Thus says the Holy One concerning the prophets who lead my people astray, who cry "Peace" when they have something to eat, but declare war against those who put nothing into their mouths. Therefore it shall be night to you, without vision, and darkness to you, without revelation.

                                                                                          Micah 3:5-6a

Dear Friends and Partners in the Gospel,

               Is there anything more unreliable than a prophet with a full stomach? This may be the most significant spiritual dilemma of the American church in our own place and time. It's not just that we're comfortable. In large measure, we live in an environment of insulated comfort that allows us, tempts us, perhaps even presses us, to become anesthetized to the pain and suffering of another humanity, larger than our own, that deals every day with the perils of marginal existence.  

               Some may object to my use of the phrase "another humanity." "We're all part of one humanity," they say. That's good to remember, but the point is that we are inclined to not remember it in our lives, day by day. In a recent lecture on white privilege at First Congregational Church in Clayton, Southwest Conference Minister John Dorhauer spoke about the strong enculturation of white Americans to view our own ethnicity, behaviors and preferences as the norm, and by implication all other ethnicities, behaviors and preferences as abnormal, alien, or other. This is not a matter of individual bias or prejudice; it's a cultural thing, lodged in the corporate psyche that white Americans share and all Americans share on some level. It is the reason that the violent death of a single white teenager in an American school grips the network news hour for days, while the death of thousands of people of color by starvation or drone attacks in other parts of the world gets only a brief, occasional mention, and the deaths of young people of color on urban streets go virtually unnoticed. This is a moral issue - no, more than that, it is one of the mainstream sources of the great human sorrow afflicting our world today.

               Occasionally, the floodgates that have contained the pent-up grief and anger of people too long unnoticed or forgotten begin to break loose and flood our social consciousness. An incident that would have barely made the news a few days earlier becomes a moment of revelation. Unearned privilege and deprivation come out and look at each other, and the painful consequences of inequality and social control are suddenly exposed for everyone to see.

               Like many of you, I am saddened by the deep wounds that have been felt over recent months in the City of St Louis. It is time to look deep into the underlying causes of our urban unrest. It is time for sacred conversation.

               Thanks to all of you for the work you do to seek justice, love kindness and walk humbly in this day. God bless your ministries of grace.

Allen