I don’t think I’ve I’ve ever seen the church awake, but I’m only 70-ish. This week makes me think that I will soon. It’s a long blog because of all the signs of the rising.
Students lead chapel at Wake Div School on Tuesdays which never fails. Afterward I went to a secret meeting of local clergy organized by Forsyth Sponsoring Committee of the NC Industrial Areas Foundation, which traces back to Saul Alinsky. We had to use an encrypted “Signal” app to disclose the location and met in an actual upper room, which has a long history in the Church.
The times force IAF to reverse how its normal focus on highly public events to hold local government accountable. But now those potential friends are highly vulnerable. And we can’t expect local government to do anything the faith folks are not. So, we focused on the churches can do nitty gritty tasks to protect our Spanish-speaking neighbors. The church is really good at practical collaboration: lining up lawyers, using our vans to move kids to school, training moms. Our hospital was and still is involved in the “Faith Action ID” which for years gives people without US documents a picture ID so the police can validate identity (and avoid arrest for petty things). It’s all underway.
Later the same evening Ardmore Baptist hosted Christians Against Christian Nationalism. I expected a couple dozen activist friends. Not so. Four hundred middle class, middle age, middle everything white people organized by the youth minister were in aflame about what is being done by MAGA Christians. Normal, normal, normal, even the beige fellowship hall. I even liked that the group wasn’t great at organizing. This is the what the rising of the middle of the long-slumbering church looks like after decades of rust. There will be 800 next time and we’ll walk somewhere (a “march”).
The next night I watched the A team online as Paul Rauschenbusch let a webinar of the Interfaith Alliance in a crisp, info-loaded practical deluge of encouragement. Asked if we are in a Bonhoeffer moment of radical resistance in small cells of disciples, Paul noted that we’re in the majority; we simply need to act like it. . You can watch it here along with the thousands who saw it live. This is not just IA, but a web of collaborating networks. A-team.
The next day Hold.Health posted “Purple.” Although I am bright blue, Hold.Health is more complex with many who care about health more than politics, so it took some editorial help to get it closer to purple. Not unlike a church committee, come to think of it. In these days we are leaning into our faith way more than operational health care Purple is a sacred color, especially now, but not just for chaplains. Faith-health folks view the work of health science researchers, community health centers and policy wonks as sacred, too.
Other national networks are tuning into the faith channel in different ways. Winston is working with We In the World to host a regional gathering the first weekend of May. In these parts working on justice so that we can be better ancestors is all about Spirit and sweat. We may start in Raleigh at Shaw University which was started by White abolitionists after the war to end white supremacy. It began training clergy but those students quickly turned to building the medical school because healing the soul, body, mind and community are the same thing. We’ll drive back to Winston to stand on Happy Hill which once—and still is—a place where you can see the whole city—soul, body, mind and community and imagine what God might want us to do. We’ll pray and sing at “Rising Ebenezer” at the top of the hill where prayers do rise.
Another one: David Docusen is a voice of hundreds—maybe thousands—of younger clergy embracing Neighborliness in a purple kind of way. They sound like evangelicals because they really like Jesus; but have no time for anything coopted, dumbed down and stripped of compassion. He calls ike Nehemiah to rebuild the broken walls of the city, with each of us focusing on our part. Right here on Patterson Avenue.
Thursday was “Founder’s Day” at Wake Forest University, which, like most liberal arts universities is trying to be invisible, terrified at losing federal funding. We met in Wait Chapel named for our slave-holding founder, which is awkward. But we took the occasion to name another campus building after the Hopkins’, two African American alumni doctors. Larry was fierce for justice, but nobody even alluded to anything timely until Corey Walker, our Div Dean at the very end channeled Dr. King’s voice, rhythm, cadence from Memphis the night before he was assassinated: “all we are asking is for you to live up to what you put on paper.” (skip to 1:26.21 mark.)
The week ended with stern instruction from our local Ministerial Association:
“A 24 hour BLACKOUT has been scheduled as the first of multiple counter measures to the attack(s) on Diversity Equity and Inclusion.
- “TURN IT OFF Fri, Feb 28 from 12:00a to 11:59p.
- WHAT NOT TO DO:
- • Do not make any purchases.
- • Do not shop online, or in stores
- • No Amazon
- • No Walmart
- • No BestBuy
- • No McDonalds
- • NOWHERE!
- “DO NOT SPEND MONEY ON FOOD:
- • Fast Food
- • Gas
- • Major Retailers
- • Do not use Credit or Debit Cards for non essential spending.
- •If you must spend, ONLY support small, local businesses.
- “WHY THIS MATTERS: Corporations and banks only care about their bottom line.
- • If we disrupt the economy for just ONE day, it sends a powerful message.
- • If they don’t listen, we make the next blackout longer.
- • This is our first action.
- • Our numbers are powerful.
- • This is how we make history.”
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It finally got above freezing today. As it rose past 42 the tougher honeybees took flight. The queens had started laying eggs around the inauguration, so there will soon be tens of thousands of new bees ready for the rising of life and power in a couple of weeks when the maples bloom.
All they—and we—need to do is be who God made us.
Illustration by Phillip Summers about the obvious fact Jesus and his family were immigrants fleeing from an overreaching despot..
