Activism with an Edge
In the past, it has been hard for me to reconcile a two-dimension gospel with justice-minded and politicized students on my campus. Contact evangelism is not the most strategic evangelistic witness at our small liberal arts women’s college, and in fact is prohibited by the school. The campus actually created a policy against proselytizing in order to protect students from solicitation and harassment by Christian evangelists.
The social activists that I am in contact with won’t hear Christians preach about salvation and personal piety if they ignore and perpetuate social injustices. From my point of view it is unfathomable to introduce the Gospel to student activists without this dimension of social justice and reconciliation.
So we’re trying a different approach and walls of hostility are coming down at Mills College. Students in the fellowship are stepping up as vocal, credible activists and leaders on campus, holding the campus accountable for creating space for Christians in the dialogue of social activism. We hosted an outreach event on campus inspired and organized by students who attended the Jesus Justice Poverty conference, focused on Smokey Mountain, the Philippines’ largest garbage village.
It started with a fundraiser. We served the mothers from Smokey Mountain by selling their purses made with reused materials from the garbage dump. It was fun telling Smokey Mountain’s redemptive story to students, staff, and faculty who would normally blow us off when we talk about Christianity. People were intrigued and fascinated – “a Christian-based micro-enterprise, providing jobs to the poor and marginalized, caring for and saving the environment, creatively turning garbage into a form of art.”
Everyone was receptive to our plea to pray for the mothers who made their purses when they wear them, because this is more than a business exchange. It’s a relationship and partnership. Isn’t it typical of Jesus to use marginalized women of a garbage dump to evangelize elitists at a private institution? We sold over 160 purses that week and raised over $3300 for the Smokey Mountain ministries!
And then, upon discovering the planning for our Smokey Mountain program, the director of the Ethnic Studies department approached us about co-sponsoring and funding the event. This woman, one the most vocal anti-Christian professors on campus, even attended. The co-sponsors and attendees God brought to us that evening included: the Filipino club, Asian Pacific Islander Sisters Alliance, Women’s Studies Program, Office of Student Life, Art Club, Queer Melanin, White Women Allies Against Racism, Office of the Chaplain, and the Black Student Collective.
The evening program included a spoken word piece performed by a student leader on her quest for faith in Jesus and activism. A student leader gave a testimony of her own transformation as a white Christian ally for social justice. East Bay Team Leader Jess Delegencia called out the sins and blind spots of the Christian evangelical church and asked for forgiveness.
After the event, an atheist lesbian woman, whom I met during the purse sale, thanked me and shared about how intriguing it is to think about the intersection of Christianity and activism. A Mills lecturer approached me and shared his desire to revisit his roots as a black Filipino, born in Smokey Mountain but never visited since he was an infant. I can’t wait to see his story unfold. It is my prayer that as he seeks to be reunited with his family, he would also experience being reunited with his creator.
The director of student diversity loved the program, and wouldn’t stop thanking and affirming the student participants. The advisor for the Black Student Collective approached me that evening, voicing a desire to collaborate more on campus events. A reporter of the campus newspaper wrote an article about our fellowship’s efforts to integrate faith with social justice this semester!
God is indeed answering our prayers in the area of advocacy, favor, and reconciliation in ways beyond what we asked for. I am so grateful to God but I also sensed the call to pray and labor for more! It is my prayer that I would not only recognize and believe in the harvest, but be better equipped and bolder as a laborer in bringing this particular community of people into the kingdom of God.