Now we command you, beloved, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, to keep away from believers who are living in idleness and not according to the tradition that they received from us.
How did we get here?
This passage can help us discern the answer, as uncomfortable as it is.
For decades – if not centuries – Christians in this country have sat idle in the face of injustice and oppression and labeled their idleness as peacemaking. When really it was “ignoring evil.”
We didn’t call out the genocide of the First Nations people; we were mostly silent about the enslavement of African people; the expansion of the West was a Christian doctrine, at the expense of a poor country. We've been silent to the many injustices perpetrated by this country.
The writer of this letter exhorts us to “not be weary in doing what is right.” We're to stand up for justice. That is our tradition. It's what we received from our ancestors.
Let’s start living up to it today.
Fighting injustice doesn't have to be a grand gesture, it can certainly start small, with you, today.
What's a simple commitment toward a more just world that you can make today? Change often begins with something small that will make difference for someone in your life?
-- Claudia Aguilar Rubalcava
We need community to build habits and rituals that stick. Use the comments to name what you're taking from this frame into your day.
Prayer has always been an action for me, not a set of words. I will act prayerfully in conversations where I have privilege and hear the voices that call out to me.