The Occupy Church

“We live in a world that is divided between ideological poles: Left and right, liberal and conservative, red states and blue states. This dynamic plays out not only in popular culture, but also within the Church. Our congregations endure vicious arguments over hot button issues like gay marriage, the ministry of women and abortion – [...]

…Is this what Lewis, Nash, Carmichael and other civil rights activists thought they were putting their lives on the line for? De facto segregation in the nation’s capital? A city divided by enormous gaps in wealth and privilege, where most of its black residents are consigned to one isolated quarter of the District? Seeing the dynamics at [...]

“In liberal circles, we always put the guilt on systems, providing all of those involved with a convenient out. Yes, the systems are powerful, but the only way we will be able to end this powerful injustice is if we have courage to take responsibility before God for our actions within unjust institutions. If we [...]

“The poet Ezra Pound liked to say that the notion that “money is energy” constituted a “satanic transubstantiation” because it falsified the facts about where energy really exists: in nature, in people, and in the divine.”

Black evangelicals have a long history of interaction with oppressive systems and structures. When African Americans read the Bible, they see the more than 2,000 passages of Scripture about God’s hatred for poverty and oppression. They see God’s desire for systems and structures to be blessings to all of humanity — not a curse to [...]

As a Christian, my ultimate desire is to see all people living in the peace and beauty of God’s power. I want to see the fearless love and radical justice of Jesus fill the world and transform our whole society. Yet, I recognize that this kind of total transformation comes through small acts of practical [...]

“The relationship between Occupy movement and sympathetic Christians dates back to just about a week before the first sleeping bags hit the ground at Zuccotti Park in New York City. A small group of students from Harvard Divinity School and a few members of the Christian organization The Crossing decided to take part in the [...]

Shannon from the Occupy Church writes on Our Daily Thread, “But as the Occupy movement grew, I found my limbs waking up. I began to feel my fingers and toes. Muscle memories long forgotten returned. And soon I was walking the streets in protest as well. This was a moment of healing for me, of [...]

“…I believe that the Reformed tra­di­tion shoves us rudely toward the affir­ma­tion that #OWS is where God is speak­ing to the church in this time and place. This cer­tainly does not mean that the church must now pro­claim the gospel of #OWS. Indeed, that would be a very seri­ous mis­take. But #OWS reminds the church [...]