most difficult things.

"He was someone who everybody liked," Liners said of Reverend Harris during a Tuesday interview, adding Reverend Harris’ also had the type of easy personality that made people want to work with him. "People easily gravitated to him."

The Reverend Harris also held the office of Secretary General to the Wisconsin General Baptist State Convention, Inc., and was past president of the Wisconsin General Baptist State Congress of Christian Education (WGBSCCE) from 1994-1997. He was also an instructor in the WGBSCCE.

Reverend Harris received his secondary education at Arkansas Baptist College in Little Rock, Ark. where he graduated in 1972 Magna Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Secondary Education.

He received a Master of Science Degree in Education from the Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. The Reverend Harris enrolled in the Southwestern Baptist Theological University religious studies in Fort Worth, Texas, where he received his Master of Divinity Degree.

Reverend Harris received a Doctor of Divinity Degree from the McKinley Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi. He has also done post graduate and doctoral studies at the Garrett Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois and Trinity Evangelical Seminary, Deerfield, Illinois.