Last year we were deeply saddened and greatly angered by the shootings at Mother Bethel AME in Charleston. In our despair we felt called to do something as a faith community and so we started by reading the life changing book Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God by Kelly Brown Douglas. Learning about God’s world through history and through the experience of another person helps us to experience more of God’s fullness. Members of our community have gone on to participate in Black Lives Matter protests and we purchased a sign for the SFC house. These are small, insignificant steps on a journey to live into the vision of God’s just Kingdom. We are still working on ways we can authentically walk with our brothers and sisters as we struggle with race and power in our country.
The suffering of our refugee brothers and sisters has also called the Sellwood Faith Community. Our hope is to work with a local agency later this year to partner with a refugee family coming to Portland. As we learn more about who God is and how God’s hope and justice is at work in this world of heartache and suffering we will be reading Outcasts United by Warren St. John. This book even has a young adult version we’ll be giving out to our youth group kiddos to help foster family discussions at home. As we read the story of a soccer team from one small town in Georgia that became a refugee resettlement community in the 90’s, we will encounter more of God in the life beyond our own limited experience and world views. We will also be more prepared for the work ahead of us. If you want to join us we will be discussing the introduction and part 1 at 7pm on September 19th at the SFC House.
I fully believe that when we experience more of God’s great big world we can find innovative ways to live as God calls us to live. We can find ways to be hopeful and to move our world along the long arc of justice. At SFC we will continue to learn and grow so that we might ever more fully follow God’s call to live out our faith.
-Eilidh
| Poster in the SFC house kitchen. |
Recent Comments