A Movement With Soul
My name is Anthony Zuba and I am the lead organizer in Massachusetts for Interfaith Worker Justice, a group that organizes religious communities to support campaigns to improve the lives of low-wage workers, especially immigrants. We are a proud member organization of the Boston New Sanctuary Movement, an interfaith coalition of religious leaders and participating congregations, called by our faith to respond actively and publicly to the suffering of our immigrant brothers and sisters in the United States. We are new and growing coalition, with members from 20 congregations and faith-based organizations. We hope many more faith communities will join us.
We feel honored and privileged to have kept vigil with the courageous and creative leaders of the Student Immigrant Movement and the MassHope coalition. Each of our members in their own way offered fellowship and hospitality to the students. There was Esther Emery from Church of the Covenant, who brought her homebaked goods to the students. There was David Fillingham from the Havurat Shalom in Somerville, spending many an hour talking to SIM members and also to passersby about the budget amendment, urging them to sign SIM’s petition. There was Susan Rutkowski of the Paulist Center, who on a very hot day brought coolattas and iced coffees for the group and offered the shelter of the Paulists’ chapel right around the corner on Park Street if a bad storm hit or if anyone was beginning to feel overheated. But for all these acts of kindness of ours, it was the students themselves who were ministering to us, teaching us by their word and example what the peace-salaam-shalom of God looks like and modeling for us the beloved community. As Bishop Filipe Teixeira said to me one afternoon, “This is where I see church. This is church for me.”
On Wednesday afternoon the New Sanctuary Movement accompanied a group of 25 Methodist ministers who marched to the State House to offer words of encouragement to the students and then lobby their legislators. And on Wednesday evening a group of about 50 New Sanctuary members gathered here in a circle to share prayers, stories, songs, and sacred silence with the students. We were Baptist, Buddhist, Catholic, Episcopalian, humanist, Jewish, Methodist, Presbyterian, Quaker, UCC, and Unitarian Universalist. But above all distinctions of creed and confession, we were all brothers and sisters. And as the sunlight faded and gave way to candlelight and moonlight, we waited with anxiety and anticipation for news from the State House about the budget bill. And we had the good fortune of being present when it was announced that the hotline and the in-state tuition ban would be removed from the budget bill. We broke out into song and gave thanks for this moment of grace.
I am so proud of the leadership of the Student Immigrant Movement throughout this budget amendment crisis. It is remarkable how these young men and women have transformed these state capitol steps over these three weeks into such an open, sharing, democratic space. To SIM, let me say thank you for welcoming your friends and allies from the faith community into this space and permitting us to express the spiritual side of ourselves, to claim the powerful prophetic voice of our traditions. Your movement has soul, and it will succeed. We will continue to covenant with you. Together we shall overcome fear and hatred. And together we will work as we wait for the day to come when no immigrant has to suffer from family separation or defer their dreams of education and a brighter future. Amen.