Gathering together

This week, I have been in the mountains of Pennsylvania at a gathering of the National Council of Elders. We began our meeting knowing that we are at a pivotal time in the history of this land. All of us have engaged in the struggles for liberation and peace that defined the 20th Century. We have seen brutality, violence, and cruelty employed in defense of privilege and power. Yet we agreed that this moment is the most dangerous time we have faced, calling for new thinking, a deeply rooted spiritual force, and the engagement of people to create new bonds of connection and community.

We met at Kirkridge Retreat & Study Center. Kirkridge has a long history of providing space for people to reflect on our collective liberation. As we discussed the growth of white, Christian nationalism and the drive toward fascism, we were reminded of the strains of peace makers who have walked this land, beginning with the Lenape peoples who were the holders of peace in the Iroquois Confederacy.  The bold thinking and acting of people of faith like Walter Wink, Howard Thurman, and the Berrigan brothers helped ground us as we considered our responsibilities at this moment.

We began with stories from Naomi Tutu and Zoharah Simmons. Naomi shared how the “daily experiences of being dehumanized in the country of our ancestors” fueled her anger at injustice. She offered the wisdom of her grandmother, who told her that Apartheid was not the “end of the story, nor was it the beginning.” We are not the first people who have dreamed of a better world. She encouraged us to see ourselves as part of the ongoing struggle for more human ways of living. 

Zoharah Simmons described how her experiences of racism in the Jim Crow South moved her to join the Civil Rights movement, in spite of the fears of her family for her safety. She encouraged us to explore what we can learn from our experiences that would be crucial for our work today. She emphasized creating face to face relationships based on confronting real issues as an essential step in developing larger movements. And she affirmed her belief in the courage and wisdom of people who long for ways of living with respect, dignity, and meaning.

The elders were joined by young activists from around the country who are using their talents, creative imaginations, and energies to develop their communities. Engaged in place-making, youth development, transformative justice, media creation, storytelling, and popular education, the group explored the unfolding political landscape and the questions that emerge from the day-to-day work of changing ourselves to change our world.

In this context, the news of the election results reached us slowly, greeted with joy. We were keenly aware that its importance lay not in the democratic party, but in the fact that it reflects the broad number of people, especially younger people, who are rejecting the vision of this country embodied in the actions of Trump and his goons.

This electoral sweep reflects the growing desire of people to find ways to publicly reject the cruelty that marks this authoritarian regime.  It is part of the continuum of public actions that are enabling us to say NO! This is not how human beings should treat one another; this is not who we want to be.  We are seeing demonstrations, court decisions, jury verdicts, local organizing, and anti-ICE actions framing values that embrace people and affirm our lives and dignity.

As we were leaving the gathering, we got the news of the Nov 7th actions across the country. The Guardian reported:

“Students, faculty and staff at more than 100 campuses across the US rallied against the Trump administration’s assault on higher education on Friday – the first in a planned series of nationwide, coordinated protests that organizers hope will culminate in large-scale students’ and workers’ strikes next May Day and a nationwide general strike in May 2028.

We know that movements for a new world take many forms and evolve in unpredictable ways. But at their heart, they require each of us to find a way to move toward each other, to act, and to converge together in ways that engage real power. Let us all move toward that moment.