Dear friends,
Episcopalians have been in the news in recent days, and in a very good way. Clergy, including Minnesota Bishop Craig Loya, have been on the frontlines of protests against ICE agents cruel and lawless brutality in Minneapolis. Bishop Loya has issued several strong statements condemning the violence, including the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. His statement that I referenced in my sermon yesterday is below.
The bishop asked that those from outside Minnesota who wish to help to donate to Casa Maria. “You can help nurture the Diocese of Minnesota’s primary engine of underground care and subversive love by donating to Casa Maria, which is providing much-needed food, supplies, and community to those rightfully afraid to go about their daily lives amidst the violence,” he said. You may donate at this link:.
https://www.saint-nicks.org/casamaria
Our own bishop, Rob Wright, has encouraged donations to Casa Maria. He also posted this today: “A nation that celebrates the civil disobedience of the Boston Tea Party, but now condones the murder of protestors by masked men is at war with its own soul. Brutality is incompatible with Jesus’ way.”
Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe, the symbolic head of the Episcopal Church, has also spoken against the violent thuggery in Minneapolis. In one statement he noted that the Episcopal Church was once known as “the church of presidents,” but now we are called to “be the engine of the resistance.” His most recent statement is also pasted below.
I am so proud and glad to have all of these bishops leading the way of following Jesus.
With love,
Tricia
Craig Loya
Fellow Americans,
Things are impossibly hard in Minnesota right now. We are a state that feels under siege, and the people of this place are doing everything possible to resist. The campaign of reckless brutality being waged by the federal goverment has been well documented, including today’s killing of a citizen who was restrained and immobilized. The clear evidence of what’s happening exposes cartoonish lies from federal agencies that echo the most cynical propaganda machines in human history. The images are clear, and we are told, don’t believe what you see.
But there is also something much more powerful, and not as widely reported, happening. We are mobilizing for revolutionary love. Vast networks of care, compassion, and solidarity, organized by churches to deliver food and supplies to those who cannot leave their homes. People are documenting the violence being used against us in a way that puts their own lives at risk. People are standing guard outside schools and daycares, and at bus stops to protect our children from real risks of harm. Others are taking turns watching each others’ kids stuck in online learning because some schools aren’t safe. Health care workers are bravely caring for people in hospitals that also are no longer safe, and risking being targets of arrest and detention for protecting the patients. A rich web of underground care and hidden love is taking deep root, and it’s amazing to think what fruit that might bear when this occupation ends.
Minnesotans cannot do more than we are doing. Here are a few ways you can help.
1) Please flood your US senators with appeals to not to further fund ICE, by rejecting a bill the US House has already passed. Please flood all your members of congress with calls for deescalation in Minnesota; for ICE, Customs and Border Patrol, and other federal agents to leave Minnesota now; and to write and pass legislation that requires proper and extensive training for all those working for the federal government in our states and local communities.
2) Organize peaceful demonstrations in your cities and communities. We live in a very big country, and it’s possible what’s happening in Minnesota feels removed. What is happening to us here is happening to all of America, and it is eroding the last remaining threads of our democracy. Minneapolis and Minnesota have been a model for the entire country over these past two weeks, with tens of thousands standing together in deep cold to peacefully protest the violence being used against us.
3) You can help nurture the Diocese of Minnesota’s primary engine of underground care and subversive love by donating to Casa Maria, which is providing much-needed food, supplies, and community to those rightfully afraid to go about their daily lives amidst the violence. Some of Casa Maria’s leaders are also working with a diocesan team to help families locate and access members who have been taken by ICE. Donations do real and immediate work to help people in Minnesota that are in real need of help.
The greatest danger we face right now is not the very real threat to our safety. It’s not even the erosion of democracy. The greatest threat we face as a nation is the assault being waged on hope. We must not give in to despair. We must not be consumed by the very justified anger we feel. The only way hatred can be effectively resisted is doubling down on love. The only way darkness can be defeated is light. The only way the forces of death can be overcome is by embracing, every moment of every day, God’s unstoppable life.
| Dear people of God in The Episcopal Church: Like Jesus, we live in frightening times. His earthly ministry began, as we heard in today’s Gospel reading, when John the Baptist was imprisoned by authorities who wanted to silence his preaching and prophesying. Jesus knew what happens when earthly powers persuade human beings to fear one another, regard one another as strangers, and believe that there is not enough to go around. In Jesus’ time, the power of these divisions motivated John’s beheading and Jesus’ own death on the cross at the hands of Roman authorities. In our time, the deadly power of those divisions is on display on the streets of Minneapolis, in other places across the United States, and in other countries around the world. As has too often been the case throughout history, the most vulnerable among us are bearing the burden, shouldering the greatest share of risk and loss, and enduring the violation of their very humanity. But we do not grieve without hope. The Christian story is full of people who lived in frightening and brutal times, and who followed Jesus’ call that we heard in church today. His proclamation turns us away from the fear born of sin and death and toward the kingdom of God, toward Christ’s ministry of justice, reconciliation, and love. “From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view,” the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Corinth (2 Corinthians 5:16), exhorting them to reject the divisions of their time in favor of being ambassadors for Christ. This is God’s call to The Episcopal Church now, and it is not an easy one. In the United States, we no longer live in a time when we can expect to practice our faith without risk, and we are confronting what vulnerable communities of faith have experienced for generations. Our right to worship freely as one church, committed to the dignity of every human being, has been curtailed by the fear that too many immigrant Christians face when they leave their homes. Peaceful protests, a right long enshrined in the Constitution, are now made deadly. Carrying out the simple commands of Jesus—feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, visiting prisoners, making peace—now involves risks for the church and grave danger for those we serve. As Christians, we must acknowledge that this chaos and division is not of God, and we must commit ourselves to paying whatever price our witness requires of us. In the coming years, our church will continue to be tested in every conceivable way as we insist that death and despair do not have the last word, and as we stand with immigrants and the most vulnerable among us who reside at the heart of God. We will be required to hold fast to God’s promise to make all things new, because our call to follow God’s law surpasses any earthly power or principality that might seek to silence our witness. To those of you who are in the center of the storm, please know that I am praying for you as you embody the love of Christ in your ministries and communities. To those of you who are watching with concern and fear, I ask you to pray for those who have died in protests and detention, for those who witnessed their deaths, and for everyone who bears authority and responsibility in this moment, that they may exercise wisdom, restraint, and courage. Pray too, especially in the days to come, for the witness of our church in these times and for a hedge of protection around all the beloved children of God who live in fear this day. The Most Rev. Sean Rowe Presiding Bishop The Episcopal Church |