“Activism is the only thing that works,” said Frank Bibeau, a Native rights attorney in Minnesota, after President Biden revoked a key permit allowing TC Energy to cross the Canadian border. As a result, TC Energy terminated the Keystone DAPL project. This is true whether it’s protecting the environment or voting rights. Activism works.
Jesus just didn’t talk about how people should live; he became a model of how people should live. And when we decide to follow the model, we should expect that those who wield power will denigrate us as part of their opposition.
Opponents to the desecration of the earth are called radicals and other names not fit to print, but we know that these are tactics to scare off possible supporters. Yes, it’s true that when we take Jesus seriously, we are radical. So was Jesus.
Prayer for the Day
You measure the heavens and the earth in the hollow of your hand,
Creating all that we see and all that we cannot see;
Although we declare in an unceasing voice that only you are holy.
We disregard the earth that you have created.
Restore us to health through your chastising Word
So we may enable the kingdom which you have given us
Through the One who opens our eyes and ears,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
Someone needs to explain to me why wanting clean drinking water makes you an activist, and why proposing to destroy water with chemical warfare doesn’t make a corporation a terrorist.
Winona LaDuke, Ojibwe activist for the environment
We buy a bottle of water in the city, where clean water comes out in its taps. You know, back in 1965, if someone said to the average person, 'You know in thirty years you are going to buy water in plastic bottles and pay more for that water than for gasoline?' Everybody would look at you like you're completely out of your mind.
Paul Watson, Canadian American environmental activist
I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean from your uncleanliness,
And from all your idols I will cleanse you.
A new heart I will give you and a new spirit I will put within you,
And I will remove from your body a heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
Ezekiel 36: 25-26