Vessel

A little background - our denomination was considering not having our next great meeting in Pheonix in 2012 and had a resolution to boycott it. That resolution morphed into it being a justice assembly, where we have our required by the by-law meeting but in a dynamically differently way. We would give as little money as possible to the state of Arizona but still meet there. We’d have our important business in megachurches and stay at people’s homes. We’d have it more open to the public and workshops would not being the normal leadership or spiritual fare, but trips to the border and opportunities for non-compliance. Hearing the people there helped me understand that this is slavery. If companies can hold over people something as important as their right to exist in this country, they can force them to do whatever they want. Because of citizenship status, these companies can tear up a family and leave natural born children in the US without the support of their parents or the parent that is the major wage earner. These are hardly family values. I know people who are fiscally conservative will have a hard time with this issue. Here is the problem to me: Reagan, our president, said our system is set up on illegal immigrants. They are the reason why our food is cheap and our houses are affordable. They are the ones doing the back breaking work of picking food and buliding homes in the hot sun for 14 hour shifts with little money. If we have a system set up on their backs, then we must treat them humanely. If we need them, then they need rights. If we do not want illegal immigration, then we can not set up our system to depend on them. Take care of that FIRST. Then decide how to humanely handle immigration issues. So. I am going to try my hardest to get down to Pheonix, Arizona, for the day of national non-compliance on July 29th to be there for the people of color who are being racially profiled by the police and the illegal immigrants that pay taxes and have families and prop up and feed our economy but are deemed without the basic inalienable, inherent rights guaranteed to us by our constitution. I hope you’ll check out altoarizona.com who is organizing this and that you’ll be there too. Also check out standingonthesideoflove.org. Because of that campaign, we are the largest denomination working on this, and everyone down there knows us as ‘The Love People’. If you couldn’t hear the call any clearer, it has come. Come be a ‘Love People’ with us on July 29th, in Pheonix Arizona.