protests

Madison Muller 1-15-2021

A member of DC Peace Team attends a Black Lives Matter protest this summer. Photo courtesy of DC Peace Team.

Ahead of President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration, monuments are fenced off, streets are closed and 20,000 National Guard members are positioned around Washington, D.C. But some local organizations are more focused on the safety of Washingtonians — especially the safety of Black and brown Washingtonians who may be at greater risk of being targeted by right-wing groups, many of which have ties to white nationalism.

Valentine Iwenwanne 11-02-2020

Demonstrators hold hands as they gather near the Lagos State House, despite a round-the-clock curfew imposed by the authorities on the Nigerian state of Lagos. October 20, 2020. REUTERS/Temilade Adelaja/File Photo

Some religious leaders believe the national protests are capable of helping to strengthen Nigeria’s democratic institutions. “If the international community is seeing this, they would see it as a people who are trying to rediscover themselves,” he said. “Our democracy is not perfect; it’s still developing. And this will help hasten the elements that would in the long run improve our democratic credentials.”

Vincent Hale 7-21-2020

A young activist at a May 2020 protest in Atlanta / Elijah Nouvelage / Getty Images

“I TEACH MUSIC and theater, so it was a little difficult to teach via an online platform. I started an initiative called ‘Worship Wednesdays,’ and I took over our school’s Instagram Live page. We started with vocal warmups and a song where the kids could move around—I choreographed the dances myself. Then I went through another two or three songs. We set it up so kids can request to appear on the screen with you, so I’d have some of them come and sing that way.

What I noticed is that students were seeking engagement with each other. The Instagram Live thing was cool because they got to interact. They couldn’t see each other’s faces but they could engage in a chat. Growing up is all about interacting with your peers, and so they had been missing out on that opportunity.

Courtney Ariel 6-08-2020

Photo by YouVersion on Unsplash

To my acquaintance, and white people who need to hear it, I say this lovingly and from a place of abundance, without scarcity: I know you are hurting too. You are human. But this is not about your pain.

Anti-extradition bill protesters use trolleys to stop passengers from entering the security gates during a mass demonstration after a woman was shot in the eye, at the Hong Kong international airport. August 13, 2019. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu

Police and protesters clashed at Hong Kong's international airport on Tuesday after flights were disrupted for a second day as the political crisis in the former British colony deepened.

Extinction Rebellion protesters at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow, Scotland / Wattie Cheung / Camera Press / Redux

“FOR A LONG TIME, people were scared to talk about climate change in its stark reality because they thought people weren’t ready to hear that story. But after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued its 2018 report laying out the situation we’re in with the climate, Extinction Rebellion started a movement to tell the truth and act as if that truth is real.

Activist Pastor Evan Mawarire is taken into a vehicle by police outside his home in Harare, Zimbabwe, Jan. 16, 2019. REUTERS/Philimon Bulawayo/File Photo

A Zimbabwean activist pastor detained in a security crackdown following violent anti-government protests asked the High Court on Friday to release him on bail but the judge said he would only be able to make a decision next week.

Adam Joyce 1-11-2019

Detroit, Mich. - June 26, 2018: Congressional candidate Rashida Tlaib speaks in protest against the supreme court's ruling on the Muslim ban. Shutterstock / Stephanie Kenner

Today, civility policing is just one more layer of rhetorical fog which obscures the truth of our political reality ─ how poverty and cruelty are manufactured and sustained by the policy regime of America’s ruling class. In reality, the Trump tax cut is uncivil, the American support of Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen is uncivil, the prison-industrial complex is uncivil, ripping families apart at the border is uncivil.

Federal air traffic controller union members protest the partial U.S. federal government shutdown in a rally at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., Jan. 10, 2019. REUTERS/Jonathan Erns

Hundreds of furloughed federal employees chanting "we want to work" gathered for a union-led march to the White House on Thursday, the 20th day of a partial government shutdown over U.S. President Donald Trump's demand for border wall funding.

"Hey, hey, ho, ho, shutdown's got to go" protesters shouted as they assembled in the bitter cold outside of the AFL-CIO union headquarters, hoisting signs reading "Trump: End the Shutdown," "Reopen Govt" and "Let Me Do My Job."

the Web Editors 5-14-2018

A Palestinian demonstrator reacts during a protest against U.S. embassy move to Jerusalem and ahead of the 70th anniversary of Nakba, at the Israel-Gaza border in the southern Gaza Strip May 14, 2018. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa

U.S. President Donald Trump announced last December plans to relocate the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, in a move to recognize Jersualem as the capital of Israel, upending decades of U.S. policy and outraging Palestinians.

Sean Hawkey 2-13-2018

'We stand on the front line, between the protesters and the military. We take photographs of what happens. We see how people are beaten, and taken. And we know that when people are taken, they are often not taken to a police station, but somewhere else where they are beaten, often to try to get information from them, and then later, and hour or two later, they are taken to a police station. Some arrived injured, their heads or hands broken, with burns. We try to take photographs as people are being arrested, and also as they arrive at police stations, to compare the condition they leave and arrive in. The soldiers cover their identity, they all wear ski masks, but the vehicles they use can often be identified."

Pope Francis speaks at the La Moneda Presidential Palace in Santiago, Chile, Jan. 16, 2018. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi
 

Pope Francis publicly expressed "pain and shame" on Tuesday over the rape and molestation of children by priests in Chile and later listened, prayed, and cried at a private meeting with victims.

the Web Editors 10-20-2017

Image via Shutterstock.com/Katherine Welles

The three white nationalists, Tyler Tenbrink, William Fears, and Colton Fears, were charged with attempted homicide by Gainesville police.

the Web Editors 10-19-2017

Image via Reuters/Abdi Sheikh.

In the aftermath of a Oct. 14 truck bombing that killed over 300 people in Mogadishu, Somalia, thousands of people took to the capital's streets in response to mayor Thabit Abdi's call to unity, according to The Guardian. 

Image via Gino Santa Maria/ Shutterstock 

The test for religious leaders in this context has been nothing short of a demand for a prophetic voice which sees, names, and challenges the reality of a system that destroys the lives of some while parading as “law and order” for others. Faith leaders are finding themselves tangled in a quagmire of competing rhetoric about what makes for peace, walking the line of proclaiming prophetic vision amid a culture, a church, and a people tightly wrapped in the clutches of white supremacy.

Mark Longhurst 8-09-2017

Image via Ken Wolter/ Shutterstock.com

So much in the world needs to change, but the people doing the most to change the world are often zealous. I know I was — and self-righteous, too. Yet perpetual effort to forge a new world did not heal my soul; rather, it deepened my soul’s sense of separation from love. To put it theologically, a friend involved with left-wing Catholic Worker style communities describes a subtle culture of “not enough,” as communal embodiment of what Martin Luther called “works-righteousness.”

the Web Editors 2-10-2017

Image via Fibonacci Blue/flickr.com

In recent days more than 100 undocumented immigrants have reportedly been detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agents. Texas Observer reports that as many as five immigrants were detained on Feb. 9. According to the Los Angeles Times, immigration activists claim that about 100 people have been taken into custody by ICE this week, resulting in a protest in downtown Los Angeles. And news of the arrest and deportation of Guadalupe Garcia de Rayos — a mother who was previously convicted for using false papers to gain employment and afterward obeyed an order to report to ICE every six months — have circulated through social media and news outlets.

the Web Editors 12-16-2016

N.C. Democratic governor-elect Ray Cooper.

Hundreds of people gathered in the state's capital during the special session in protest of what they describe as a “power grab.”

 

Image via RNS/Reuters/Enrique De La Osa

Pwint Phyu Latt is a Muslim peace activist in Burma who sought to promote interfaith relations with Buddhists, the nation’s religious majority. She was sentenced this year to two years in prison and two more years of hard labor.

Gulmira Imin is a Uighur Muslim in China who led the 2009 Uighur protests against its communist government. She has been in prison ever since.

the Web Editors 12-07-2016

Image via Stephen Melkisethian/flickr.com

On Dec. 6, protests ensued at Texas A&M University during an on-campus speech from Richard Spencer, a white nationalist and the self-proclaimed head of the so-called "alt-right" movement, reports the Houston Chronicle. Protesters were met with — and pushed by — law enforcement officials in riot gear and riding on horseback.