Praying for Peace and Justice on March 17, 2024
The Call of Seekers Church says that we see ourselves as “called into Christ’s ministry
of deliverance from bondage to freedom in every personal and corporate expression.
We recognize the value of each individual and seek to heal any wounds of
discrimination inflicted by our society and church.”
As I take seriously this season’s reflection about the Church’s responsibility to address
White supremacy, I cannot help feeling that while it is essential, it is also insufficient.
Almost from its very beginnings, what eventually came to be known as the Church,
began to differentiate itself from the Jewish people, and in so doing unleashed nearly
2000 years of hatred and lies against the very people from which it sprung. Many of the
texts that were used to create this situation are the very ones that we read in this holy
season of Lent.
If, as our reflection says, the body of Christ by its nature exists to be a healer, then it
bears an extraordinary responsibility to address antisemitism’s history of oppression,
expulsions, pogroms, and genocide and continues to cause Jews to be attacked when
they are at worship, at school, or just walking down the street simply because they are
Jews. Just as this country’s complicated history of White supremacy demands an
honest reckoning, so does the church’s complicated love/hate history with respect to the
Jewish people. If love is simply who we are, the church universal, including this beloved
body we call Seekers, must take seriously the work of repair.
Holy One, help us heal the wounds caused by the systematic antisemitism that is too
often unnoticed in the words and actions of your Holy Body and its individual members.
Amen.
