I found this very balanced and poignant, under the circumstances. There’s
plenty of idiots and fools on both sides. We need a better way forward than
blame.
Begin forwarded message:
Pastors and Faith Leaders,
The shootings of two African American men and eleven Police Officers have
sparked a firestorm of debate, fear, angst and rage around the country. This,
among so many other issues, has tapped into the greater narrative of the pain
that faces our communities around the Bay Area.
While this issue affects the entire country, we have a responsibility as Faith
Leaders to stand against injustice and join along with those who mourn.
The many Faith Leaders in Oakland have inspired us and we hope they will
inspire you. They have humbly asked us to join with them in a call to the
United Church in the Bay Area.
• Help us UNIFY by connecting to the pain that our brothers and sisters
of ethnicity face every day.
• UNITY requires righteousness and justice that mirror KINGDOM
principles, not political, economic or social systems that divide us.
• We ask that people of faith do not remain silent as we wrestle with
principalities and powers that manifest themselves in racial prejudice,
systemic evil and violence.
• We ask you to mourn with those who have untimely lost their lives
whether in service or in their daily routines.
As you lead your influence in the next several weeks, consider the following
prayer in your services, written by one of our brothers in Oakland.
• Let us not rush to the language of healing before understanding the
fullness of the injury and the depth of the wound.
• Let us not rush to offer a band-aid, when the gaping wound requires
surgery and complete reconstruction.
• Let us not offer false equivalences, thereby diminishing the
particular pain being felt in a particular circumstance in a particular
historical moment.
• Let us not rush past the loss of a mother's child, a father's
child...someone's beloved son.
• Let us not value property over people; let us not protect material
objects while human lives hang in the balance.
• Let us not value a false peace over righteous justice.
• Let us not be afraid to sit with the ugliness, the messiness and the
pain that is life in community together.
• Let us not offer cliches to the grieving, those whose hearts are
being torn asunder.
Instead.....
• Let us mourn for our fallen police officers and pray for the
protection of all those who have taken that sacred oath.
• Let us mourn black and brown men and women, those killed
extrajudicially.
• Let us together stand in solidarity against violence.
• Let us weep at a criminal justice system, which is neither blind nor
just.
• Let us call for the mourning men and the wailing women, those willing
to rend their garments of privilege and ease and sit in the ashes of this
nation's original sin.
• Let us be silent when we don't know what to say.
• Let us be humble and listen to the pain, rage and grief pouring from
the lips of our neighbors and friends.
• Let us decrease so that our brothers and sisters who live on the
underside of history may increase.
• Let us pray with our eyes open and our feet firmly planted on the
ground.
• Let us listen to the shattering glass and let us smell the purifying
fires, for it is the language of the unheard.
God in your mercy....
Show me my own complicity in injustice.
Convict me for my indifference.
Forgive me when I have remained silent.
Equip me with a zeal for righteousness.
Never let me grow accustomed or acclimated to unrighteousness.
Christ have mercy on us and our fallen world.
join the conversation.....
www.tbc.city and
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Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community
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Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism
Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
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