our hands are red

Yesterday, a group of us girls were eating dinner in the cafeteria. Feryal came in and joined the table, upset by something. She told us she had just posted on Facebook, this photo and post: 


"One of the greatest lies that we can believe is that there is no threat. That the threat to women and girls is no longer there, that we can stop fighting for our voices to be heard. Citizens are dying while protesting authorities who did not respond to the brutal rape and murder of a young girl, Zainab Amin, in Pakistan. There is something so critically wrong when little girls are made to fight for other little girls, learning about the realities of their victimhood at such a young age. Although most of us are offered the privilege of ignoring stories like this because we do not experience them, we must not take it. Our "human rights" in North America mean nothing if we stop here. We are only 7% of the 7.6 billion people on earth that deserve to live in the same freedom. It is so much easier to go through life pretending that this doesn't exist. But I challenge you - do not respond in silence for the sake of your comfort. We are not free if the world is in chains." 


We started talking about what can we do? It's paralyzing, the injustices of the world. And perhaps worst of all, we struggle to actually feel it, feel it like it was our sister or our daughter. Whether it's refugees drowning in the Mediterranean, millions of children dying from preventable diseases, or women sold for sex all over the world, we've become desensitized. And in our desensitization, we've become silent. And in our silence, we've become complicit in the oppression itself. We, the most privileged people in the world, have so often sat back and done nothing. 


We stopped. We asked God to show us something, give us some idea of what to do from here. And then we started sharing what we were thinking, seeing, feeling. 


We read Isaiah 1, where God is angry with Israel because in spite of their religion and all their appearances of good, they have neglected the things God truly wants. 



"Bring no more vain offerings;
    incense is an abomination to me.
New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations—
    I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly.
14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts
    my soul hates;
they have become a burden to me;
    I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands,
    I will hide my eyes from you;
even though you make many prayers,
    I will not listen;
    your hands are full of blood.
16 Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean;
    remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,
17     learn to do good;
seek justice,
    correct oppression;
bring justice to the fatherless,
    plead the widow's cause."

Isaiah 1:13-17 (emphasis mine)



So we're deciding to start a movement, a wake-up call. This is our goal: 

Our silence silences the voiceless. Our apathy victimizes the vulnerable. Our hands are full of blood. Therefore we are devoted to becoming people who refuse to walk in ignorance of the injustices committed against our brothers and sisters, choosing to take responsibility for the guilt of our silence by repenting, mourning, and seeking justice.


And so we are choosing to take the season of Lent (from Ash Wednesday until Easter) to ask God to help us become people who care. People whose hearts are broken by what breaks God's heart. People who mourn with those who mourn. People who God can use to go make an impact. We will do something each week to raise awareness, but most importantly to constantly remind us of the gravity of injustice and the value of each life.

More will be shared soon, and I hope and pray you will be involved. It will be heavy; we've asked God to break our hearts for what breaks His, and that will be painful - excruciating, I've learned. But the grief and heartbreak that I have walked through for my dad is the same grief that people are feeling everywhere. So many go unacknowledged. And if each human is my brother and my sister, my mother and my father, then I must grieve with them.

I can't handle that much grief. I trust that Jesus will give me as much of his heart as I am capable of walking through, only with Him. Only with Him.