A very personal message to our readers from Janice Matthews…

Raymond and Amelia, and Deven, of Beit Shalom Ministries are in serious need of our help. Due to their walk from Denver to DC for peace and 9/11 truth, and calling the Christian churches to account in these times of heinous, massive human rights violations in every imaginable form, they are enduring extreme oppression from the state, as they have documented in their weekly updates from the road. This oppression has now involved the state taking their 6-year-old son from them. PLEASE look at their site to see what’s happening and consider whether and how you can help–they need it right now.

Friends, this is not a “religious” matter; it is a “human” matter. Personally, I’m writing this from my heart, the heart of a mother with her own 6-year-old son… No matter your own personal spiritual affiliation, this is an example of the horrifying harassment (and what I call “police state domestic terrorism”) these courageous people–and this very sweet little boy with whom I’ve shared supper and with whom my own children have played–are facing. This same horror is being perpetrated upon many, many other children, including American-born children of the immigrants now being held indefinitely in detention centers in Texas and Pennsylvania. We must begin to see these crimes, and we must allow ourselves to act on our outrage–peacefully, insistently, intensely.

There simply must come a moment, for each of us, when the horror being heaped upon the People–human beings of all colors, nationalities, spiritual faiths, around the world–becomes personal. Truly, politics is personal. This is not about someone else, somewhere else. It’s about us. It’s happening to US. We are ‘the other’. How will we respond? How will we really stand with our brothers and sisters in this fight for truth and justice? When will we resist…? This is the struggle.