On Sunday (Oct. 27), I learned what it feels like when a little-known band gets to play a set as a warm-up act for a superstar. In this case, the main attraction was Rev. William Barber II and the stage was The Riverside Church in New York City.
Bible study and book club groups at Riverside had spent the previous five weeks reading and discussing Baptizing America. They’ve been reading the book I co-authored as part of their monthslong emphasis called “Faith Over Fear: Road To and Through the Election.” And I got to join them for the conclusion of the book study.
I started Sunday morning off with a class that read Baptizing America. We had an engaging hour of dialogue about issues in the book and beyond. Then after the worship service featuring a sermon by Barber on the critical issues in this last sprint toward Election Day, I gave a “lunch and learn” lecture about Christian Nationalism. That was followed by another time of Q&A and the signing of some books (and I got Rev. Adriene Thorne, Riverside’s senior minister, to sign her foreword in my copy).
As I was talking about historical and present-day Christian Nationalism, a large rally started about 4.5 miles south of the church. This campaign event for Donald Trump at Madison Square Garden mixed in some Christian Nationalism with lots of racist, misogynistic, and crude remarks. Reading reports about the rally as I rode the bus toward the airport Sunday evening and sat at my gate waiting to board, I was struck by the whiplash from hearing Barber preach about the importance of speaking out for “the least of these” to reading about how speakers at the Trump rally made explicit comments about the alleged sexual activities of Latino immigrants, attacked Puerto Rico, used racist tropes about Black people, made misogynistic comments about Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton, and labeled Harris both the devil and the antichrist.
Although coincidental in timing, the remarks by Barber and Trump in New York City on Sunday offer quite a contrast ahead of next week’s elections. One of the nation’s leading preachers stood in a historic mainline Protestant church that has hosted significant prophetic sermons while one of the nation’s main presidential candidates held an event in an arena that hosted a Nazi rally 85 years earlier with a similar “pro-American” message. So this issue of A Public Witness journeys to the Big Apple to consider two appeals for people to raise their voices and votes.
Left: Brian Kaylor gives a presentation at The Riverside Church in New York City on Oct. 27, 2024. Right: Rev. William Barber and Brian Kaylor inside The Riverside Church. (Kagan Kaylor/Word&Way)
‘Speak Now!’
Rev. William Barber II is one of the most prominent preachers in the U.S. today. A Disciples of Christ minister, he led Greenleaf Christian Church in Goldsboro, North Carolina, for 30 years. He left that pulpit last year to become the founding director of the Center for Public Theology & Public Policy at Yale Divinity School. During his time in North Carolina, he gained a national profile after launching the “Moral Mondays” movement in 2013. Then the head of the North Carolina NAACP chapter, Barber brought together thousands of people from dozens of organizations to march to the statehouse. As they protested cuts to education, attempts to limit voting rights, and policies harming the poor, hundreds of marchers were arrested during the acts of peaceful civil disobedience.
“He communicates the message of the South with a power I had heard only in recordings of Dr. Martin Luther King,” minister and author Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove said in 2013.
In 2017, Barber stepped aside from his state NAACP leadership to focus on building a national “Poor People’s Campaign,” named in honor of one of the last projects King worked on before his assassination in 1968. The effort has led to numerous rallies and other efforts, including gatherings at state Capitols in March and near the U.S. Capitol in June. Last month, Barber helped lead a faith vigil in Springfield, Ohio, after Trump and other political figures demonized Haitian migrants who live there. And he appears in Bad Faith, a new documentary about Christian Nationalism.
Ahead of Barber preaching on Sunday, his appearance was billed as “a national sermon” about the stakes in the 2024 election “for faith communities and our democracy.” Delivering such a message at Riverside makes sense given its rich history as one of the nation’s more prominent churches. Dually aligned with the American Baptist Churches USA and the United Church of Christ, its pastors have included Harry Emerson Fosdick, William Sloane Coffin, James Forbes, and other towering figures in mainline Protestant life. Other significant voices have also preached there, including Martin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela, and Tony Campolo.
At the start of his sermon on Sunday, Barber stressed he would not endorse any candidate in his sermon because he does not think that’s appropriate from the pulpit. But he added, “I did come to endorse what thus saith the Lord.”
Barber read from Isaiah 58, where God tells the prophet to “raise your voice like a trumpet.” He noted that in Hebrew, the word found in the text for “voice” also today can mean “vote.” Someone’s vote is also their voice, he explained.
Screengrab as Rev. William Barber preaches at The Riverside Church in New York City on Oct. 27, 2024.
“In Isaiah 58 things were rough,” he said. “Faith had been hijacked in a bad way. Religious nationalism had caused faith to be turned into merely a ritualistic notion, faith with no prophetic voice to the nation or to the leaders. Things were bad and the prophet is called by God to say real piety and real religion is not just what you do in a worship service. It’s not just going through the motions. But real piety and real religion must lift up a voice like a trumpet to the nation and declare a word against the injustices and call for correction and remind people that piety without a principle of justice is not what God is looking for.”
He connected that dire situation needing a prophetic voice to the current context in the United States.
“What I want to talk about this morning is if we ever needed a voice and a vote, we sure do need it now,” Barber said. “Why is it that we can’t be silent? If we ever needed a voice and a vote we need it now because who would have thought that fascism would have to be used to describe our politics or portions of our politics?”
Barber addressed specific issues he believed showed the need for Christians to use their voice and vote today, including calls to deport people, skyrocketing CEO pay while workers can’t make a living wage, efforts to block people from healthcare access, and attempts to limit voting rights. And he criticized the media for not asking about poverty in any of the presidential debates.
“Proverbs says, ‘Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. Speak up and judge fairly. Defend the rights of the poor and the needy,’” he said. “If we ever needed to use our vote and use our voice we sure do need to do it now. We can’t forfeit our voice, Riverside, because if we do, our silence makes us accessories to the crimes.”
After telling a story about a would-be bride who later thanked someone who stopped a wedding by objecting when the officiant asked if anyone had a reason, Barber urged congregants to speak out against injustices.
“We need to speak up with our voices. If you know a candidate’s policies are going to hurt rather than help, it’s time to speak up now or forever hold your peace. Let your voice and your vote be heard. Speak now for love or forever hold your peace. Speak now for justice or forever hold your peace. Speak now for mercy with your vote and your voice or forever hold your peace. Speak now for voting rights, speak now for the general welfare, speak now for the common defense, speak now for the poor. Speak now, speak now, speak now for ‘the least of these!’”
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‘Fight!’
As Barber preached, a crowd started filling Madison Square Garden just a few miles south of the church. But they were gathering on this Lord’s Day to cheer hateful remarks at a campaign rally.
Stand-up comic Tony Hinchcliffe attacked Puerto Rico as “literally a floating island of garbage.” He also made crude comments claiming Latinos “love making babies” as he crassly compared their sex lives with their attempts to cross the border. Radio personality Sid Rosenberg attacked Hillary Clinton as “a sick son of a b****.” Businessman Grant Cardone made a misogynistic attack on Harris’s sex life that was echoed by shirts worn by many in the crowd. Commentator Tucker Carlson mocked Harris’s mixed-race heritage and called her “low IQ.” He also gave support to the “great replacement theory,” a racist anti-immigrant position espoused by White nationalists. Trump echoed those sentiments as he claimed there is a “migrant invasion of our country” as he made false claims about Harris importing people from mental institutions. He also pledged to “defeat” those he called “the enemy from within” who disagree with his policies.
Another speaker was sanitation worker David Rem, who was billed as Trump’s “childhood friend” (though they may not have actually met until a few weeks ago and he’s 20 years younger than Trump). Rem called Harris both “the devil” and “the antichrist” (which is theologically absurd since they are different beings and both are referred to in the texts with male pronouns). He demonized Harris because “at her rally last week, she said that ‘Jesus Christ’s followers are not welcome at my rally.’” That allegation is based on a lie; Harris did not actually say what he claimed and she was not responding to a shout of “Jesus is Lord!” but instead to shouts of “Lies!”
“I think that President Trump loves Jesus’s followers at his rally,” Rem added as he held up a crucifix to applause. “And I think that President Trump, in what he has experienced, knows that Jesus Christ is king.”
“We need to make New York red!” he added while still waving the crucifix in the air. “And I want to say I love you, President Trump! … I love you, Donald! God bless America! And God bless the United States of America! USA! USA! USA!”
David Rem speaks during a Donald Trump campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in New York City on Oct. 27, 2024. (Alex Brandon/Associated Press)
That wasn’t the only way religion mixed with partisan rhetoric at the rally. The opening prayer was delivered by a co-founder of Moms for Liberty, a group formed to fight mask and vaccine mandates in public schools and that has since led efforts to ban books about racism and LGBTQ issues. With uniformed New York City firefighters on stage behind her, Tiffany Justice declared in her prayer that the U.S.’s founders followed God’s “guidance” in creating the nation and thanked God for leaders who work to protect the Constitution.
“Father, we ask for a deep-rooted love for America in our hearts,” she said in a prayer frequently interrupted by applause as she prayed for Trump and the nation. “Let us remember that this great land was built on the foundation of faith, hope, and love.”
Justice thanked God for sparing Trump from an assassination attempt in July, adding, “We give you the credit and honor for protecting this man who has promised to ‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’” And as she prayed for Trump and other Republicans to win, she said, “We pray that as our people go to the polls that you will deliver us a victory so great and wonderful that all will be amazed at the work of your hand.”
As newspaper headlines and TV reports highlighted the racist, misogynistic, and crude remarks at the rally, Trump met Monday with charismatic and evangelical pastors in Georgia. As he mocked evangelist Franklin Graham for suggesting he curse less at rallies, Trump said that “last night we had a great rally at Madison Square Garden.” The room of pastors erupted in applause and cheers.
As the pastors cheered Trump and his rally, I recalled Barber’s sermon from Sunday morning.
“What do you do when everything the Lord hates has seeped into our politics?” Barber said. “Let me read to you what the Lord hates, and try to make it clear a little bit more why if we ever needed your voice, if we ever needed your vote we need it now. Proverbs 6 says this, ‘There are six things that the Lord hates and seven that are detestable to God: proud eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, hearts that devise wicked schemes, feet that are quick to rush to evil, false witnesses who lie against their people around them, and a person who stirs up conflict.’ All seven things that God hates have seeped their way into our politics.”
As a public witness,
Brian Kaylor
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