America seems to be in a perpetual state of war. We’ve militarized our borders and violently separated children from their families. We are inundated with horrifying images, such as that of the father and daughter who lost their lives to the Rio Grande.
I am not from the border, but the border runs through me.
War is not new. Its effects are felt from generation to generation, a collective trauma from our ancestors to our living bodies. War lingers on the land and in our bones. We have a responsibility to speak out against destruction and to rise to meet the needs of the most vulnerable. It is clearly a time for spiritual activism.
Some churches have fallen short in speaking out. They have fallen short in meeting the needs of God’s children. Following Jesus in times of humanitarian crisis is difficult; it requires us to come fully into awareness about the harm we, as a nation, have caused and about our complacency, and complicity, in that harm against one another. And it can compel us to consider breaking the unjust laws that are causing the harm.
Many churches, on the other hand—often those who seem to have the least resources—have risen to the occasion, offering what little they have (from providing translators at bus stations to offering support and sanctuary) to those in need at the southern border. Is it enough?
Many people feel hopeless. They think, “What can I possibly do?” Many say that prayers are not enough—that’s true; prayers alone will not heal the deep wounds in our nation and across the globe. But prayers are a start; there is hope in prayer.
Each of our humanitarian crises holds a mirror to who we all are. The southern border crisis is only one of many mirrors that asks us to face ourselves. While we can blame governments and blame unjust laws and loopholes, we truly have to face ourselves as active participants in creating our government and in creating room for loopholes. We did this.
Now what? Sit with the “we did this” portion and begin to make active and real change in our spirits and in our homes. There is room for every kind of activist to change structures of power; that includes spiritual activists who draw on and are guided by the Holy Spirit.
We seem to be in a perpetual state of war—with ourselves. We are re-creating trauma for every generation. War lingers because we allow it. America seems to be only able to view these humanitarian crises from a Western lens. We have to take off the lens of Western thinking and begin to look inward. This is the moment to find what makes you a spiritual activist for the healing of the kin-dom.
Carolina Hinojosa-Cisneros is a Tejana, Chicana, and Mujerista from San Antonio, where she is a graduate student at Our Lady of the Lake University. She is the 2019 recipient of the Rubem Alves Award in Theopoetics.
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