“For many of us the march from Selma to Montgomery was about protest and prayer. Legs are not lips and walking is not kneeling. And yet our legs uttered songs. Even without words, our march was worship. I felt my legs were praying.” – Rabbi and activist Abraham Joshua Heschel.
Engaging in protest, activism, and civil disobedience is a beautiful pathway for prayer and spiritual practice. To pray is to yearn for the divine presence, to seek inspiration, and to reconcile our will with the Sacred One’s desires. Activism is to yearn for justice, to speak truth to power, to be inspired, and to reconcile the world we have with the world that is possible. The two are intimately linked, yet people can often miss the connection.
When a protest looks angry, people dismiss it as not being spiritual. The legacy of the prophets teaches us that the Holy One is outraged and heartbroken over injustice. Prophetic prayers were full of anger. Jesus flipped tables and chased moneylenders out of the temple. When the world is unjust, anger and disruption are required to bring attention.
Sacred Activism does not dwell in anger. It acknowledges and expresses anger to move us back into covenant and relationship with each other. Our prayers, from Jesus and the prophetic tradition, bring us to reconciliation and transformation. The message is not to watch the world burn; the message is the world is already burning and that we need to make changes before all that is left is ash.
Sacred Activism is the art of dreaming a world of love, justice, and mercy into being and then enacting it in the public square. It shows everyone that despite all the pain and systematic oppression, “The Kingdom of heaven is amongst and within us.” We just need to live into it.
For further reading:
The Radical King by Martin Luther King, Jr. Edited by Cornel West – specifically start with “Pilgrimage to Nonviolence” and “Letter From Birmingham Jail.”