Sunday, May 23, 2021

Queerying Pentecost as Protest

ID: against the black of night, the yellow and orange flames of a fire are visible moving and breathing with the wind.

The following Call to Worship and Opening prayer are rooted in the Ezekiel 37:1-14 as a Pentecost text.

Call to Worship
The graveyard is full. The dead, dying, and killed with blood on the ground.
The price that has been paid is already too high.

The breath of God calls the prophets to prophesy,
even when all seems lost, when everything around is death.

The prophets prophesy. The people shout in so many languages
Black Lives Matter!
Free Palestine!
Trans people are divine!
Accessibility is a human right!
Ninguna persona migrante es ilegal!
Queer Justice, not Gay Rights!
Nothing about us without us!


The Spirit breaks in, knitting bone to bone, sinew on bone, and the very breath of life back into what was given up for dead.
People rise, not for the end that they can see, but for the present they can resist.

Life breathes in. Life breathes out.
The Holy Spirit is alive in resistance. In worship. In protest. In the world.

Opening Prayer
Creative Spirit,
You breathe life into your people in unexpected ways. When we’ve given up all for lost. When we’ve resigned ourselves that the government will never change, leaders will never listen, justice will never come, you break into our lives like the rush of a violent wind at Pentecost. Upsetting our assumptions, you upend the apathy and despair that we fall into. You celebrate the diversity of your people in tongues of flame and many languages. You breathe new life into bones that are weary, dead from violence, oppression, and neglect. You bring us back to life and send us into the world with new power, creativity, and connection. Inspire our worship. Inspire our protest. Be our breath.
Amen.

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