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Jul 30, 2013 | Sharon Sheridan

North Carolinians Stand Up for Poor, Vulnerable on Moral Mondays

It’s not every day a bishop receives a courtesy call from one of his priests letting him know he plans to get arrested.

 

Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina Bishop Michael Curry received just such a call from the Rev. Randall Keeney, vicar of St. Barnabas Episcopal Church in Greensboro, before Keeney’s May 6 arrest for civil disobedience during the second “Moral Monday” protest against actions of the state legislature in Raleigh. On July 29, the movement marked its 13th week with a march to the state capitol and an interfaith social-justice rally. The weekly rallies – although not the push for change – may now take a hiatus until lawmakers return from their summer break, participants say.

 

“We are in the middle of a movement that is only just beginning, and it’s a church movement,” said Curry. The North Carolina NAACP launched the rallies, led by the Rev. William Barber, its president and a United Church of Christ minister. The interfaith protests, which draw believers and nonbelievers alike, are “revival-like,” Curry said. “There’s singing and there’s praying and there’s preaching, and Jesus gets talked about a lot. … The Hebrew prophets are quoted regularly.”

 

The number of protesters – including Episcopalians from across the state – has grown weekly, reaching 2,000 on July 15, said the Rev. Lisa Fischbeck, vicar of the Episcopal Church of the Advocate in Chapel Hill, who has been participating since June 3. “Every time I’ve gone, there’s been at least 1,000, and slowly edging up.”

 

“You begin to realize that numbers do make a difference,” she said. “As numbers increase, that makes a statement. That’s been part of my motivation, is just to go and take a stand, because I don’t know what else I can do at this point.”

 

The impetus for Moral Monday rallies was a series of legislative actions that protesters believe hurt the state’s neediest and most vulnerable citizens.

 

Read the rest of story from the Episcopal News Service.