A new justice cycle begins for MORE Justice @ St. Martin’s
House Meetings @ St. Martin’s
Join with other folks in our parish for intimate house meetings. We share what community issues are on our hearts and learn more about justice ministry at St. Martin’s.
Thursday Sept. 8 — 6:30 PM
at David Jones’ house
Monday Sept. 12 — 6:30 PM
at Leslie Hoover’s house - Meeting Rescheduled
Friday Sept. 16 — 6:30 PM
at Leslie Hoover’s house
Sunday Sept. 18 — 11:45 AM
at St. Martin’s, hosted by David Jones
Wednesday Sept. 21 — 6:30 PM
at Mother Caitlyn’s house
Thursday Sept. 22 — noon
at St. Martin’s, hosted by Mother Caitlyn
Sunday Sept. 25 — 6 PM
at St. Martin’s around the firepit, hosted by Mother Caitlyn
RSVP HERE
MORE Justice is a growing network of faith-based congregations in Columbia that are culturally, economically, racially, geographically and religiously diverse – coming together to fulfill our scriptural mandate to “do justice” and make the Central Midlands area a more just place to live for all people.
St. Martin’s works together with other congregations to empower marginalized people and act powerfully to address serious community-wide problems through direct action. We accomplish this by identifying a problem, doing research, educating the public, and publicly addressing the root causes of, and solutions to, poverty and injustice in our communities. Issues that MORE Justice and St. Martin’s work on locally include affordable housing, gun violence, and mental health. Each year, through the grassroots process that begin in each congregation, a new issue is identified and lifted up.
House meetings are being held at St. Martin’s throughout September. Pick one meeting to attend to learn more about our justice ministry and put your faith into action.
How does MORE Justice work?
In the Fall, Team Leaders host House Meetings to discuss community problems that are directly impacting people. At the Community Problems Assembly, members vote on which problem areas to prioritize for the year. Issue Committees are formed to conduct research into those problems, and ultimately come up with specific, winnable solutions. At our Nehemiah Action in the spring, thousands gather to ask public officials to implement these solutions. After the Nehemiah Action, leaders follow up on the commitments made at the Action, and members are invited to invest in MORE Justice.
Who was Nehemiah? What is a “Nehemiah” Action?
In 5th chapter of the Old Testament book of Nehemiah, the Prophet Nehemiah returns to Jerusalem to find his people being exploited. During a terrible drought and famine, a group of moneylenders began capitalizing off of the Israelites desperation by enticing them to buy loans with high interest rates. When the Israelites defaulted on their loans, they were forced to sell their children into slavery (Nehemiah 5:1-5).
Instead of practicing mercy ministry by providing direct service in order to alleviate his people's immediate needs, Nehemiah understood the problem stemmed from a unjust system and the root cause had to be addressed with systemic change. In doing this, Nehemiah was practicing justice ministry.
Nehemiah used his influence to coordinate a "great assembly" where a large Israelites called out the moneylenders for their foul practices. Upon seeing the great numbers gathered to hold them accountable, the moneylenders publicly promised to abandon their practices of usury and to return to the people all that they had taken unjustly.
Every year, MORE Justice recreates the "Great Assembly" Nehemiah led by holding our own Action Assembly.
Like in Nehemiah 5, the assembly addresses public officials and powerful decision makers and asks them to publicly commit to use their positions of authority to address our community’s problems.
