Many have been asking me about leaving Living Water UCC and POWER to head to DC. Yes, I am leaving Living Water later this month and POWER shortly thereafter to become the Political Director of the PICO (People Improving Communities through Organizing) National Network in Washington, DC. PICO is the nation’s largest Faith Based Organizing Movement. For those that know me well this is not much of a surprise. I was a Political Science major when I started Boston College almost 20 years ago. Politics and Activism/Advocacy/Organizing have been important to me since my childhood. My faith has been equally important to me longer than politics. Finally, I am able to work deeply at the intersection of two of my passions to bring about healing and hope for a broken world.
Some have asked about what church I will be pastoring. I am not. In my new role I will be serving as a Public Theologian in the midst of our Nation’s Capital. In addition, later this year, I will be installed as the Presiding Bishop of Higher Ground Christian Fellowship International. My mentor Bishop Kermit L. Newkirk, Jr. will be retiring from the role as Presiding Bishop. I look forward to serving the church in that new capacity. As a matter of faith practice, I am working with a collaborative of faith leaders from around the country on the creation of an Ecumenical Religious Order committed to a charism of Social Justice as Spiritual Discipline and Spiritual Practice. The early conversations have been exciting and I look forward to helping establish this new body. Please keep this effort in your prayers. If you are interested in learning more about the order, please email me at ddroyster1969@gmail.com. I would be glad to share with you the plans in more detail. My family and I will be looking for a UCC church in the MD/DC area to call home. Pray for us as a seek a place where we can finally sit together during worship and delight in the Lord.
It has been a hard decision to leave both of these organizations and head to DC. Yet, I am feeling called to our nation’s capital for such a time as this. There is much going on in the world that requires faith voices to speak truth to power and demand justice in the land. For that reason, I feel called in this moment…this Kairos moment. I am not one who believes that faith should not be engaged in the political realm. I am not sure how anyone could read the sacred texts of the Christian tradition and not see that faith has always engaged the empire in one way or another. For many communities all across this nation there is great pain. As the Rev. Dr. Howard Thurman asked in his book Jesus and the Disinherited, “What does our faith have to say to people with their backs up against the wall?” For far too long the church has been a sleeping giant. It is time to “Wake Up!” God has always had a remnant that has lifted a witness for Justice but now we need the whole of the many faith traditions and communities across our nation to become engaged. Good people who do nothing in the face of injustice are not good people! We must work to challenge the narratives and stories that have anesthetized our faith traditions into a dreamless slumber that does not even produce rest. We do not need a sleeping giant but instead a massive army of faith people in a cacophony of voices that calls this nation to its better self. A massive army that draws our faith communities out of the walls of their institutions and to care for the greater community that surrounds them. A call to care for all of God’s creation!
So I head to Washington to be Faith Warrior. To fight for a Moral Economy! To Fight for Racial Justice! To fight for an end to Mass Incarceration! To Fight for a Pathway to Citizenship! To Fight for Climate and Environmental Justice! To fight for issues yet to be named!
Please join me I continue my efforts to Change the Damn World!
Grace and Peace,
+DDR
Some have asked about what church I will be pastoring. I am not. In my new role I will be serving as a Public Theologian in the midst of our Nation’s Capital. In addition, later this year, I will be installed as the Presiding Bishop of Higher Ground Christian Fellowship International. My mentor Bishop Kermit L. Newkirk, Jr. will be retiring from the role as Presiding Bishop. I look forward to serving the church in that new capacity. As a matter of faith practice, I am working with a collaborative of faith leaders from around the country on the creation of an Ecumenical Religious Order committed to a charism of Social Justice as Spiritual Discipline and Spiritual Practice. The early conversations have been exciting and I look forward to helping establish this new body. Please keep this effort in your prayers. If you are interested in learning more about the order, please email me at ddroyster1969@gmail.com. I would be glad to share with you the plans in more detail. My family and I will be looking for a UCC church in the MD/DC area to call home. Pray for us as a seek a place where we can finally sit together during worship and delight in the Lord.
It has been a hard decision to leave both of these organizations and head to DC. Yet, I am feeling called to our nation’s capital for such a time as this. There is much going on in the world that requires faith voices to speak truth to power and demand justice in the land. For that reason, I feel called in this moment…this Kairos moment. I am not one who believes that faith should not be engaged in the political realm. I am not sure how anyone could read the sacred texts of the Christian tradition and not see that faith has always engaged the empire in one way or another. For many communities all across this nation there is great pain. As the Rev. Dr. Howard Thurman asked in his book Jesus and the Disinherited, “What does our faith have to say to people with their backs up against the wall?” For far too long the church has been a sleeping giant. It is time to “Wake Up!” God has always had a remnant that has lifted a witness for Justice but now we need the whole of the many faith traditions and communities across our nation to become engaged. Good people who do nothing in the face of injustice are not good people! We must work to challenge the narratives and stories that have anesthetized our faith traditions into a dreamless slumber that does not even produce rest. We do not need a sleeping giant but instead a massive army of faith people in a cacophony of voices that calls this nation to its better self. A massive army that draws our faith communities out of the walls of their institutions and to care for the greater community that surrounds them. A call to care for all of God’s creation!
So I head to Washington to be Faith Warrior. To fight for a Moral Economy! To Fight for Racial Justice! To fight for an end to Mass Incarceration! To Fight for a Pathway to Citizenship! To Fight for Climate and Environmental Justice! To fight for issues yet to be named!
Please join me I continue my efforts to Change the Damn World!
Grace and Peace,
+DDR
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