The faculty and staff of North Park Theological Seminary offer the following statement in response to our current national climate. Though we write primarily to our students, we hope to bless our larger community of faith as we all engage in dialogue, discernment, and action.
The United States has experienced a contentious election and post-election season marked by fear, polarization, and violence. The political climate reveals longstanding national sins of racism, elevation of whiteness, misogyny, nativism, and economic disparity. As faculty and staff members of North Park Theological Seminary who represent varying degrees of privilege and power, we join our voices with those who are most vulnerable.
We submit to the Lordship of Christ who humbled himself unto death. As members of his body, we strive to consider others above ourselves (Phil. 2:2–8) and to serve one another in humility (Matt. 20:26–28). As one body, if one member suffers, all suffer (1 Cor. 12:26); if one weeps, the body laments with them (Rom. 12:15).
A large part of our community is weeping. The fear of deportation is real. The anxiety of being assaulted is real. The fear of being forgotten or mistreated is real. Many people of color, women, and other marginalized groups feel increasingly alienated not only in the political context but in much of the white evangelical culture as well.
Regardless of where Christians stand politically, the gospel demands we recognize vulnerable populations among us who find themselves further marginalized in the wake of the recent election. The gospel also demands that Christians recognize ways we benefit from and participate in structural injustices. Ignoring policies that denigrate and even endanger vulnerable groups is not a faithful option, even if privilege allows some to do so. When we have power, we use it justly and for the good of all.
In the midst of real suffering within our community, we seek not only to love our neighbor but to know our neighbor (Lk. 10:29), through our conversations, classroom discussions, and times of prayer. We hope to embody a community in which walls of hostility are broken down (Eph. 2:14) and where love casts out all fear (1 John 4:18).
Deb Auger
James Bruckner
Mary Chase-Ziolek
Stephen Chester
Michelle Clifton-Soderstrom
Paul de Neui
Timothy L. Johnson
David Kersten
Ellen M. Kogstad
Max Lee
Alexandria Macias
Hauna Ondrey
Amy Oxendale-Imig
Luke Palmerlee
Deborah Penny
John E. Phelan, Jr.
Elizabeth Pierre
Soong-Chan Rah
Stephen Spencer
Al Tizon
Emily Wagner
Related material | “NPTS Faculty Statement on Race & the Justice System”
Thank you for this message, which speaks to the values of Christ we should all emulate, particularly those of us who strive to be ‘Christians’.
Thank you for this sound and reasonable, caring and compassionate position.
Thank you for speaking out! Glad to stand with you
So proud to be part of and stand with a community that lives out this embodiment of the gospel. Thank you, dear professors and fellow seminarians. ?
Thank you! You make me proud to be an alum and a Christian.
When the prophetic Word of God is spoken, this is what it sounds like. Thank you.
Tack!
Thank you so much for this beautifully moving statement. You spoke to my heart. I’m so grateful for each of you and proud to be part of the North Park family.
I’m so blessed to be a part of a university that understands the anxiety this election and aftermath is causing. I’m proud of you.
If Christ is our Lord , Then we are all foreigners, here on the earth .
If you do not have familial roots in one of the Native American Indian Tribes as your heritage,, which I do not .I do not belong here
I am truly a foreigner and I am a displaced person, both because of my family ancestral background and/or nationality being European.Secondly. I have been displaced here also because of my faith and hope I have placed in Jesus. My only hope here is my Church family like people in this community..Much prayer is needed in this season.