From Joan Kessler

 

The film Percy (2020) – also released as Percy vs. Goliath – tells the true story of one Saskatchewan farmer’s fight to harvest and save his own canola seed. In the late 1990s, Percy Schmeiser was sued by agricultural giant, Monsanto, for being in possession of its gene-patented canola seed.

 

Schmeiser describes himself, or his vocation, as a saver of seeds, like generations in his family were before him. Unbeknownst to Percy, he is found to be in possession of Monsanto’s seed which he did not pay for and did not acquire the rights to use in his field.

 

This underdog storyline revolves around supporting characters including Percy’s small-town lawyer and an environmentalist who uses Percy’s lawsuit to further her own causes and ambitions. Together, they support Percy and his wife Louise as they make repeated attempts to have the charges overturned in court. Percy raises the much-needed cash to fight the Goliath, Monsanto, by going on a public speaking tour. His journey sees him speak to farmers in India who know the hardship Percy speaks of and the devastating reality of farmers dying by suicide. One Indian farmer gives Percy a tour of his farm operations as a way to thank him for his work. The farmer shares with Percy a passage from the Bhagavad Gita as some good advice: “Don’t measure the result of your actions… measure the effort. What is most important is to do the right thing.”

 

After a failed appeal, the Saskatchewan farmer sees his case heard before the Supreme Court of Canada. The Court finds in favour of Percy and he is not required to pay financial restitution to the seed company. But he is ordered to hand over all his canola seed. The win was a mixed blessing for Percy, a saver of seeds. When asked why he took on the agri-business giant, he replies, “There are a lot of farmers who can’t stand up… I figured I should.”

 

Percy died October 13, 2020, at the age of 89.

 

Explore… 1 Samuel 17: (1a, 4–11, 19–23), 32–49

• What David and Goliath moments in leadership have you faced? Was there a line in the sand that was crossed and that motivated you to stand up for yourself and/or others?
• What toll and personal sacrifice was part of the fight?
• What do underdog stories illuminate for us today about the nature of God?

 

Prayer…

God of the underdog, may we find strength and courage to face our Goliaths with grace, tenacity, and fortitude. We give thanks for those who support our efforts to speak truth to power and to fight the good fight. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Percy vs. Goliath 
• Well-known Sask. farmer, Percy Schmeiser, dies 

From Paul Turley

 

On June 16, 2016, Jo Cox was murdered.

 

Cox was the British Labour Party Member of Parliament for the constituency of Batley and Spen in Yorkshire and was meeting with constituents in Birstall when she was shot three times and stabbed by a white supremist and neo-Nazi.

 

Now, almost five years later, Cox’s sister, Kim Leadbeater, has been chosen by the British Labour Party to run in a by-election for her sister’s old seat. While a date for the by-election has yet to be set, it is likely to be on July 22, five weeks after the fifth anniversary of her sister’s murder.

 

Keir Starmer, the leader of the Labour Party, said, “I am delighted that Kim has been selected to stand in the Batley and Spen by-election. Her roots in the community will make her a fantastic champion for Batley and Spen, tackling the issues local people are raising. Batley and Spen holds an important place in the Labour Party’s heart. And Kim’s work to bring people together, just as her sister Jo Cox did, has inspired us all.”

 

In the years since her sister’s death, Leadbeater, a self-employed well-being coach and personal trainer, has spent much of the time in community work with the establishment and implementation of the Jo Cox Foundation.

 

In an interview with her local paper, Leadbeater said, “I’ve been moved by how many local people from across the area, many Labour Party members but others too, have been in touch asking me if I would stand in the by-election. It has knocked me for six. I would love to represent this extraordinary, vibrant place that I have called home all my life. I am touched that so many people seem to think I would do a good job and I can promise that if they want me I will give my all for Batley and Spen at Westminster.

 

“The truth is, I have never really seen myself as a political animal, but I care deeply about the area where I was born and have always lived, and where the people are second to none. Through all the work I have done with Jo’s foundation over the past five years, I have met so many truly fantastic people from across this area, some of them Labour, many not involved in party politics at all.

 

“Everyone knows I talk a lot, but I also listen a lot…I’ve listened to [people’s] ideas about how we can give Batley and Spen an even brighter future. I won’t pretend to have all the answers, but I will speak up wherever and whenever it takes, so the voice of this constituency is heard loud and clear. Strengthening the community that I love and taking it forward will be a team effort but I’m ready to take a lead in that.”

 

Explore… 1 Samuel 15:34 — 16:13

• The story of Kim Leadbeater has some parallels to the story in our text. Both Leadbeater and Samuel refuse to be thwarted even in the face of the threat of death. And while Samuel cannot imagine God choosing someone who is not already “leadership” material, Leadbeater wants to change what that idea even means. Where can you see these stories and others like them, playing out in your own community?
• What would it mean for us to take seriously this verse: “for the LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart”?

 

Prayer...

God, you see past all the things we see as so important – appearance, speech, education, wealth, and status. Teach us your way, teach us to see as you see, teach us to value not the outward appearance but the heart. Amen.

 

Learn more...

• Jo Cox’s sister chosen as Labour candidate
• Kim Leadbeater to run for Labour nomination 
• Jo Cox Foundation

From Paul Turley

 

Vaccinations for 450 million Indians or the purchase of 10 million oxygen cylinders. These are some of the alternative ways that Rahul Gandhi, President of the Indian National Congress, suggests spending $1.8(US) billion.

 

Instead, the money is being spent on a rebuild of the Indian parliament buildings, including a lavash palace for the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi.

 

When the plan was announced in September 2019, it was criticized by many in India as a vanity project that served no one but Modi. That was before the outbreak of COVID 19, which has seen India suffer more than 23 million cases of the virus and, in the last few weeks, as many as 4,000 deaths a day.

 

While logic, compassion, and simple justice would demand that any national government put all its resources toward stemming the increase in infections and treating the infected, this has not been the approach of the Modi government.

 

Critics of the lack of response of the government have seized on the massive building program, set to redesign the whole of the government area of New Delhi, known as the Central Vista, as a symbol of the government’s waste and inaction.

 

While deaths from the virus continue to climb, the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) has, in the last week, informed a government-appointed expert panel that the project can go ahead.

 

“At a time when the people of the country are struggling with a shortage of oxygen, vaccines, hospital beds, medicines, it would be better if the government deploys all resources in saving the lives of the people rather than building a new house for the PM,” Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra said. “Such expenses send a message to the public that the government’s priorities are elsewhere.”

 

So focused is the Modi government on completing this mammoth project by the end of 2022, it has been declared an essential service. This means that, while other major public works have been halted because of the pandemic, work on the Central Vista must continue.

 

“This is grotesque. No money for oxygen and vaccines as our brothers and sisters die waiting for a hospital bed to be cremated in parking lots BUT Modi will squander public money to feed his megalomaniac vanity. Stop this Crime,” general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) party Sitaram Yechury said.

 

Explore… 1 Samuel 8:4–11, (12–15), 16–20, (11:14–15)

• Given how accurate Samuel’s predictions of how a king would operate were, why do you think the people in our text ignored his warnings?
• According to our text, it is the failure of one form of government that sent the people in search of another. What would it mean for your faith community to engage in a conversation about forms of government? What form of government do you think is most compatible with our faith?

 

Prayer…

God, we look around our world and see too many examples of rulers who operate just as Samuel predicted an Israelite king would. Give us courage to hope and work for a better world, and give us persistence to demand justice for all from our own government. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Thousands dying from Covid while PM Modi “building new house” 
• Congress slams Modi’s obsession with Central Vista project 
• Even before Covid struck, Modi’s $1.8B New Delhi revamp divided opinions 

From Paul Turley

 

It started in Sheikh Jarrah in East Jerusalem. Here a small group of Palestinian families who have being living in the same home, in the same neighbourhood for six decades, are in the international spotlight.

 

The Israeli government, upheld by an Israeli court ruling, have decided that these families must be evicted to make way for Jewish settlers. The Israeli government claims that right because, prior to 1948, when the city of Jerusalem was divided during the Battle for Jerusalem, it had been home to a Jewish population for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years. At the same time, the descendants of Palestinians who fled their homes in 1948 have no legal means to reclaim their families’ land.

 

The Palestinian residents are protesting their forced removal and Israel’s Supreme Court was due to hear an appeal against the evictions a week ago. That is now being rescheduled for the coming weeks. “We will not leave the neighbourhood. We will put up tents outside and live in our tents until we force them to bring us back into our homes,” Reem Hammad, one of the Palestinian residents told reporters this week.

 

But did it really begin in Sheikh Jarrah? Or did it begin almost a month before the first rocket was fired from Gaza, when Israeli police officers entered the Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem and cut the cables to the loudspeakers that broadcast prayers to the faithful? (The Israeli president was delivering a speech at the Western Wall, a sacred Jewish site that lies below the mosque, and Israeli officials were concerned that the prayers would drown it out). Or did it begin a day or two later when Israeli authorities closed off the plaza outside the Damascus Gate, one of the main entrances to the Old City of Jerusalem where young Palestinians typically gather at night during Ramadan, leading to clashes with police. Or did it begin two decades ago with the right-wing Israeli government’s longstanding pattern of forcible displacement and expropriation of Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem and the West Bank? Or did it begin in 1967 when Israel occupied East Jerusalem in the Arab-Israeli war? Or did it begin when the Balfour Declaration was made public in 1917, or the Sykes – Picot Agreement in 1916?

 

While there is little that is simple or easy to understand about the Israeli and Palestinian relationship since the beginning of the 20th century, what is clear is that unless ordinary men and women – and particularly in this case ordinary Palestinian men and women receive justice – this tragedy will not end. And it is not just Sheikh Jarrah where Palestinians are under constant threat of forced evictions by Israel – Silwan, Jaffa, Umm al-Fahm and other places have been occupied, often for centuries, by Palestinians and in all of these places they live in fear of eviction.

 

These evictions, this off-handed, undignified, and humiliating treatment of Palestinian citizens and residents of Israel is illegal in international law and has been condemned by nations around the world. And, as Reem Hammad, told reporters, “We’re not going to give up so easy.”

 

Explore… Isaiah 6:1–8

• The image of God in the temple is an image of untouchable and unapproachable holiness. What do you think the implications are for us that in this vision Isaiah, an ordinary human being, is present?
• If this vision is a glimpse into the very heart of God – into the heart of goodness, justice, and holiness – it is understandable that Isaiah thinks of himself as lost! What does it mean for you and your faith community that, in a very real sense, this vision is not complete until someone appears “who will go for us?”

 

Prayer...

God of all knowing and of all truth, we pray for the world and particularly for our sisters and brothers in Israel and Palestine. We pray for wholeness, for justice, and for true unity where all people know themselves to belong in faith, hope, and love. Amen.

 

Learn more...

• After years of quiet, Israeli-Palestinian conflict exploded. Why now? 
• Not just Sheikh Jarrah 
• The tiny neighbourhood at the centre of a dispute… 

From Fraser Macnaughton

 

Pentecost is often described as the birthday of the church, even though it was originally a Jewish festival. Nowadays, this would be called cultural appropriation, the adoption of an element or elements of one culture or identity by members of another culture or identity. This can be controversial when members of a dominant culture appropriate from minority cultures.

            As Pentecost marked the birth of a movement, so too in our times – movements spring up and evolve but always have to be aware that they may be hijacked by others with ulterior motives.

            In the sphere of the climate change debate, the notion of “greenwash” – using false or misleading information to make a process or product sound more environmentally friendly than it actually is – is well understood. As the world begins to unlock from Covid restrictions, travel companies are keen to have as many of us as possible flying again. Yet it is well known that air travel contributes greatly to carbon emissions, and environmental campaigners are keen to ensure that governments and industry do not lose sight of targets and goals to reduce carbon emissions.

            In the UK, campaigners have pointed out to government that things such as airport expansions do not send a positive signal to the climate crisis debate, especially as the UK is hosting the next major climate conference, COP26, in November. “Greenwash” is a tactic used by many industry and government publicity machines to soothe public anxiety by misrepresenting their operations or policies so that they appear to have good green credentials. The problem is some UK policies are pushing emissions up, not down: massive road building, a scrapped home energy efficiency program, slashed electric car incentives, new oil and gas exploration, a failure to halt airport expansions or block a new coal mine. Oil giant Chevron has plans for carbon capture and storage – a plan that actually only covers less than 1% of its 2019 carbon emissions.

            The celebration of Pentecost as the involvement of the Spirit in God’s creation is perhaps never more pertinent for creation than now.

 

Explore… Acts 2:1–21

• What priority does your faith community give to engagement with the climate change debate?
• To what extent do you think the church is “too heavenly-minded to be of any earthly use”?
• How do you think care of the earth could breath new life into your faith community, especially for younger members?

 

Prayer…

May we not be so caught up in our celebration of Pentecost that we ignore or miss the pressure that creation is under from humanity’s actions. The Spirit calls us to action, each in our own way, to inform ourselves about and to work to maintain the integrity of creation. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Cultural appropriation: What is it and what does it mean? (for young people)
• Campaigners say UK airport expansion must be suspended 

From Fraser Macnaughton

 

The recent death of His Royal Highness Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, husband to Queen Elizabeth II, prompted in many people a realization that for most of us he had been a witness to all our lives, and we to his. Dying just weeks from what would have been his 100^th birthday Prince Philip’s life spanned the ups and downs of our world for the last century. He was witness to and served in the Second World War, the culture revolution of the 1960s, the landing of men on the moon, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the beginning of the Internet and world wide web, the new millennium, and what is now known as the Anthropocene age with its attendant climate emergency and accelerating species extinction.

 

This has probably been no better illustrated than in the acclaimed Netflix series The Crown, an historical drama about the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, created and principally written by Peter Morgan. Over its four series thus far, we witness the unfolding drama of the Queen’s 69-year reign amidst unprecedented social and cultural change. Accomplished actors play the principal parts with incredible empathy. While the focus is naturally on the Queen, the portrayal Prince Philip evolves showing how he put aside any personal ambition in the Royal Navy to become the man “who was destined to walk two steps behind his wife,” which he did for 75 years.

 

Witness Prince Philip’s story and how he spent so many years at the centre of British and global public life gives a peculiar insight into the pressures of monarchy, as he walked alongside the Queen and witnessed the personal and national challenges she faced. While he is perhaps better known for some of his off-the-cuff remarks and inappropriate asides, his faithfulness and sense of duty to the Queen over such a long period of time demonstrates an endurance that we can only admire.

 

Indeed, Prince Philip’s life might be seen by some as a shining example of witnessing on the path of love.

 

Explore… Acts 1:15–17, 21–26

• Who in your life experience has been a witness, an example of walking the Way of Christ?
• When have you been a witness, and example of Christ’s Way for others?
• Where might you see, outside of church or faith community life, witnesses who walk the Way of Christ?

 

Prayer…

May we have eyes to see and ears to hear when people witness to the way of Christ. For the Spirit is not bound by human tradition, or expectation, however we might wish her to be, but is as free as a bird, a dove, a wild goose, going where she will and surprising us in the most unexpected of ways and people. Amen.

 

Watch…

• The Crown 

From Fraser Macnaughton

 

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to threaten to engulf India, reports are coming through that people are hoarding oxygen and vital medicines in homes, creating panic and causing shortages in hospitals that treat critically ill COVID patients. India continues to have record numbers of new cases on a daily basis, as well as set new records for day-to-day fatalities. At the end of April, the country recorded a cumulative 89% increase in COVID deaths compared with the previous seven days. Amidst increasing panic, people who don’t need to be treated with oxygen are holding it in private homes, reducing its availability for critical patients. In the capital New Delhi, more than 20 patients died at one private hospital after oxygen supplies ran low. Shortages have pushed the government to run special trains to send oxygen to the worst-hit cities and some hospitals have been forced to turn away patients. Shortages are so severe that some states deployed armed police to guard supplies, following reports of theft by desperate families.

 

While earlier in the year India’s infection rate seemed to have been brought under control, it is perhaps with hindsight easy to see that the government lifted restrictions too early and allowed events such as cricket matches, election rallies, and religious festivals to take place, all of which led to large gatherings of people in close proximity.

 

Now, as an example of practice how to love God by loving one another (albeit on a somewhat macro level), the European Union, the United State,s and Britain have announced emergency measures to aid India. The European Union has mobilized its Emergency Response Coordination Centre to provide oxygen and medicine to India. Emergency medical supplies are being airlifted in. The U.S. promised to “rapidly deploy” support to India’s healthcare system, while the UK started sending hundreds of oxygen concentrators and ventilators following a request.

 

President Joe Biden said the U.S. was “determined to help India in its time of need,” immediately making available supplies of vaccine-production material, therapeutics, tests, ventilators and protective equipment. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said the EU was “alarmed by the epidemiological situation in India” and was “pooling resources” in support.

 

While some may scoff at these political decisions, it nevertheless shows love in action and a response to the call to love. 

 

EXPLORE

• What are your views on equitable access and distribution of the various COVID vaccines now available, but not to everyone? What is the most loving course of action?
• What ways can your faith community influence local and national governments to do more to love to their neighbours.
• Jesus’ injunction to “love one another” is severely tested in a time of pandemic. How does your faith community “love the other” by example, and exhort others to do the same.

 

Prayer…

Often it is so difficult to imagine loving others especially if we do not know them or they live on the other side of the world. May we learn to broaden our horizons of love and deepen our knowledge of others that we might love them more effectively. Amen

 

Learn more…

• Countries rush to India’s aid 
• Delhi hospitals issue SOS alerts over oxygen supplies 

From Sandra Rooney

 

Sunday, April 18, the New York Times had a special section called “Transformation: How the pandemic birthed an awakening for many Americans.” The focus of the selections chosen were mostly personal introspection that focused on living life in the moment and valuing oneself and those you love. News reports throughout the year have widened the perspective of how people, individually and collectively, have been doing some soul searching, not just because of the pandemic, but also because of the number of unarmed Black men killed by police and the growing Black Lives Matter movement, to say nothing of the growing list of senseless killing.

 

Columnist Charles Blow pulled much of that history together in his April 17 column, starting with the summer of 2014, in Ferguson, Missouri, when Michael Brown, a Black teenager, was killed, until last summer, with the killing George Floyd, and then again more recently Daunte Wright, both in Minneapolis. While every year over that six-year period police shot and killed roughly 1,000 people, Black Americans were killed at a much higher rate than those who were white. Unarmed Black people accounted for about 50 percent of the unarmed Americans killed by police, while making up only about 13 percent of the population. It has been a wake-up call regarding the issue of policing in America. We have also been forced to reexamine the history of slavery in this country.

 

As the country has grappled with systemic racism, laid bare by the pandemic and the increasing number of Blacks being killed in confrontations with the police, President Biden and others in the Congress have begun to seek solutions. A House panel has approved legislation that would create a commission to examine slavery and discrimination from 1619 to the present and recommend ways to educate Americans about its findings and identify appropriate remedies. While the bill is not expected to be approved, as representative Sheila Jackson Lee, Democrat of Texas, said, “We think it will be cleansing for the nation and will be a step moving America forward to see us debate the issue on the floor of the House.”

 

At the same time, President Biden has put addressing racial inequities at the centre of his domestic policy agenda, including billions of dollars in investments in Black farmers, business owners, neighbourhoods, students, and the poor. His jobs and infrastructure proposals would go further by earmarking billions for job training, schools, mortgage support, business loans and more, for under-served communities, including Black Americans. There will certainly be lots of debate and controversy regarding these proposals as well as the idea of reparations, but, as Roy L. Brooks, a law professor at the University of San Diego, has written, we have an “opportunity to bring home to the American people the enormity of the atrocity that was visited upon African-Americans for 250 years of slavery and then another 100 years of Jim Crow.”

 

Explore…John 15:1–8

• What other language might you use in place of “pruning” to describe changes in attitudes or new insights you have experienced over the past year?
• How has your faith community or where you live experienced change that might be described as “pruning” to encourage new growth?
• In what other areas of life today do you see “pruning” happening, or the need for it?

 

Prayer…

Oh, God. Change is hard. May we have the courage to face our fears as new insights and hard lessons offer us the possibility of new life, as individuals, communities, and nations. Amen.

 

 Learn more…

• Rage is the only language I have left 
• House panel advances Bill to study reparations 

From Sandra Rooney

 

A recent online request for donations brought my attention to a story of love being lived out at the Muslim Center in Detroit.  During the month-long observance of Ramadan, Muslims fast from dawn until dusk and the Muslim Center would normally provide a daily community iftar, the meal eaten by Muslims after sunset during Ramadan.  Normally they would also host interfaith iftar throughout the month.  The Center has had to forego those traditions this year to comply with social distancing practices.  This circumstance, however, has only expanded an even more far-reaching ministry.

 

For 25 years the Muslim Center has had a food pantry and soup kitchen, where volunteers pack grab-and-go lunches and hot dinners. They have continued providing meals for those in need, every day of the week.  As Detroit workers faced job losses, income cuts and increased need during the pandemic, the number people coming to the mosque for meals has doubled. The mosque’s board secretary, Davine El-Amin, along with another board member and other volunteers prepare some 200 meals daily. Other volunteers deliver a couple hundred meals each week to households without transportation.  While they had previously served mostly non-Muslim residents of the neighborhood, it’s now about fifty/fifty, she said. 

 

Five thousand miles away, in Rio de Janiero, David Hertz is operating Gastromotiva, a non- profit he founded in 2006.  Since the pandemic exploded in Brazil, Gastromotiva’s food bank has cooked and distributed nearly 100,000 meals for homeless and other vulnerable people, and distributed more than 55 tons of food.  

 

Hertz was born and raised in one of Curitaba, Brazil’s 2000 Jewish families.  His earliest and fondest memories of cooking was time he spent with his grandmother, who was born in Poland. “I always connected to Jewish food,” he said.  After a trip to Israel, working on a kibbutz for about 18 months, he spent several years backpacking around the world, including to India, Vietnam and China, and for the first time witnessed the extreme poverty which much of the world experiences. 

 

Hertz enrolled in Brazil’s first culinary training program when he returned home. He found most of the students came from low-income communities, and he began to recognize how privileged he was.  In 2004 he visited a favela in Sao Paulo, speaking with the people as he walked the neighborhood.  Afterwards, he kept thinking about how many people were living in poverty.  It was then that he realized he could use his skills to help make change.  Instead of pursuing a career in a restaurant, he decided to bring his cooking and managerial skills to as many people as possible.  “I also realized how food can be linked to social justice and social change,” he said.  That was the beginning of Gastromotiva, which now operates in Brazil and Mexico City, in El Salvador and South Africa, through the U.N. World Food Program.  One of the programs offered is Solidarity Kitchens.  Current and former students, many of whom lost their jobs in restaurants and hotels because of the pandemic, have turned their home kitchens into small delivery restaurants.  Local farms and businesses provide financial help, food donations and supplies.  The result, healthy and free meals delivered to the neighborhoods’ most vulnerable residents.

 

Explore. . .John 10:11-18

• How do you think Jesus meant his disciples to understand their mission when he described himself as the good shepherd?

• How do you like to express love to family and friends and how has Covid-related isolation  changed that for you?
• In what ways have you seen love being expressed this past year, within your faith community and beyond?

 

Prayer links. . .

            We pray, O God, that the lessons learned from the hardships of the past year may not be forgotten.  May we find ways to break down the barriers that divide us and find common purpose in alleviating pain and suffering that we may all move forward, faithfully following the one known as the good shepherd.  Amen

 

Learn more. . . 

• Muslim Center in Detroit keeps soup kitchen open during ...
• For this Brazilian chef, stopping world hunger starts in ...

From Sandra Rooney

 

In today’s world, every day the media make us “eye-witnesses” to all manner of tragedies, catastrophes, and disasters everywhere. We look over the shoulder of reporters on the scene. But are we not often more moved when we are eyewitnesses to the compassionate response of others on the scene than the images of devastation and pain? Here is such a story, brought to us by John Yang on PBS NewsHour.

 

President Biden has set high expectations for public vaccinations in the United States. While more than one in five Americans has received at least one dose of a COVID vaccine, in many parts of the country, people who are eligible are still struggling to get vaccinated. Volunteers are stepping in to help.

 

There’s Mansi Shah. She works full time but makes calls and scours the Internet early in the morning and late at night, when appointment spots are made available. “If I’m not working, if I’m not sleeping, I’m doing this,” she says. She started by helping her parents. Her mother doesn’t speak English and she describes her dad as “not the most tech-savvy.” Now she’s helping complete strangers. She says it’s their stories that touched her. Like Harriet, 93 years old and desperately needing help to get an appointment. Often when Shah is calling, the response is “no appointments, totally booked,” even for seniors over 65. But she persists.

 

It’s estimated that some 25 million Americans don’t have Internet access for online registration. That’s where Shah and other volunteers come in. She says stories like Harriet’s are what keep her up late at night and wake her in the morning in time to catch appointment slots as they become available.

 

Then there’s Michaelene Carlton, mother of two, currently on disability because she is still struggling with her COVID symptoms a year later – symptoms that include daily headaches, heart palpitations, and shortness of breath. She has free time now due to those complications and says she doesn’t want others to have to experience what she has. “This is a way that I can help others,” she says.

 

Fifteen-year-old Elisabeth Decker is part of a group of ninth graders who have secured more than 600 appointments for New Jersey residents. They use social media, Facebook groups, Twitter drops, anywhere that offers advice, to search for drops, the times when appointments become available. “It just takes time. They do go out quickly. It’s frustrating, but it’s so rewarding in the end,” she says.

 

Mark Meeks, pastor of City Church of Sacramento, has teamed up with UC Davis Health to get people vaccinated. Members are going person-to-person to find folks who need help. His church hosts a weekly vaccination clinic. “People feel overwhelmed with the task, and they don’t know where to go.” No one knows when this is going to end, he says, so he just keeps telling his faith community they need to stay faithful to the task.

 

Explore… Luke 24:36b–48

• How did the disciples understand their call, in response to feeling Jesus’ presence with them?
• When have you had an encounter that moved you to action?
• When have you felt the need to take on what seemed like an impossible task? What about your faith community?

 

Prayer…

Open our eyes and our hearts both to see and respond in the face of pain, loss, and injustice. May we be not merely followers, but those who step up to offer compassion and to do the hard work of seeking justice. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Shot chasers: Volunteers help bridge America’s vaccine gap 

From Joan Kessler

 

As one who has not owned a television for some time, I have come to rely on radio broadcasts to keep me up to date on current events around the world. There is something about sitting down to the table at suppertime and listening to CBC Radio’s World Report. I rely on my hearing to evoke images in my mind’s eye as to what scene is being reported on from around the globe. It has become for me an embodied experience each evening. It has also shown me that some means of communicating, such as radio, have not gone out of fashion.

 

Tofino is a district located on the west coast of Vancouver Island and is the official western terminus for the TransCanada Highway. With a population of approximately 1,900 people, it is an area famous for surfing and natural wonders. In June of last year, a local couple poured their life’s savings into the purchase of Tuff City Radio, a community radio station that broadcasts to Tofino, Ucluelet, and six surrounding First Nations communities. But with the pandemic came an economic downturn, tourists stayed home, and the small community came to rely on their local radio station for information and connection. Local leader and BC’s Minister of Municipal Affairs, Josie Osborne, sees community radio as an opportunity for residents to participate. There is also an authenticity to radio that is hard to replicate. Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, websites and emails are means of disseminating information in a digital age, but according to Osborne, “nothing gets into people’s homes the way radio does.”

 

Tuff City Radio used the lockdown as an opportunity to broadcast community events. Cancelled concerts found a new venue on the airwaves. As one program host noted, “All of a sudden, everyone was tuning in at certain time of the day. In a small community like this, the radio is something we can all share.”

 

Explore… Acts 4:32–35

• In this second COVID season of Easter, how are we maintaining connection to our congregations and wider community?
• What resources do we have to share to meet the needs of others and build community?

 

Prayer…

God of community, may compassion move us to share from our abundance rather than a sense of scarcity, that all may have enough. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Covid-19 created the radio star 

From Joan Kessler

 

Vaccination appointments are the hot topic of conversation of late in my socially distant, virtually online community of faith. One person told me about being in an auditorium where visitors were entertained with Mr. Bean movies and an upbeat atmosphere prevailed as folks waited their turn to receive the jab.

 

The vaccine rollout in Canada has been met with mixed reviews. Some are elated to have received the shot and to start resuming pre-COVID activities; others are indifferent. The rollout has been described as sluggish and some have wondered why we are so far behind our neighbors to the south, where U.S. President Joe Biden announced the achievement of his goal of delivering 100 million shots before his 100-day deadline. For some, the reality that the vaccines do not eliminate the presence of COVID and its variants feels anti-climatic. Normalcy and the ability to return to activities we previously enjoyed may still be months away. The end is not in sight for many. As one gentleman expressed following his vaccination, “It is not going to change anyone’s life right away… I can’t take off my mask right now and talk to you.”

 

If you are like me, you may be again planning online Holy Week and Easter services. People are getting anxious around returning to buildings and social gatherings – some can’t wait and others are in no hurry. In John 20, we read of Mary’s encounter with an empty tomb and a conversation with the resurrected Jesus. We can only imagine the mixed feelings she must have experienced: confusion, uncertainty, disbelief, joy, and elation. May our Holy Week and Easter preparations bring us a renewed sense of the mystery of this holy time. On this second Easter in the midst of a pandemic, we acknowledge we still live in a COVID world.

 

Exploring… John 20:1-18

• What are people talking about this Holy Week? Are there mixed emotions surrounding this year’s Easter celebrations?
• Where does the message of Easter greet us as we prepare to celebrate another Easter together, apart?

 

Prayer…

As we hold the tension of uncertainty, of the now and not yet, with the hope of putting COVID behind us, steady us, Easter God. Whatever feelings we are experiencing this Holy Week, may we meet the joy of Easter anew. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Mixed emotions felt as Canadians receive their jab 

From Joan Kessler

 

Earlier this month, many watched as Oprah sat down with Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, and Prince Harry for their tell-all interview. The couple announced last year their intentions to leave the royal family and to live life in the private sector in America. What was revealed to Oprah and to the world were the couple’s reasons behind the split. Shocking allegations of racism were waged against Meghan as a person of colour. A “senior member of the royal family” made the disparaging comment regarding the skin colour of Meghan and Harry’s unborn child (Archie). Meghan also shared the difficulties she experienced integrating into royal life and the toll it has taken on her mental health.

 

In the days and weeks that have followed, media outlets have weighed in and pondered what exactly was accomplished in this latest royal rumble. Since the person who made the racist comment about their child’s skin colour was never named, accountability is difficult. The royal family, aka The Firm, has been largely silent other than to issue a statement acknowledging they heard what was said and are saddened by the couple’s experiences. Prince William, when confronted by media with the allegation, responded, “We’re very much not a racist family.” In the interview, Prince Harry stated he would not be sharing the source of the racist comment, which leaves us with the distinct impression such a revelation would do irreparable damage to the House of Windsor. But Harry holds on to the hope that “time will heal” this broken relationship.

 

Status quo is any ideology that preserves a current state of affairs. The presence of the “other” gives us a new perspective on things we have been unwilling to see, on long-held beliefs we have been unwilling to change. Nobody likes an outsider who questions why things are as they are. As we prepare for Palm Sunday and Jesus’ humble entry into Jerusalem, let us confront and protest the status quo. May we use this Palm Sunday as a reminder of the structures that keep power in the hands of the few at the top, line pockets, and oppress those who scrape by and have learned to tolerate intolerance. May our path this Holy Week continue the dialogue, and the work of confronting our status quo.

 

Exploring…Mark 11:1–11

• What status quo needs to be addressed and even dismantled?
• How does remembering Jesus’ passion this coming week parallel the collision course our world is experiencing with respect to racism?

 

Prayer…

May we find courage, Holy One, to speak up when we witness racism and question and challenge the structures that enable it. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• The Meghan and Harry interview 
• The Meghan and Harry interview: Beyond the turmoil 

From Fraser Macnaughton

 

For several years, in many countries across the world, there has been a perception that democracy has been under attack from populist and authoritarian governments. This has been manifested in many different ways. There is a widespread feeling that the covenant between a people and a government who have been democratically elected by the people to rule in their stead (the basis of democracy) has been dramatically changed.

 

One recent example of this in the UK has been the newly proposed Police, Crime, Security and Courts bill. In particular, it has emerged that some sections of the bill seek to restrict the democratic right of protest. Justice secretary Robert Buckland did not in any way seek to deny that the government had protest groups such as Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter in their sights when drawing up those parts of the Bill. Mr. Buckland claimed that the bill sections were needed because of the “huge inconvenience to people going about their lawful business.”

 

This comes on the back of comments made by the Home Secretary Priti Patel, who complained that the Black Lives Matter protests which swept the U.S., the UK, and many other parts of the world last summer were “dreadful.” Those who campaign to maintain what they see as basic democratic rights to free speech and lawful assembly, as well as the right to protest, are alarmed at the inclusion of measures such as the requirement to notify police and to protest quietly without inconveniencing Parliament.

 

Across many less democratic countries, the first things shut down – often brutally by riot police or the military – are protests, demonstrations, and marches. In the UK, some aspects of this proposed bill are being viewed as the thin end of the wedge, steering a course that will inevitably stifle democracy. All this comes at a particularly sensitive time as the issues of climate change and racism put the government at odds with large parts of the population sympathetic to the issues, and which, for many Christians, go indeed to the heart of God.

 

Explore… Jeremiah 31:31–34

• What are the causes your faith community are most passionate about?
• If justice is at the heart of God’s promises, how does your faith community engage with issues such as racism and climate change?
• What are some of the ways you discern a breakdown of the covenant between government and people?
• Where do you see the latter days of Jeremiah in your community or country?

 

Prayer…

May we remain steadfast in the way of Christ, trusting in the divine promises, as we engage the world with Jesus’ message of justice and inclusion for all, and as we seek to respect all of creation. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• New crack down on Extinction Rebellion and Black Live Matter 

From Fraser Macnaughton

 

An untold number of column inches have been written about the mental health challenges among young people in the wake of the continuing Covid pandemic, as people have begun to better understand its debilitating effects on mental health. Coupled with the stigma mental health conditions still carry, and an enduring sense of machismo in many young men (for whom “I’m fine” is the go-to response), the pandemic has exposed unparalleled levels of stress and anxiety in younger age groups. One new study based in the UK suggests that as many as one in four young people feel they have been “unable to cope with life” since the start of the pandemic, with the unemployed more likely to feel anxious and depressed. Half of 16- to 25-year-olds said their mental health has worsened since the start of the pandemic. Meanwhile, with the imminent re-opening of schools to some pupils, research is also emerging that shows significant increases in stress levels among children. Some charitable mental health services said they have seen a 70% rise in demand for services over the past three months. According to some research, some 1.5 million children under 18 will either need new or additional mental health support as a result of the different pressures caused by the pandemic. Of these cases, a third will involve children who were previously healthy and who displayed no psychiatric-related illnesses before the pandemic. Eating disorders, suicidal thoughts, isolation, and anxiety are some of the indicators researchers uncovered, and all of these appear at higher rates among children who live in poverty.

 

Explore…Psalm 107:1–3, 17–22

• How can your community engage better with young people with potential and real mental health issues?
• How hard do you think it is for parents and families of young people suffering mental health issues to “choose to give thanks”?
• When lockdown restrictions make it difficult to make any sort of choices, how can your faith community be a beacon of gratitude?

 

Prayer…

In our sophisticated world we have no time for the biblical idea of lament. And yet the Psalms are full of lament as a legitimate response to suffering. May we be bold enough to resurrect lament and stand beside and lament with those who currently suffer more than we do. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Doctors fear new child mental health crisis made worse by COVID

From Fraser Macnaughton

 

One of the interesting developments in the theological world is what has been described as “creation spirituality,” and is revisiting or rediscovering something the psalmist clearly had a very good grasp of when Psalm 19 was written thousands of years ago. As science reaches the furthest boundaries of the known universe and discovers hitherto unknown wonders, the language of science has changed to include what would reasonably be called much more religious or spiritual language.

 

Since “a picture paints a thousand words,” take a moment to view this video, which gives us a wonderful insight into a reality the psalmist could only begin to imagine, and which, if we are honest, is really beyond our comprehension.

 

Click here, or on the photo to watch the video.

 

  

This short film takes us on a journey of discovery, starting from one human being in a particular moment in space and time on earth, panning out to the farthest reaches of time and space of the universe, before zooming back in not only to the microscopic but to the very atoms that make up our bodies. Such is the scale of the magnificence and awe of the universe, of the creation, which can lead us down ever-new paths in our understanding of the divine.

 

Perhaps the biggest impression that is made is just how small we are in the grand scheme of things as the camera pans out to the edge of the universe. Similarly, as the camera goes as far within us as it can, it also shows us how “fearfully and wonderfully we are made.”

 

The film also portrays the fact the while each person is unique, we are all inextricably linked to one another and further, interconnected do all other aspects of life in the cosmos. This should give us pause for a moment, cause to put all our human bickering, disagreements, and attitudes of superiority or difference into a wider perspective. That goes as much for religious faith and tradition as for our politics, economics, and social structures.

 

For some people within various religious traditions including Christianity, creation is synonymous with God. Perhaps this little film can give us a perspective on that viewpoint which help us we develop faithful ways of relating to God and living together.

 

Explore… Psalm 19

• How might your faith community can engage with the creation around it?
• To what extent do you think the natural world can be a point of engagement for faith groups with the wider community?
• In what activities does your faith community involve itself in connection with the natural world?
• In what ways can your faith group engage in a contemporary way with the wisdom of the psalmist?

 

Prayer…

May our community be a mirror of the interconnectedness and interdependency of all living things, from the microscopic to the gigantic, that we may be effective witnesses to Jesus’ dream “that they all be one.” Amen.

From Paul Turley

 

Alexei Navalny is in jail.

 

He was sentenced last week by a Moscow court to serve a three-year sentence for allegedly breaching the terms of what had formally been a suspended sentence.

 

The sentence came as no surprise to Navalny or his supporters. A prominent opposition leader in Russia, leader of the Russia of the Future party, lawyer and anti-corruption activist, Navalny had been in detention since returning to the country a little more than a month ago. Navalny had been in Germany where he was treated for a near-fatal nerve agent attack on him in August of 2020. Navalny blames Russian President Vladimir Putin for the attack and, in court, called Putin a “poisoner.” He also rejects his latest arrest and sentencing as “fabricated.”

 

Addressing the court before the sentencing, Mr. Navalny said the case was being used to frighten the opposition: “This is how it works: they send one to jail to intimidate millions.” 

 

Thousands of Russian citizens have taken to the streets in protest against this latest crackdown by the Russian government with upwards of 4,000 people being arrested at protests last week.

 

Last week, our scripture reading was a promise encompassing the whole world. Today’s reading is a promise encompassing, in the first instance, the lives of two people. The promise of a new life and a new world rests in Abram and Sarai. In Russia, for this moment, the promise of a new life and new world seems to be contained in the life and fortunes of Alexei Navalny and his courageous stand.

 

While there are questions around Navalny’s nationalism and some of his party’s statements that seem to border on racism, and while his view on the Crimea and its status as part of Ukraine are at best ambivalent, there is no doubt that Navalny is a lightning rod for government attacks and a rallying point for disgruntled Russians.

 

As Garry Kasparov, the former world chess champion said in an opinion piece, “Navalny knew what awaited him in Russia before he left Berlin, and yet he chose to return. He knows he can be killed at any time, but felt he had no choice but to make a stand with the only weapons he has left, his body and his spirit. After his sentence was read, he drew a heart to his wife, Yulia, on the glass of his cage and shouted, ‘Don’t worry. Everything will be OK.’”

 

While, as of this writing, everything for Navalny seems far from okay, the promise of a new Russia, which he currently embodies, is what many hope will endure and come to fruition.

 

Explore… Genesis 17:1–7, 15–16

• In what ways can we, in reading the story of Sarah and Abraham, see them as exemplars or signs of the wider promise of God to a whole people?
• What do you think it means that Sarai and Abram are given new names derived from their original names?
• How do you understand the promise to Abraham and Sarah impacting in your life today?

 

Prayer…

God, promises and dashed promises litter our personal and collective histories. Help us to see clearly your promise of personal and community justice and peace and to live in hope and expectation for your kingdom present and still arriving. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Putin critic Navalny jailed in Russia 

• Alexei Navalny: Russia’s vociferous Putin critic 

• The people who let Putin get away with persecuting Navalny 

From Paul Turley

 

Great promises have been made by the world community since the end of the Second World War. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees in 1951, the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989, the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992, The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007 and now, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which came into force on January 22, 2021.

 

With the world consumed with COVID and COVID news, some of us might have missed this new promise that the international community has made to safeguard our future.

 

In 2017, according to the United Nations Office of Disarmament Affairs, the UN General Assembly convened, “a conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination.”

 

ICAN, the organization and campaign focused on prohibiting and eliminating nuclear weapons – and the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize winner – said, in response to the entry into force (the official designation of the enacting of the treaty), that this is, “the first treaty to comprehensively ban nuclear weapons and provide a pathway for all nations to outlaw and eliminate nuclear weapons. It is a crucial piece of international law that puts nuclear weapons in the same illegal category as biological weapons, chemical weapons, anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions.”

 

Article one of the treaty lists the treaty’s prohibitions:

Each State Party undertakes never under any circumstances to:

(a) Develop, test, produce, manufacture, otherwise acquire, possess or stockpile nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices;

(b) Transfer to any recipient whatsoever nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices or control over such weapons or explosive devices directly or indirectly;

(c) Receive the transfer of or control over nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices directly or indirectly;

(d) Use or threaten to use nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices;

(e) Assist, encourage or induce, in any way, anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State Party under this Treaty;

(f) Seek or receive any assistance, in any way, from anyone to engage in any activity prohibited to a State Party under this Treaty;

(g) Allow any stationing, installation or deployment of any nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices in its territory or at any place under its jurisdiction or control.

 

While the entry into force for this new treaty is a promise in the right direction for the international community, there is still some distance to go. The major nuclear powers – the USA, the UK, France, and Russia are yet to sign.

 

Explore…Genesis 9:8–17

• How do you think the international promise of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons compares to the divine international promise in our text?
• The promise that God makes in this story is a promise made to humanity and “every living creature,” between God and the earth. What might this mean for us today?
• Why do you think, in the ancient time from which this story comes, God needs to be remined of God’s covenant with the earth by means of a bow?

 

Prayer…

God of the earth, the sky, and all they contain, remind us today that we are all your creation, that we all come from your life and love. Help us to know our place and our role in the cosmos and the live rejoicing on your good earth. Amen.

 

Read more...

• ICAN: The treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons 
• U.N.: Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons 
• Global nuclear weapons ban begins – without the world’s nuclear powers 

From Paul Turley

In episode one of the television drama World on Fire (BBC, PBS, SBS), the German army invades Poland, and the lives of our main characters are changed forever. 

Rather than follow the movements of troops, great battles, or the actions of those in power, this television series follows the lives of ordinary people who try to find ways to live in a world on fire.

While we, the viewers, know the horror and the devastation on its way in what will become the Second World War, our main characters must react moment by moment with very little information about what is happening around them, and even less about what will happen next. Their desire for things to be as they have been is palpable. Their determination to live as they have lived in hopes that it will all go away, that it is all just a misstep or mistake, drives them all in the beginning. Douglas, a World War I veteran who suffers from shellshock, campaigns for peace and conscientious objection out of his own experiences of war. Webster, an American surgeon living and working in Paris, can’t compute that the life that he loves (and the man that he is falling in love with) can be under threat from military and political events nearly 2000 kilometres away. Kasia, a Polish waitress in Warsaw, continues to arrive at work and serve customers at her café even as her father and brother leave the city to fight in the defence of the free city of Danzig and when most of her customers are now Nazi officers.

Gradually, in different ways our main characters, adjust to their new reality. Or, at least, they operate in the new and shifting reality even if, at times, their desire for what is now gone has them doing things and saying things that no longer fit in the new world. Douglas continues to try to sell “Peace News” at the factory gates in Manchester, as if the dangers of the Second World War can be responded to in the way Douglas feels the Great War should have been responded too. Webster sits on the banks of the Seine river in Paris with his lover and wishes it could always be like this, while the Nazis are pushing their way through Belgium on their way west toward France. Kasia tries to ignore the lewd and racist comments of her Nazi customers.

Is the Transfiguration this kind of world changing event for those involved? One of the structures proposed for Mark’s gospel has this event as the central element of the whole text. It is from this point that everything changes. Either side of our text, Jesus speaks about his death and his resurrection. The first time he does so, Peter takes him aside and “rebukes him” (8:32). You rebuke someone when you are certain of the way things are and the way things are supposed to work; you rebuke from certainty. The second time Jesus speaks of death and resurrection, in chapter nine, Peter and the other disciples say nothing. The text says that “they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him.” They no longer lived in certainty. What they had known about the world and how it should work was now obsolete. The transfiguration had changed everything. 

Even though we read the Transfiguration as a glorious and literally luminous event, is it too much of a stretch to compare it also to Hitler’s attack on Warsaw in September 1939? That event, as World on Fire dramatizes, made the world a strange and dangerous place for each character. The Transfiguration, for all its glory, makes the world, for the disciple and for Jesus as they move toward Jerusalem, a strange and dangerous place.

Explore…Mark 9:2–9

• Why do you think Peter, after experiencing the Transfiguration, responds to Jesus by saying, “Rabbi, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings”?
• Why do you think Jesus “ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen”?

Prayer…
God of all, we long for certainty but live in a world where few things are certain. Help us experience the certainty of your love and presence, and to have the courage to live in your love in a world of change and danger. Amen.

Learn more…

• World on Fire (BBC) 
• World on Fire (PBS): cast, air date, trailer and more 
• Meet the women fighting on all front in World on Fire (SBS)

From Sandra Rooney

 

In February, the U.S. observes Black History Month, a time to celebrate achievements, but also a time to remember. At the memorial service the evening before President Biden’s inauguration, he stressed that “to heal, we must remember.” He was referring specifically to remembering those who had died from the COVID-19 virus this past year, but he also talked throughout his campaign about “healing the soul of America.” Black scholars, historians, and clergy have been reminding us that we cannot heal our society’s longstanding ills without first remembering. To start, we must remember the tragic 400+ year-old legacy of slavery in this country, and elsewhere. Add to that the legacy of the abhorrent treatment of native peoples in the U.S., Canada, and Australia. Indeed, it seems that the sins of the fathers have passed on to our sons and daughters.

 

Analysis of the remarks during and after Biden’s inauguration and the articulation of the challenges facing the new administration continue. It is often noted that if Biden’s choices for his cabinet and other senior officials are approved, many will be firsts – first Black, Latino, Native American, female, openly gay and transgender – making his cabinet the most representative in American history. We celebrate firsts because they signal progress and representation for people who have not had power in the past. Role models are important but political scientists remind us that for true change you have to change structures at all levels.

 

Isabel Wilkerson, author of Caste, The Origins of Our Discontents, noted in a recent interview that after the January 6 riot at the Capitol Building, after everyone else had left the scene, the cleaning crew came in, most of them Black, “the people assigned to the subordinated caste for 400 years, since before there was the United States.” To heal the soul of America requires first that we recognize the whole of our history and remember. Wilkerson added, “There’s no single pill that you can take for something that is this longstanding. It’s on the systems level at multiple levels. It’s economic. It’s social. It’s political. It’s labor. And it’s employment. It’s health care system, criminal justice, education, law enforcement. It’s everything.”

 

The United Church of Christ in the U.S. is urging congregations to use a new adult curriculum, “White Privilege: Let’s Talk,” designed “to invite church members to engage in safe, meaningful, substantive, and bold conversations on race.”

 

Explore…Mark 1:29–39

• What did the “miracles” described in Mark’s gospel mean for the lives of those he “healed”?
• What are the ills that need healing where you live?
• What remembering needs to happen?
• What is your nation doing to right wrongs of the past to promote healing?
• In what way might you share in such remembering and healing?
• What is your faith community doing to contribute to the healing needed today?

 

Prayer…

Merciful Creator, in the words of an old Methodist hymn, “Where cross the crowded ways of life, where sound the cries of clan and race, above the noise of selfish strife,” may we hear your voice of grace, and be strengthened to do the hard work of remembering and responding. Amen.

 

Learn more…

• Biden at ceremony for coronavirus victims says, “To heal we must…” 
• Why Kamala Harris and “Firsts” matter, and where they fall short 
• America’s caste system is 400 years old. That doesn’t change overnight 
• White privilege: Let’s talk – a resource for transformational…