Love in a Dangerous Time Russ Jennings

My guest is Sunita Viswanath. She is a life-long organizer and activist, a founder of a nation-wide activist organization, and a Hindu. In New York City, you’ll always see Sunita in the demonstrations for immigration right’s, Black Lives Matter, & against climate change. And she is also a member of the Strategy Team for the Micah Institute (a multi-faith justice coalition). This year, she received the Micah Spirit award for her work in New York City.

Much of her work is among the Hindu community – mostly concerning the caste system. As a founder of Sadhana, a US-wide progressive Hindu organization, she and fellow members are involved in Hindu community and faith-based justice work in many US cities.

Our conversation went deep into the difficulty of organizing as a Hindu in the broad coalitions of progressive activism in the US and of organizing among Hindus in the US to participate in broader struggles here, and to begin the process of eliminating the caste system, which brands certain people as Dalits, or “untouchables”. This social system, which is practiced throughout India and some other Hindu areas, also labels some people as Brahmans, the highest caste, and everything in between. All of this leads to generational poverty on a mass scale in India.

Follow Us

——————————————————–

A month ago, I was in the San Francisco Bay Area for my sort-of-annual visit to the place where I lived for 37 years, to connect with lots of old friends. As usual, I attended the church where I had been a member for a long time before leaving for New York City, First Congregational Church of Oakland.  You may have seen an article about them in the Washington Post. My old congregation is, as we speak, going through the soul searching and preparation to wean themselves from using the police to solve problems that may come up in the building – or as my guest on this program, Nichola Torbett puts it, “We will no longer outsource our violence.”

Lately, it seems that often when people call for police help to take care of someone who’s mental state has made them belligerent, or who refuses to leave, or is simply an African American male, someone winds up

dead. This congregation realized that if they were going to not be complicit, they’d have to change their relationship to violence and to the police. We’ll hear about their process in reaching these decisions and how they are being implemented

Nichola Torbett is a lay leader in this lay-led United Church of Christ church. She’s part of the worship team and does spiritual development work. Up until a few years ago, she led Seminary of the Street, which offered lay people a chance to study and experiment with integrating a gospel of justice into their lives.

Be sure to go to LoveInADangerousTime.net, and check the show notes to find the news stories about First Congo and links to books and organizations that are mentioned in the interview.

So let’s go to Oakland, California, the town of my roots, for this very interesting talk with Nichola Torbett.

———————————-

First Congo’s Holy Week Declaration:

NO MORE STATE-SPONSORED CRUCIFIXIONS IN THE NAME OF “SAFETY”

SURJ Faith Campaign inviting congregations to think about their relationship to policing. Here’s the link to that campaign landing page: http://www.showingupforracialjustice.org/community-safety-campaign.html

Press Articles: Washington Post, SF Chronicle

SeminaryoftheStreet.org

Follow Us

——————————————————————————

All Rights for All, Without Boarders

Last week, the Trump administration launched what they call a “deterrents” program, on the Mexican board, of separating children from their families as

they process hopeful immigrants attempting to enter the United States. The entire world was shocked that this brutality was happening. Hundreds of angry denunciations came from every corner of our culture.

On Monday, June 18, 2018, (one week ago today) a large number of theologians and religious educators came together to write a powerful document spelling out the appalling immorality of this program and the “family incarceration” plan that eventually replaced it. You can read it, download it and send it to everyone you know online. The address is in the shownotes for this episode at LoveInADangerousTime.net.

The title is All Rights for All, Without Boarders. This four paragraph statement was released on Thursday, June 21, in both English & Spanish.

On this episode, we’ll talk with three people who’s hard work went into the creation of this important piece. It not only explains the theological understanding of how these attacks on families are immoral, but also encourages people of faith to join the fight to stop them.

 

My three guests are:

Rev. Dr. Danielle Tumminio, Seminary of the Southwest, Austin

Rev. Dr. Miguel de la Torre, Ilif School of Theology, Denver

and Camilo Pérez Bustillo, Hope Boarder Institute, El Paso

We’ll talk about the document itself and the issues that it raises, and take a look at how the Lovers, and everyone else, can use it to help carry on the fight for justice.

Be sure to look at the show notes at Love in a Dangerous Time.NET. There you’ll be able to click the statement and find several related links.

LINKS

All Rights for All, Without Boarders: https://action.groundswell-mvmt.org/petitions/all-rights-for-all-without-borders

Tales of Hope and Terror (film by Miguel de la Torre): https://www.trailsofhopeandterrorthemovie.com/

1994 Boarder Patrol Strategic Plan:  https://www.hsdl.org/?abstract&did=721845

Trump’s executive order:  https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/affording-congress-opportunity-address-family-separation/

Hope Boarder Institute – https://www.hopeborder.org

Follow Us

 

It’s still pretty early in the year and all over the country we’re seeing mayors and governors (and even the president) deliver very official “State of” speeches that take a look at the accomplishments of the past year and spell out what the major tasks of the new year will be. Here in New York City, our mayor, Bill De Blasio, delivered his – progressive sounding – speech on February 13. Two days later, New York’s faith community, led by the Micah Institute, delivered it’s own take on the situation, calling it the “Spirit of the City.”

This is a great example of people of faith stepping up and offering leadership on several fronts in the struggle to make our city a safe and just place. So you may want to take some notes here and try to pull this together in your city. It’s a good time for people of faith to gather together some power to help straighten out the mess we’re slogging around in today.

 

Read and download the “Spirit of the City” document at: www.MicahSpirit.weebly.com

Follow Us

Have you ever felt that somehow you personally were responsible for repairing this crazy world we live it. That this world where kids are murdered in their school, where Nazis march around chanting hateful slogans, in this world where millions of refugees are refused help when they flee for their lives and the lives of their families, where armed representatives of the state are free to murder people of color whenever it pops into their mind to do that? What is your/my responsibility in those situations?

Today I talk with my good friend, Diane Steinman who is one of the most committed workers for justice in our city of New York. Most of her always-energetic activism is focused on immigration issues, but she’s always there. It’s just who she is.

As a Jew, she grew up with the idea of Tikkun Olam, or “Repair the World.” It’s part of her religion to see the repair of the world to be a basic responsibility of life. Maybe we Christians could learn a little from that. Do you think?

I work with Diane in the Micah Institute, here in New York, where she heads two committees. She is also the director of the New York State Interfaith Network for Immigration Reform, and an activist in the New Sanctuary Coalition of New York.

Diane and I talked about what it means to commit to a life of struggling for justice, and how it fits into her religious view of life.

– – – – LINKS: – – – – –

The Micah Institute recently presented the “Spirit of the City” address, to compliment the mayor’s State of the City – www.MicahSpirit.weebly.com

A very active and effective group doing work to support imigrants in NYCA is – www.NewSancturaryNYC.org

A really great Jewish magazine, Tikkun, publishes articles by Jews, Christians, Muslims and Buddhists that offer insight into the repair work that we need to do in these times. – www.tikkun.org

Follow Us

I hope that everyone has listened, at least once, to last week’s program with historian and author, Dr. Nancy MacLean on her very important book, DEMOCRACY IN CHAINS: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America (episode 101). It’s a very scary book about the real world and I think it opens up a view to Christians as to what our “job” is in these dangerous times. Seriously, if you haven’t heard the episode, please go back and listen to it now.

Then, I invite you to return to the comments section on the page at LoveInADangerousTime.net, or in our Love in a Dangerous Time Community page on Facebook, and write your comments about the book, the subject matter, your reaction, or what you think will be the impact on your faith walk.

Speaking of “Faith Walks,” today’s guest walked with her faith through twenty years as a New York cop, and is now a strong supporter of Black Lives Matter. This was the subject of an earlier episode that we did together (episode 84).  And after she retired from the NYPD, she went back to school (Union Seminary) and came out as a professor of theology, who teaches in the “majority world,” (i.e. not in the US or Europe).

The Rev. Karyn Carlo, PhD is someone I’ve been friends with for over ten years, here in New York. Her teaching career has taken her to two countries in particular: Myanmar (aka, Burma) and Liberia. In this episode she talks about her recent stint in Liberia, in Western Africa, teaching theology in a Baptist seminary. In her time there she witnessed the huge price that country has paid for a 14-year civil war followed by the Ebola epidemic, which, combined, tore apart the country’s infrastructure and

generate deep poverty. And after twenty five years of essentially no schools, Dr. Carlo and her students have many obstacles to overcome in the process of educating Liberia’s next generation of clergy.

In this interview we’ll talk about some of the big questions that come up for Dr. Carlo in her work. What does it mean to say, “God is Black?” Why is it that a white Christian has to come to a Black country to tell Black people that “God is Black?” How does this all inform Christians in the “minority world” (i.e, the US and Europe) as we look at race, colonialism? We get into these questions and more in this very interesting interview.

So, Lovers, you know that this podcast is designed to raise important questions for a diverse community of faith that is at a crossroads. I hope this interview stimulates you to take a serious look at what kind of faith communities will we need to do our job, as Christians, in these Dangerous Times.

 

 

 

 

Follow Us