Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde. Photograph courtesy Washington National Cathedral.
Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde. Photograph courtesy Washington National Cathedral.
Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde stood in a Washington, DC cathedral and did the one thing spiritual leaders are here to do: she let her faith speak unequivocally—pushback, conflict, and retribution be damned.
Republished with permission from John Pavlovitz
For nearly 30 years I sat where you sit.
I know the difficulties of the work you do that many people don’t think about: the collective expectations of the people you serve, the incredible pressures that come from above you and around you, the number of opinions you have to respectfully sift through—and I know the tumult that often creates within you.
I understand the dizzying high-wire walk of trying to carry your personal convictions as well as the virtues and values you’re entrusted to steward as part of your position—and I’ve felt the fierce whirlwind when those things don’t align.
And I also know how easy it is to find your voice gradually silenced, to grow beholden to a congregation or a denomination; to let the practical fears of losing your job or your health insurance or your livelihood slowly force you to make small concessions, usually without even realizing it.
I’ve felt what it is to soften your delivery, to edit your messages, to start talking around issues that you know will create conflict or bring turbulence or slow things down, and how tempting it is to rationalize why this is simply part of doing ministry.
And above all, I know that you didn’t begin this work wanting to become a compromised people-pleaser with watered-down words, unspoken passions, and feet of clay.
So, why exactly did you begin this work and what is stopping you from doing it right now?
Maybe you need a reminder.
This week, Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde stood in a Washington, DC cathedral and did the one thing spiritual leaders are here to do: she let her faith speak unequivocally—pushback, conflict, and retribution be damned.
In a breathtaking display of courage and leadership, she stood before the world and before the most powerful man on the planet, and she made vulnerable and oppressed human beings the center of that moment, because that is what Jesus calls those of us who follow him to do. Like him, we are here to be Good Shepherds: loving caregivers to the harassed and helpless sheep in our care—and the fearless opposition to the wolves who would devour them, wherever they show up and however much influence they have.
And while I’ve gratefully watched Bishop Budde’s act of bravery bring a nation to its feet and remind us of the power of a single voice, my greatest fear is that she will be the only one of her kind; that in a few days she will prove to be an outlier, just a beautiful aberration.
I’m afraid she will be the last minister to stand against the hatred having its renaissance here in the name of God—and I need you to prove me wrong.
Your congregations need you to prove me wrong.
The American Church needs you to.
Immigrants and trans kids and Muslim families and young black men need you to.
This weary, beleaguered, terrified nation needs you to draw deep from your reservoirs of faith, to clarify your calling again, to ask yourself why you do this work.
And after doing that, it needs you to find your voice and to speak in such a way that the heavens shake and powerful people stagger and sleeping people are roused awake to the urgency of the moment.
All faithful people here need to be reminded what that faith requires of them, so that they can be similarly courageous where they are.
Non-religious people here need to know that believers aren’t all wall-builders and book-banners; that many are moved by their faith to acts of beauty and kindness and generosity—not exclusion and cruelty.
This world has enough ministers who’ve been content to stay silent and become complicit in the weaponizing of religion and the ascension of bigotry. We don’t need any more of those.
I don’t your ministry setting, your family situation, your financial condition, or your faith journey. All I know, is that if you consider yourself a spiritual leader of any kind, the one thing you have, the only thing of real value, is your authentic voice birthed by your spiritual convictions: not your church’s, not your supervisor’s, not your loudest church members.’
Your singular, irreplaceable gift is your personal burden to heal and help and lead—and your willingness to make that burden known without dilution.
Bishop Budde did something awe-inspiring, something sadly rare, and something you are also capable of doing.
You don’t need to speak directly to a world leader, but you can speak to the small world entrusted to you, and with unmistakable clarity you can plead for mercy, demand justice, advocate for compassion, and beg for audacious love to be what we believers are known by in these days.
Sunday is coming.
May you greet it with courage.
May we all.
Please share this piece with your congregations, church friends, and most of all with the paid and volunteer clergy and church staffs in your communities. Give them permission to be clear and encouragement to be brave.
John Pavlovitz is a writer, pastor, and activist from Wake Forest, North Carolina. A 25-year veteran in the trenches of local church ministry, John is committed to equality, diversity, and justice—both inside and outside faith communities. When not actively working for a more compassionate planet, John enjoys spending time with his family, exercising, cooking, and having time in nature. He is the author of A Bigger Table, Hope and Other Superpowers, Low, and Stuff That Needs to Be Said.
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