Making a Difference

​Written by Priscilla Berg, CtK Member
 
This time of social distancing in response to a pandemic has made us long for the time when we can gather again as a Christian community.  At the same time, it is made clear that church is not a building.  We, as God’s people, live our Christian lives and witness beyond the walls of a physical place.
 
Christ the King has a long history of supporting the needs of our community.  The weekly Herald newsletter highlights many of those needs. The Social Ministry Team encourages you to read those highlights carefully and consider how you might be involved.  Here are two that serve our immediate neighborhood:
 
Ralph Reeder Food Shelf has had a 30% increase in demand.  The needs will only increase now that children don’t have access to school meals.  Unfortunately our SUNNY program, which in the past has tried to fill some of that gap, had to be cancelled this summer due to COVID-19 concerns. If you would like to donate to Ralph Reeder you can mail a check to: 2544 Mounds View Blvd, Mounds View, MN. 55112 or do so online at: https://www.moundsviewschools.org/Page/173
 
The Community Support Center (CSC) works to prevent homelessness by preventing evictions and working long-term with participants to move toward stability.  The CSC has continued to work with participants via Zoom or conference phone calls. The CSC expects a surge of demand when the emergency moratorium on evictions ends. Thanks to those of you who donated to the online “Un-luncheon” in lieu of the CSC annual fundraiser.  Donations can be made to the Community Support Center, 1600 Silver Lake Road Northwest, New Brighton, MN. 55112.
 
I have long had a quotation from Martin Luther King above my desk.  It’s from his “Mountaintop” speech on April 3, 1968, one day before his assassination. It reads:
 
It’s all right to talk about “long white robes over yonder”, in all of its symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear down here! It’s all right to talk about “streets flowing with milk and honey”, but God has commanded us to be concerned about slums down here, and his children who can’t eat three square meals a day. It’s all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God’s preacher must talk about the new New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennesee (the new New Brighton). This is what we must do.
 
As I have watched a resurgence of activism for racial justice following the killing of George Floyd and the recent Supreme Court decisions providing protections for LGBTQ individuals, and at least temporary protection for DACA “dreamers”, I have renewed hope that we as individual Christians and as a Christian community can look for those places where God moves us to make a difference.