Regular whistles ring through the halls of homes and apartment complexes in and around Powderhorn Park. Sometimes, their shrillness is silenced by the deafening blast of a concussion grenade.
These sounds are constant reminders of two seemingly contradictory truths: the continual encroachment of our society’s systems of domination that have and continue to displace Indigenous people, and the life-affirming beauty of the ways community responds to the whistles, to the calls for food, to the need for ritual.
Faced with force, communities have instead built power. Not, as the media and federal government would have you believe, through reciprocal force, but through love, through solidarity. We stand up, we speak out. We hold community vigils, raucous rallies, community roundabouts, diaper drives, and potlucks. We pray. We have cried out for the release from detention of Liam Conejo Ramos and his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Ramos. Now, the father and son are arriving home after a court order mandated their release. Will we continue to cry out for the over 3800 children detained since Trump took office last year? How about their parents? How about all folks who have been uprooted from their homes through these policies of further colonization, annihilation, and erasure?
To all of this love and care, to singing and potlucks, the government has responded with tear gas, concussion grenades, with jeering laughter and gleeful contempt. As people in communities follow the command to “love each other as I have loved you” (John 15:12), they are also finding the truth that “if they persecuted me, they will persecute you also” (John 15:20).
We must remember our strength and hold fast to the love we have for one another.
Today is the birthday of the trees [tu b’shvat] in Jewish tradition. Gaze at this photo of trees in Powderhorn park, particularly a robust, outstretched cottonwood, who reminds us of our spines, arighting through our re-membering of our strength in community and the power it holds. They might have Loud Force, but our whistles and our neighborhood connections create a Loud Power that no force can tear down.
May this prayer, and the spines in our back, mirrored through the trees, remind us of our ability to refine our Prayers in Action to meet the Moments we find ourselves in:
truly God’s words have been our life, and the length of our days enabling us to outlive powerful nations that have sought to enslave or destroy us. It has taught us to put our trust, not enforce in violence, not in aggression and domination, but injustice and truth in kindness and compassion, Torah has helped curb in us the lust and greed, indict Tõnis and cruelty that my human life has filled us with a yearning for a world permeated with love in which people live in peace and security and mutual loyalty and friendship it has inspired us with the faith that the ultimate destiny of humanity is to achieve the triumph of righteousness
therefore, we will not despair even in life, darkest moments, for we possess in to the token of God‘s love their hearts, be ever open to love with grateful awareness of all the kindness and goodwill in the world let us reach out to others, then whatever follows us in life, we shall not feel forlorn or forsaken. May you never withdraw your love from us. Blessed are you our God who shows eternal love to all those who wrestle in your Good name.
Actions:
Join us in prayer this weekend:
On Saturday Feb 7th pray from 10am-3pm CT in solidarity with two Indigenous led prayer gatherings in Minneapolis (details below)
Join us on Sunday (Feb 8th) at 2PM Pacific Time for an online prayer+share gathering hosted by the Coalition to Dismantle (Zoom registration here)
Local to MN:
Contact Gov Walz and demand an eviction moratorium now.
Saturday February 7th – start your morning (10am-12pmCT) at the Whipple Detention Center with an Indigenous-led rally. Then make your way to Powderhorn Park for an indigenous-led memorial ceremony (gathering at 12pm, ceremony 1-3pmCT).
