Invoking Justice:

An Interfaith Service of Public Witness

to Welcome the 88th Texas Legislature

January 10, 2023

Videos from the Interfaith Service of Public Witness

Creator of Us All:

Since you made us and we are Your children, help us to act like brothers and sisters.

We are ordinary people

Gathered in extraordinary circumstances

To help create laws that will touch every living creature in this great state:

Lobbyists and lumbermen; oil field hands and office workers

Herefords and Santa Gertudis; Longhorns and Aggies; Highland Parkers and Dime Boxers; 

Lawyers, doctors, engineers, cotton pickers, road builders, migrant workers

Corporate giants and dependent children of the unemployed; armadillos and golden cheeked warblers.

When the back rooms fill with tension and the lobbyist buffets bulge our waists and dull our sensitivities… And when pressure and deadlines push us to the breaking point…

Remind us that Your ultimate and resolute involvement in history

Always comes down on the side of Love, Justice and Mercy

Especially for the poor…the lame…the oppressed…and the orphan.

And when we find it uncomfortable to live with Your priorities, perhaps we will not so lightly invite you to be present among us.     

Bless the members of the Texas Legislature, the lobbyists, their secretaries, the pages, the sergeant-at-arms, the doorkeepers, and all who labor in this place. May the work of our minds, hands, and hearts be offered as our sacrifice of love to You. 

And we all say Amen.

It helps, now and then, to step back and take a long view.

The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is even beyond our vision.

We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent

enterprise that is God’s work. Nothing we do is complete, which is a way of

saying that the Kingdom always lies beyond us.

No statement says all that could be said.

No prayer fully expresses our faith.

No confession brings perfection.

No pastoral visit brings wholeness.

No program accomplishes the Church’s mission.

No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about:

We plant the seeds that one day will grow.

We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.

We lay foundations that will need further development.

We provide yeast that produces far beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.

This enables us to do something, and to do it very well.

It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an

opportunity for the Lord’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders; ministers, not messiahs.

We are prophets of a future not our own.

Prayer of St. Francis

Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace;

Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon;

Where there is error, the truth; where there is doubt, the faith;

Where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light;

And where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek

To be consoled, as to console; to be understood, as to understand;

To be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;

And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

If We Can Hear

A prayer by Rabbi Richard Levy

If we can hear the words from Sinai then love will flow from us;

and we shall serve all that is holy

with all our intellect and all our passion and all our life.

If we can serve all that is holy,

we shall be doing all that humans can

to help the rains to flow, the grasses to be green, the grains to be golden like the sun,

and the rivers to be filled with life once more.

All the children of God shall eat and there will be enough.

But if we turn from Sinai’s words

and serve only what is common and profane,

making gods of our own comfort or power,

then the holiness of life will contract for us;

our world will grow inhospitable.

Let us therefore lace these words

into our passion and our intellect,

and bind them as a sign upon our hands and eyes. Let us write them in mezuzot upon our doors, and teach them to our children.

Let us honor the generations that came before us, keeping the promise for those yet to be.

Every discussion, 

every decision about the use of our institutional resources or power 

is a reflection of what we value. 

Our recognition of the interdependent web of life of which we are all a part, 

of the inherent worth and dignity of every person, 

and of the call to promote justice, equity and compassion in human relations 

compels us to honor our common humanity, our shared responsibility, 

and our commitment to all who are part of the One. 

May it be so.

“In this century and in any century,

Our deepest hope, our most tender prayer,

Is that we learn to listen.

May we listen to one another in openness and mercy

May We listen to our own hearts in love and forgiveness

May we listen to God in quietness and awe.

And in this listening,

Which is boundless in its beauty,

May we find the wisdom to cooperate

With a healing spirit, a divine spirit

Who beckons us into peace and community and creativity.

We do not ask for a perfect world.

But we do ask for a better world.

We ask for deep listening. “

In my tradition, we follow a crucified carpenter. In the gospel of Luke, that carpenter tells a crowd of the forgotten, the persecuted, the oppressed:

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.”

These are strange words. How can the poor, the hungry, and the brokenhearted be blessed? Isn’t it the rich and the powerful and the successful who are blessed?

That’s what our world tells us. But this carpenter is building a new world in which everyone counts—especially those who have been left out. This new world is where we put the people at the margin at the center. That’s the new world, the beloved community, the kingdom of God that we must build together.

What would Jesus do if He visited the Texas Legislature? I think he would tell us:

Blessed are the trans children who are bullied.

Blessed are the new moms who are kicked off their healthcare.

Blessed are the construction workers who are denied a water break.

Blessed are the prisoners who are locked in windowless cells without air conditioning.

I think Jesus would flip over our fancy desks and demand that we take care of all of our neighbors, especially the lost the last and the least. Because once we love them, as we love ourselves, thy kingdom will come. Thank you and God bless you.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,

my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

for He has looked with favor on His humble servant.

He has mercy on those who fear Him

in every generation.

We suffer when community structures and systems fail

We worry we are leaving future generations an unlivable world

We retreat when we can’t identify easy solutions

He has shown the strength of his arm,

He has scattered the proud in their conceit.

Parents of trans kids fear for their children’s safety

Parents of color fear for their children’s safety

Parents fear for their children’s safety

He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,

and has lifted up the humble.

Mothers die in pregnancy and childbirth

Prisoners are denied justice 

The poor go hungry

He has filled the hungry with good things,

and the rich He has sent away empty.

Workers struggle to afford housing

Families struggle to find respite

Communities struggle to overcome conflict

He has come to the help of His servant Israel

for He has remembered his promise of mercy,

the promise He made to our fathers,

to Abraham and his children for ever.

We are Our Neighbors’ Keepers

How many go hungry in this State:

• hungry for equality, for voting rights, for affordable housing, for citizenship or asylum, for a cleaner environment, for safety from gun violence, and for justice

How many of our neighbors go hungry without these, while so many of us go to sleep full?

We are Establishers and Sustainers of Justice

Among the many names and attributes of God in Islam include:

• Al Hakam, the Giver of Justice, and
• Al ‘Adl, the One Who is always just and never unjust

God says in the Qur’an:

• O you who believe, stand firmly for and uphold justice, as witnesses for God, even if it be against oneself, one’s parents, or one’s family and community.
• To establish and maintain the balance of justice, and to not transgress the balance with injustice
• For indeed, God commands justice, kindness, and the doing of good to and for one another

And God tells us:

• I have forbidden injustice for Myself, and I have forbidden it among you, so do not oppress one another

But how often do we see ourselves, if not committing, at least being complicit to injustice?

We are Those Who Speak for Those Who Cannot

The Prophet Muhammad taught that one of us sees an injustice or an evil or a wrong, that we strive to change it with our hands, or with our words, or at the least, with our hearts.

He taught that the best kind of struggle one can undertake is speaking a word of truth, a word of justice, a good word to an oppressor and unjust ruler.

God reminds us in the Qur’an that we have been raised for the benefit of and service to humanity, that we enjoin in what is right, cooperating in good, and forbid that which is harmful, not perpetuating injustice.

God also reminds us that among the signs of God is the diversity of our tongues and of our colors, that our differences in our cultures, ethnicities, and persons are cause for unity, for better understanding, and to know one another, and not to hurt, harm, or oppress each other.

Yet how often have we let our differences not only divide us, but causes for harm towards one another, rather than unity and cooperation?

Verily, to God we belong, collectively, and to God we will return, collectively, accountable for that which we said and did, as well as that which we did not say or do.

We ask in humble prayer, as children in humanity, creation of the Divine:

• May the God of Mercy and Compassion, Ar Rahman, Ar Raheem, enable us to be merciful and compassionate, to instill mercy and compassion in our world, and to not be of those who deprive it of these
• May the God of Justice and Accountability, Al Hakam, Al Haseeb, enable us to be sustainers of justice and accountable in all of our actions, to persist in the fight for justice, and to not be oppressive, unjust, or unmindful.
• And May the God of Love and Truth, Al Wadud, Al Haqq, enable us to be those who spread love and speak truth, and to not be driven by hate or by falsehood.

Ameen, Amen

God in the Spirit revealed in Jesus Christ,

calls us by grace

   to be renewed in the image of our Creator, that we may be one

   in divine love for the world.

Today is the day

God cares for the integrity of creation,

   wills the healing and wholeness of all life,

   weeps at the plunder of earth’s goodness.

Today is the day

God embraces all hues of humanity,

   delights in diversity and difference,

   favors solidarity transforming strangers into friends.

Today is the day

God cries with the masses of starving people,

   despises growing disparity between rich and poor,

   demands justice for workers in the marketplace.

Today is the day

God deplores violence in our homes and streets,

   rebukes the world’s warring madness,

   humbles the powerful and lifts up the lowly.

Today is the day

God calls for nations and peoples to live in peace,

   celebrates where justice and mercy embrace,

   exults when the wolf grazes with the lamb.

Today is the day

God brings good news to the poor,

   proclaims release to the captives,

   gives sight to the blind, and sets the oppressed free.