It was an honor to share in offering an interfaith invocation at the Women’s March rally at the State House on Saturday, January 19. I spoke alongside Asma Elhuni and Auburn Watersong. Asma is a proud Muslim women who came to the United States as a child. She moved to the Upper Valley a year and half ago and is currently working as Lead Organizer for United Valley Interfaith Project organizing around immigration and economic justice. Auburn is an Abenaki Woman, Episcopal Priest, Mother, Advocate and Activist. She works as the Policy Director at the Vermont Network and as the Priest Associate at Christ Episcopal Church in Montpelier.

This is the portion I shared:

I join my sisters Asma and Auburn this morning standing before you as a proud Filipina woman, daughter of immigrants, mother, and Unitarian Universalist minister.

As prophets of the resistance, we draw upon the power within ourselves,
We draw upon the power within this collective gathering,
We draw upon the power of our Source, the Divine, Gaia, the Ever-Living Spirit of Justice and Love.

This power is moving here, now, can you feel it?

As we gather this morning [as sisters, siblings, survivors, comrades, companions, and allies,]
let us unite together honoring one another’s power and right to claim our own agency
to fight for the freedom we seek to realize.

Let us unite together at the intersection of our many identities, our many struggles, our many visions of freedom.
In this gathering today, we are Christian, pagan, atheist, humanist, Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim,
We are native to this land, we are immigrants and children and grandchildren of immigrants,
We are healers, storytellers, artists, and organizers,
We are first-wave, second-wave and third-wave feminists,
We are people of all abilities, cisgendered and transgendered, gay and straight,
We gather at the messy and beautiful intersection of our many identities and our many visions of liberation
Committed to staying in the struggle together no matter how hard it gets.

As we join together, let us be prophets of resistance who with one hand say NO to the denigration and violence against women.
Let us say NO to white supremacy, anti-semitism, Islamophobia, and xenophobia.
Let us say NO to the accumulation of wealth by the few at the cost of the many,
Let us say NO to the devastation of our precious Mother Earth,
Let us say NO to empire and tyranny.

And with the other hand, let us say YES to the power of our prophetic resistance,
Let us say YES to welcome, inclusion, and Beloved Community,
Let us say YES to a moral economy and work that is valued and dignified,
Let us say YES to the stewardship of our planet and her resources,
Let us say YES to rising together for justice and freedom.

And, with the spirit of love and justice within us and among us, let us say:

WE ARE HERE. WE ARE POWERFUL. WE WILL RISE.

AsalamuAlaykum-Alaykum
Blessed be.
Amen.