President Trump’s administration acts like he was elected to be a monarch. Each day of his term has felt like a daily assault on vulnerable people. It’s clear the administration’s plan was to overwhelm proponents of democracy in order to quell any sort of resistance.

In response, we must recommit to catalyzing a multi-faith, multi-race, gender equitable movement; to building a beloved community rooted in dignity, abundance and belonging. We must reaffirm the need to see and include people of color, immigrants and LGBTQIA folks as our fellow Americans. Now, more than ever, it is critical that our aspirations for a vibrant democracy will not be deterred by words and actions rooted in exclusion and hate; and we recommit ourselves to our principles: engaging our faith in the public square, committing to the fundamentals of organizing and unleashing our true power, that of organized people.

A faithful response

A faithful response

At Faith in Action, we refuse to relegate faith to those who propagate a faith that is rooted in domination, fear and exclusion. We strongly believe that profane faith cannot merely be answered by assertions, policies or coalitions. They must be met with examples of faith culled from our sacred texts that call us into aspirations of being a better community. 

Any monolithic expression of faith absolutely misses the point, because faith is necessarily rooted in community. It moves fluidly from the realm of the personal to being communally generative. It requires people encountering one another, participating with each other and sharing experiences that move us beyond our own experiences. This is why we believe that faith is both a noun and a verb. 

At Faith in Action, we are people of faith, many faiths in fact: Muslim, Jewish, Unitarian Universalist, Bahá’í, Buddhist, Hindu, Indigenous, Christian and many other traditions. And we believe that in order to create long-lasting, transformative change in the world, we must diligently faith with one another. We understand that we must strengthen our organizing by expanding our base of leaders. Therefore, we are ramping up our training efforts that center the practice of organizing for our leaders. For lay leaders, faith leaders and organizers we are taking them through our cycle of organizing:

• Prioritizing authentic encounters with one another through one-to-one conversations that surface elements of one’s story and identify one’s interests

• Allowing the encounters to disrupt a sense of individual so folks can move from self interest to shared interest

• Re-imagining shared solutions for systemic problems through research actions with people in positions of power

• Participating in public actions that seek commitments from decision-makers to change the status quo

• Engaging in a process of reflection on what happened, what was learned and what can be done differently

A new kind of faithful witness

A new kind of faithful witness

We seek to exponentially increase a base of people who are willing to faith a different world into existence. Yet, we don’t simply want to increase the breadth of our organizing. We are making a commitment to deepen our organizing. We are seeking more than just having large numbers of people show up to a public action. We want leaders who seek to be authors of their own liberation, who understand that those closest to the pain of any given systemic issue are the ones who should be leading the change efforts, who are committed to organizing their friends, neighbors and community members to faith a different reality into existence. 

Fundamentally, we believe in the collective power of people; we have faith in one another. Within community organizing, power is usually defined as organized people, organized money and organized ideas. The current administration has a billionaire who is visibly firing government employees and canceling government programs while quietly pushing through multi-million dollar contracts that benefit his various companies. Organized money will always seek to further its own interests.

We want leaders who seek to be authors of their own liberation, who understand that those closest to the pain of any given systemic issue are the ones who should be leading the change efforts, who are committed to organizing their friends, neighbors and community members to faith a different reality into existence. 

  

We believe in the power of organized people to transform our world, because regular people acting together on behalf of shared interests will create more lasting change than the few who operate for their own interest and wealth. We believe in it, because we’ve seen it work. In Ferguson, faith leaders listened to young people protesting and joined their cause to demand change in the police department, the city council and how much of a city’s revenue can be collected from citations. Faith in Action leaders organized against payday loans which led to the establishment of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which has benefited consumers across the US. Several Faith in Action federations have worked to raise the minimum wage in their states (California, Colorado, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nevada, New York, New Mexico and Vermont) so that workers can have wages that try to meet the rising costs within their communities. 

As we learned from the Montgomery Bus Boycott, “more than anything else, what made Montgomery a truly mass movement was the way in which the initiative for continuing the struggle came more from the ‘followers’ than from the ostensible ‘leaders.’”

In this difficult moment, many of us may be inclined to give up hope and shelter ourselves away from harm until the threat goes away. As people of faith I want to offer a different strategy. Let us remember the folks who’ve gone before us and created a pathway that allows us to see what faith can do in trying times.

Toolkit for organizing collective action

Toolkit for organizing for collective action

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