The August 7 edition of The Living Church is available online to registered subscribers. This edition’s theme is “A Nation Wounded,” which we explore in a news report, essays, photojournalism, and poetry.
The Rev. Deacon Charles Allen Wynder, Jr., the Episcopal Church’s missioner for social justice and advocacy engagement, writes:
A lifelong Episcopalian, I grew up in an Afro-Anglican parish in Virginia. I am a father of an 11-month-old black boy who was baptized in June. His development and flourishing is my main concern. I tremble at the world facing him. These issues have a lived and concrete meaning for me. My prior vocation allows me to understand the strengths and flaws of the criminal justice system. I respect the sacrifice and service of law enforcement officers. I worked with many professional police and state troopers. The elected prosecutor and staff judge advocate who mentored me were ethical, competent, and respected individuals in the community. I also recognize the brokenness of a justice system that incarcerates more people than any country in the world.
And the Rev. Will Brown, rector of the Church of the Holy Cross in Dallas, writes:
Our nation has sowed the wind, and I am afraid that we will reap the whirlwind. We are beginning to see the legacy of slavery more and more. And if you do not believe in corporate sin or corporate guilt, you have not read the Bible.
I don’t have any political answers. Frankly, I do not think there are any answers for our nation anymore. We have denied ourselves access, politically and corporately, to the resources that animated the civil rights movement of the 1960s. The heroes of that time proclaimed from the rooftops that their work was underwritten by the imperatives of their faith in Jesus Christ.
Dwelling in the Love of the Crucified Lord | By Deanna Briody
