Rev. Jennifer Hosler, PhD

Last week, siblings in Minnesota put out a call for interfaith clergy to come and join them, supporting their demands to get ICE out of Minnesota now, to bring accountability to the officer who murdered Renee Good, and for no additional federal funding for ICE in the federal budget. After some discernment, I felt led to answer this call. Today (Wednesday, January 21st), I traveled to Minneapolis

– to witness what is happening: occupation, federal harassment, racial profiling, tear gas, beatings, abuse, illegal arrests, and general indifference and disregard for the dignity and beauty of human life;

– To be in solidarity, to remind our siblings that they are not alone, to reinforce the testimony that people of faith, that Christians, that pastors, are against this violence being done each day.

Last Sunday, I preached from Luke 4, where Jesus starts his ministry and declares what his mission is all about. Jesus read from the Isaiah scroll that

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

because he has anointed me

to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

and recovery of sight for the blind,

to set the oppressed free,

to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

The Kingdom of God transforms the spiritual and the social – as Jesus followers, we are called to continue the work of Jesus, building a new reality of just economies and freedom for prisoners and deliverance for people who are oppressed.