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After-Action Release: In Front of the White House, Four Faith Leaders Turn a Public Pulpit Into One Moral Chord — Stop the War, Protect Voting Rights, Stop the Attack on the Poor
On Monday, June 22, Repairers of the Breach gathered clergy and moral activists in front of the White House for Moral Monday in the Nation’s Capital. The Plaza became a Public Pulpit — not a pulpit behind sanctuary walls, but one in the open air, on contested ground, where four faith leaders each carried a single demand and sounded it together as one moral chord.
WASHINGTON, DC — With founder Bishop William J. Barber, II carrying the moral fusion message to the global church in Germany at the World Council of Churches, the evening opened as an elevation, not an apology: the same truth spoken on the Plaza was being spoken across the ocean. The pulpit had not emptied — it had multiplied.
Four sermonettes built toward a single demand spoken together: stop the war, protect voting rights, stop the attack on the poor, and reject the religious nationalism that threatens to drown all three.
Rev. Sandy Sorensen of the United Church of Christ carried the call to stop the war, drawing the line between a signature and a peace.
“We continue to hear peace has been reached, victory has been achieved when there is no peace, there is no victory — there is only the devastating cost of war. A cost the Administration continues to obscure, deny, and disguise,” Sorensen said.
Rev. Kendal McBroom, Director of Civil and Human Rights at the General Board of Church and Society, carried the demand to protect voting rights.
“When district lines are manipulated so that communities lose meaningful representation, justice is at stake. When polling locations disappear from neighborhoods while remaining plentiful elsewhere, justice is at stake,” McBroom said.
Rev. Stephen Erich, Pastor at Takoma Park Seventh-day Adventist Church, carried the demand to stop the attack on the poor, preaching that this is no longer a time for teaching but for preaching — not learning something new, but loving something old.
“To cut SNAP is to attack the poor. To fund war is to attack the poor. To cut Medicaid is to attack the poor. To fund ICE is to attack the poor,” Erich said.
Rev. Dr. Beverly Goines of Shepherd Park Christian Church named the rise of religious nationalism and the faith leaders who refuse to let it speak in God’s name.
“We refuse to conflate religious identity with national belonging. We refuse restricting the personal freedoms of minority groups. We stand here today, backed by the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, which assert democratic governance, universal human equality, and religious pluralism,” Goines said.
The sermonettes did not stand apart. War abroad and poverty at home were sounded from the same breath; the attack on the vote and the abuse of God’s name were struck by the same hand.
Moral Monday in the Nation’s Capital continues as part of Repairers of the Breach’s sustained mobilization. To get involved, visit breachrepairers.org/get-involved/events.
Repairers of the Breach is a national organization that trains moral leaders and builds social justice movements rooted in a framework that uplifts our deepest moral and constitutional values.