Protest As a Church (3 of 3)

I’m so angry I want to protest what is happening.

Protests are a tough subject. They accomplish many things. They make our reactions to what is happening more visible to the public. They sometimes get helpful publicity for an important issue. They feel wonderful in the moment, to be with people with similar views, to feel the energy of the crowd, to feel that we are taking action.

Protests are dangerous. At the women's march in 2017 I lost my mother in the crowd, which was as terrifying as anything I've experienced to date. Sometimes people take advantage of the chaos to engage in violence against buildings and, less often, against people. Sometimes the powers-that-be respond with excessive force, either by accident or as a way to show they can't be moved. But a small number of protests have resulted in deaths, arrests, fires, and damage to vehicles, businesses and buildings.

Sometimes, protests make a difference. The powers-that-be intentionally communicate that they don't make a difference, in an attempt to keep us from engaging in them. But Kennedy was constantly worried about Vietnam War protestors. The young adults who died at Kent State made visible the unchecked power of the police. The use of attack dogs and water cannon in response to the non-violent civil rights protestors brought many moderates to recognize the violence of the segregationists. The woman killed in Charlottesville showed the violence inherent in the mythology of the preserving Confederate icons. In ​Walter Wink's book The Powers That Be​ he offers many examples of authoritarian governments overthrown by non-violent protests.

I am not going to tell oppressed people that they must not be violent when the powers-that-be are using violence all the time--both in the moment with shootings and beatings, and the slow violence of poverty, lack of access to health care, deportations, misnaming, and more. At the same time we should recognize that ​research​ suggests that non-violent protests have the most impact. Gandhi's idea of non-violence was explicitly to drive the powers-that-be to react violently, to show who they really were, and to publicize that. But effective non-violent protests require people who are willing to risk being hurt and being killed. Usually the risk is small.

I'll admit that I want to engage in protests where old folk like me are out front, so that any violence that happens is hurting those of us who have already lived a full life. I'll also admit that I'm willing to be shot, but I'm no longer willing to take an 8 hour bus ride to the protest, walk several miles, and take the bus home the same evening. I just don't have the stamina. So I'm in the weird place that I'm willing to take the risk of death, but not the risk of sore feet or lack of a good night's sleep.

Churches already engage in protests of the most mild sort. We take part in the march against hunger, in the Mother's Day Peace event, in Pride Celebrations, and other gatherings of that sort. We may not consider them protests, but they are making public the issue we care about, and are gathering people in a way that builds our commitment to these issues.

It's worth a discussion in your congregation. Is this something we are willing to protest about? Why? Why not?

The most important book on Non-Violence is The Powers that Be: Theology for a New Millennium by Walter Wink. This is based on his extensive academic research, but is written for ordinary readers and is well suited to congregational discussion.
Order Wink at Bookshop.org

Here are opinions from social scientists about protests--should we do them? Do they work? And more from several different view points.
Social Scientists on Protests

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