Congregational Guidance for a Time Without Precedent

by Jim Antal, TAF Coordinating Committee Member

Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.           – Joshua 1:9

For if you keep silence at such a time as this, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another quarter, but you and your father’s family will perish. Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this.          – Esther 4:14 

PERHAPS YOU AND I HAVE BEEN CALLED for just such a time as this—called as humble yet bold emissaries of God’s truth at a time when history itself is swinging on a hinge. Perhaps you and I and the congregations of which we may be a part have been given everything we need to engage the hydra-headed polycrisis as we recognize the interplay between (at least) the climate crisis; the abandonment of truth, science, and history in favor of alternative facts and conspiracy theories; the ascendency of white Christian nationalism; and the rise of authoritarian plutocratic leadership.¹ 

These crises are not accidental. They are driven by values. 

As people of faith, we too are driven by values. While we gather in congregations to worship, we also gather in congregations to strengthen our values and rededicate our lives to witnessing to our values. 

The recent election has triggered both fear and grief in many of us as we watch the powerful, plutocratic purveyors of the polycrisis assume positions of political leadership. But if we have been called to just such a time as this, we would do well to embrace both fear and grief as unexpected and perhaps unfamiliar allies. We can welcome as our guides Gen Y climate activists like Greta Thunberg, who reminds us that once we start to act, hope is everywhere. Preachers can draw upon sources like Brian McLaren’s Life After Doom and Britt Wray’s Generation Dread to fashion sermons that offer wisdom and guidance.

Let us not forget the poet’s reminder: “In a dark time, the eye begins to see.”

Sixty-two years ago, that courageous champion of justice and harbinger of hope Martin Luther King, Jr. reminded us of “the fierce urgency of NOW.”  Whether under Eisenhower, Kennedy, or Johnson, King was clear that America needed “a revolution in moral values.”  In keeping with Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who railed against those who would “abort their conscience,” and following King, who “refused to segregate his conscience,” now is the time for people of faith to amplify the call of conscience as never before.

AS WE SEEK TO BE ATTENTIVE TO GOD’S CALL in a time such as this, we must provide one another with the selfless courage and abundant joy that is ours when we join with others to safeguard God’s creation, the least of these among us, and democracy itself. Rarely can this work be done by people acting on their own. As both Bill McKibben and Katharine Hayhoe remind us: we need to stop acting as individuals.

That leads to the role—the vocation—of the congregation in a time such as this.

Yes, the role—the vocation—of the congregation, if it seeks to be faithful, must be responsive to major changes in its neighborhood, its country, and in the world. While worship attendance in America has dropped precipitously over the past few decades,² it remains the case that about 24% of Americans attend worship at least once a week. That’s an enormous number. It took only 10% of Americans showing up in the various actions and teach-ins of the first Earth Day in 1970 to prompt Congress to create the Environmental Protection Agency and pass the Clean Air Act; and two years later, pass the Clean Water Act; and a year after that, pass the Endangered Species Act.  

So, on any given weekend, 24% of Americans can be found in worship, seated alongside neighbors with whom they sing from the same hymnal and listen to the same sermons. 

IMAGINE IF ONLY HALF OF THOSE CONGREGATIONS were to hear regularly from their pulpit—in prayers and in sermons—how the climate crisis threatens everything they care about—everything they love—along with an invitation to gather after worship to join with others to take action in response to just one of the ways the climate crisis is impacting their particular neighborhood. 

Imagine if only half of those congregations added to their worship service a monthly opportunity for a member of the congregation to offer a brief testimony in which they shared how they or their family recently took action to address the climate crisis, and why they were motivated to do so out of love. ³

Imagine if only half of those congregations convened an adult education forum in which they learned that for many of them, their most significant contribution to the climate crisis is their choice of where they do their banking, and where their congregation does its banking, and how they could choose more climate friendly alternatives. ⁴

Imagine if only half of those congregations were to discard their vague understanding of hope as optimism and replace it with an embrace of hope that takes the form of courage; hope that is grounded in truth; hope that comes to life through collective action; hope that emerges when we resist injustice; hope that propels us to confront the powers and principalities; hope that allows us to give ourselves to a future of a just, livable world at peace.

Imagine if only half of those congregations, recognizing God’s call to people of faith to safeguard creation, the least of these among us and democracy itself, set aside “business as usual” and began to contact the White House and their members of Congress—as well as their state and local political representatives and leaders—to advocate for policies and bills that are consistent with God’s call to restore creation and uphold the Golden Rule.

Imagine if only half of those congregations—in their prayers and in their sermons—paid as much attention to collective salvation as they do to personal salvation. Imagine if those congregations were to align themselves with the prophets and seek to reinvent the social order, beginning with their town and community. Imagine if those congregations and their leaders met this moment by supporting, reinforcing and, when necessary, challenging their local and regional leaders to make their communities more resilient (Tikkun Olam), beginning with addressing the various injustices visited upon people of color, indigenous communities, and poor white communities.

AS MANY HAVE RECOGNIZED AND HISTORY CONFIRMS, religion is the most powerful force on earth. David Brooks suggests that for people of faith, religion is the “means” by which many people make awe and wonder part of our lives. 

I would add that religion can be the means by which we rightly recognize God’s role as creator and humanity’s role as responsible stewards; that religion can be the means by which we recognize our interdependence with all of creation, and that religion can be the means by which our conscience incorporates justice, truth, hospitality, and integrity into our lives and our life together. 

It is long past time that people of faith accept God’s call to stop humanity from running Genesis in reverse. Let us welcome this Kairos moment as an opportunity for congregations to embrace a new vocation. 

God’s call to protect creation is at the core of our vocation as people of faith. As countries throughout the world anxiously await headlines that detail how the Trump administration plans to roll out its demolition of environmental protection, let congregations throughout the United States receive God’s call to protect creation as they joyfully engage new liturgical practices and courageously undertake community acts of witness that are truth telling, justice seeking, and creation restoring.

FOOTNOTES:

About Jim Antal

Rev. Dr. Jim Antal serves as Special Advisor on Climate Justice to the General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ. Antal’s 2023 book, Climate Church, Climate World (Revised and Updated), is being read by hundreds of churches. From 2006-2018, Antal led the 350 UCC churches in Massachusetts as their Conference Minister and President. He has preached on climate change since 1988 in over 400 settings and has engaged in non-violent civil disobedience on numerous occasions.