SAINT MARK'S EPISCOPAL CATHEDRAL

Dear Friends,

I write today to share the sad news that the cathedral façade was vandalized during the night.

The photo below shows the message, which is clearly intended to incite us to some similar reaction of negativity and anger, but those are not the emotions I feel on seeing their message. I am saddened by their destructive impulse, which will cause us to clean the surface and repaint it at considerable expense. I find myself grateful that their message did not target a group of individuals based on race, orientation, or identity, using derogatory terms for injurious purposes. In the hours since seeing this early this morning, I find myself prayerful—for those whose lives are filled with such hatred that they can justify desecrating a church, for this community that we might bring the fullness of our hearts and souls into this call to be the Body of Christ (even when some in the world choose to hate us), and for this nation whose political discourse seems to condone acts such as this vandalism as justifiable in the course of partisan disagreements. And if I am honest, I am a bit amused by the graffiti—as if the perpetrators think they will have accomplished something by doing this. We are a community that holds a broad swath of political opinions, and we are the richer for that diversity. And I am hopeful, that their crime will only strengthen our resolve to be the Body of Christ in a broken, hurting world .

The irony is not lost on me that they did this on the heels of this nation’s annual observance of the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his cause of non-violence and justice for all. We can debate how best to engage that work, but we cannot conclude that the work of civil rights is complete. As the prophet Amos said, and Dr. King wrote from his cell in the Birmingham jail: “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.” We have work to do, my friends, in the cause of justice. Let us do so in God’s name, with courage and faithfulness, and let us remember that that arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. I am,

Your Brother in Christ,

The Very Reverend Steven L. Thomason

Dean and Rector