Eight days ago, at roughly 7:30 in the morning, I pulled my little Honda Fit into a parking space over at Sheldon Field, and took a deep breath. I was as prepared as I could be to lead a busload of people to the “Hands Off!” rally in Boston but, the truth is, I didn’t feel prepared at all.

I didn’t know exactly what we were walking into, where we were going, or how we would get ourselves out. I was afraid that someone in our group might get hurt or lost. There were already whispers of record size crowds and brewing opposition, icy rain and impossible traffic, none of which are my cup of tea. And it may sound silly, but I was even worried about when and where we would find bathrooms. I was happy to give a day of my life to all this, but I’m no Cory Booker. When I gotta go, I gotta go.

But most of all, I was afraid because I love you, all of you, and I had some of the best of you going with me on that bus.  I mean, can you imagine if something had happened to David while we were there or we lost Sue? What if the crowd panicked and Patti got trampled (she’s so tiny!) or someone from St. Johns fell and broke a hip? Thank God we had Dr. MJ with us! That gave me some comfort.

But how would we handle it if things got ugly or people started getting arrested? I could feel myself starting to spiral, so I reached out for help. I took a picture of my tea mug in one hand and my clipboard on my lap and posted it on Facebook with a request for prayers and support. I said a prayer myself, and then I stepped out of the car and the day began.

I unloaded snacks donated by Scott and Gayle, passed out the placards we’ve been making these past few weeks after church, and then gathered our people under a tree while we waited in the drizzle. Bus after bus arrived before ours finally got there and then 50 of us boarded and instantly bonded.

We had people from First Churches, St. Johns, Edwards, First Church Amherst, the local community, and 3 students from Smith, one of whom belongs to a U.C.C. church out in Seattle. When she told her mom she wanted to go to the rally her mom reached out to us to see if the local UCC church had anyone going who could get 3 Smithies there and back safely.

Mission accepted, Mom! Now we just needed to see it through. And so, with my heart in my throat, I stood up in the front of our bus and called everyone to attention.

“Friends,” I said, “our job today is simply to show up, and the fact that you are on this bus means that you have already done your job. There may be so many people going today that we don’t make it into Boston because of the traffic, in which case, we will have done our job. We might not make it close enough to City Hall to hear the speakers and that will be okay, because we will have done our job. Our job today is to create such a massive crowd that it will make the news and you have already done your part.”

I asked how many people had training in non-violent resistance and half the bus raised their hands. “If there is trouble, you move to the edges of our group,” I said. “If it looks like people are going to get arrested and you are trans, an immigrant, or a person of color, move to the center, and grandmas,” I said, (because we were blessed with a lot of grandmas on that bus) “This will be your Dorothy Day moment. Your job will be to surround our most vulnerable people and do what you can to keep them safe.”

We each found a buddy. We resolved to try and stick together. I sketched out the plan, we set a place and time to meet at the end of the day, and our journey began.

Shawn, the world’s best bus driver - canIgetanAMEN! -let us off at Boston Common about 2 hours later and we made our way into the crowd that was massing. You could already see that this march was going to be big. But my worst fears were immediately assuaged by the tone the leaders set from the very beginning. They made it clear that we were here for a peaceful protest. They declared that we were here because we cared about our neighbors and our job today was to take care of each other. And we did.

As the march toward city hall began, the feeling in the crowd was resolute but peaceful. There were plenty of police officers on the ground in bright yellow vests, but none in riot gear, and other than helping people cross the street, they had very little to do.

There was also plenty of anger and no small amount of snark being expressed if you looked up at the signs people carried, but it was all directed at the people in our government who are abusing their power. The people on the ground were full of love for each other, and it was clear that what had brought them out to march was not just their fear or their anger but their love for “the other.”

“Make America Kind Again,” read one sign.

“Make lying wrong again,” said another.

“Stop pretending your racism is patriotism.”

“So much destruction/such little hands.”

"Empathy is not a weakness.”

“So bad even the introverts are here.”

And my favorite “So much to say! So Little Cardboard.”

I saw signs for Mahmoud Khalil, Abrego Garcia, and Rümeysa Öztürk.

And another that declared: “The only minorities destroying our country are billionaires!”

As we passed under the steeple of Park Street Church, the chimes played “O Sacred Head Now Wounded,” and I couldn’t help but think of Jesus and his procession into Jerusalem. I imagine that he was probably as concerned for his people as I was, and yet there are times in life when you know there is no way out but through and you know in your heart that come what may you must keep going.

As we marched, people slowly merged from various side streets into one great flood. There were people with canes and walkers and wheelchairs, people of different races, ethnicities, identities and orientations, so… many….people…. all carrying signs that pointed to a myriad of issues and concerns.

But as we walked, people made space for each other and came alongside each other and sang out encouraging words to each other. Our folks managed to stay together behind the First Churches banner and the American flag that one of our number carried, but when we finally reached the plaza, the crowd was so thick it pressed us into a single line and then bit by bit we lost touch and then sight of one another.

We were pressed in so tight that you could breathe, but you couldn’t really move. I still had Gene and his daughter-in-law with me, along with an older couple from St. Johns, and so I stopped moving and stayed with them. I prayed again for everyone’s safety and that we would somehow find one another in the end.

We stood and tried to listen, but between the helicopters overhead and the acoustics, it wasn’t easy. Bill from St. Johns - who, like Gene, has got to be in his 80’s -looked at me with a wry grin and said, "I can't hear, but that's ok because I am here!" “That’s right,” I said, “and in our hearts we know what they are saying anyway, don’t we?”

And so we took our stand there in the rain until, by some miracle, Michelle Wu’s words broke through in our direction. The mayor of Boston spoke eloquently about her love for her city; a city built on diversity, a city that has welcomed the gifts of immigrants for generations and is proud to foster the research of students from all over the world for the benefit of all. She called Boston a progressive city that takes pride in its inclusivity.

"We are the safest major city in the country because we are safe for everyone,” she said.

“I refuse to accept that …our kids could grow up in a world where threats and intimidation are the tactics that the president uses to get his way. I refuse to accept that they can grow up in a world where diversity and equality are constantly under assault. I refuse to accept that they can grow up in a world where immigrants… are automatically assumed to be criminals. Hands off Boston!” she yelled. And we yelled, “Hands off!” right back.

And then she had us turn to our neighbor and get to know them and ask why they were there. It felt just like passing the peace in church, and - get this! - in the midst of a crowd of 100,000 people I met a woman from Waltham who was delighted to hear that 11 busses had come all the way from Northampton. Turns out she used to live in Amherst and taught at my children’s elementary school for 40 years!

By all accounts the rally was a huge success, huge being the operative word. Around 2:00, as things were winding down, I started searching for our bus and our bus driver started searching for us. As I moved through the crowd I found little groups of our people and sent them down to hang with Sam Adams in front of Faneuil Hall. But I couldn’t find Shawn and there were so many busses he couldn’t find a place to park.

He ended up a good four blocks from our intended meeting place on the far side of the City Hall. Once I found him I started ferrying people in his direction, but we were still missing folks and I hadn’t seen the Smith students since we left Boston Common. By this point the rain was really coming down. It was cold and hard to see, and yet somehow people kept finding each other and then finding me.

As Jessica started to take attendance, I got a call from a First Church Amherst member who had just run into the Smithies in a Sephora two blocks from our bus. They poked their heads out and started walking our way and by the time they got on the bus we had everyone safe and sound.

“Friends,” I said, “If you didn’t believe in God before now, you might want to reconsider, because we are all here and I think that’s a miracle.” Shawn cranked up the heat to dry us all out and got us on the road. We took up a collection for him to thank him for his good work. I gave it to him at the rest stop and before he drove us the rest of the way home he took a moment to speak to us himself.

“Folks,” he said, “as a veteran, I just want to thank you for standing up for our democracy. It is especially good to see people, but especially Christians, coming out to stand up for our country. And I just want to say that it has been my honor to be a small part of what you did here today.”

Yeah, it was that kind of day. I am really proud of those of you who went and just as proud of those of you who helped us prepare and prayed for us and those of you who found a rally closer to home, because we all took a stand for mercy, compassion, and hope. We all took a stand against policies that are harming our neighbors, be they immigrants, the poor, the people of Gaza and Ukraine, our federal workers, our park rangers, students, researchers… the list goes on and on and on. Showing up mattered. But so did showing up as Christians.

This came through clearly in Shawn’s words, but also in the thank you notes I have received from the community members who came with us on the bus. It mattered that First Churches chartered a bus right alongside the Episcopalian church. It mattered that we marched behind our church banner along with an American flag. It mattered that the ordained amongst us marched in our collars and that we carried beautiful signs like this one (thank you Doryne!) that proclaimed: “This Christian Stands against Christian Nationalism!”

Given the number of Christians who have aligned themselves with this administration, it was important to stand out there and show the world that there are Christians who stand against the cruel policies and unlawful actions we see harming innocents here and abroad.

And yet, I admit, there is a part of me that feels troubled and is still trying to resolve what may be a contradiction in my own thinking.

There is a part of me that is wrestling and wondering what the difference is between a Christian Nationalist who is using their new found power to push forward their agenda and impose their beliefs on this country, and a Christian like me who believes their actions are profoundly un-Christlike and wants to take that power away from them so they will treat people the way I believe they should be treated?

I don’t want to be just an equal but opposite reaction, a fine person on the other side of a long running disagreement?

But is it not just as political for me to march in a protest as it is for them to cozy up to the president?

How can I judge them for claiming political power as conservative Christians if I just want to take it back as a liberal one?

Do you understand the dilemma?

I think it’s a real question and the short answer is that I don’t know. I don’t know how to resolve this and I think it is an important question to keep wrestling with. I admit that I feel trapped in a version of Karl Popper’s paradox of tolerance. But, to paraphrase Jean-Jacque Rousseau: “I would rather be a (wo)man of paradox than a (wo)man of prejudice.”

I look at Jesus on his little donkey, marching peacefully into the teeth of a violent empire, critiquing the alliance of power and religion in his own day that was crushing the innocent under its heel in its never ending quest for more - more territory, more wealth, more power - and I can’t help but feel I am in good company.

Because deep down, for all the apparent contradictions in my thinking, I believe there is a difference between us and that difference lies in what we want to use our power for. I think we are in a battle, a culture war, a moral conflict with two opposing sides, but at the heart of this battle is a conflict about power itself…and how power should be used.

It says in our reading today that the crowds praised Jesus for his deeds of power, but think about what those deeds were: healing, teaching, feeding, and raising the dead. Jesus never used his power to harm. He only ever used it to heal. He didn’t use his power to coerce but to set people free.

Jesus didn’t use his power to push people down but to lift them up. He used his power, not to extort, but to give, not to cast out but to draw those on the margins back in. Jesus didn’t whip up storms to threaten people and cause chaos but calmed them in an effort to instill faith and bring people peace.

Palm Sunday was a protest against the excess and abuse of empire. It was a peaceful but powerful provocation meant to expose just how fragile any society really is if it is built on exclusion, coercion, and fear, rather than inclusion, freedom, and love.

Jesus shows us that there is a difference between the love of power and the power of love and I know which side I want to be on. Riding into Jerusalem on a donkey rather than a war horse, surrounded by peasants waving palms rather than swords, with no weapon but his wit and no battle plan but the gospel, Jesus proclaimed the truth that power in and of itself will not save you. Only love can do that, because it is love, not power, that opens our eyes up to the humanity in one another.

Those in love with power oppress. Those who believe in the power of love liberate. “Power has no choice but to make captives. Love, no choice but to set them free.”  Power blinds us to the needs of one another.  Love forces us to see one another. Only love can teach us to value equity over privilege, forgiveness over fairness, restoration over retribution.  Only love can break the cycles of violence and domination that haunt our world generation after generation.

"We are the safest major city in the country because we are safe for everyone,” cried Michelle Wu, and I believe Jesus would want us to expand that vision till we can say that we are the safest country in the world because we are safe for everyone.

Not a Christian nation because, to paraphrase James Talerico, a truly Christian nation would never want to be a purely Christian nation…a nation for Christians alone.

A truly Christian nation would only ever want to be a nation where all are cared for and loved because Jesus the Christ set a table where all are welcome.

That is the vision we marched for and the hope Jesus was willing to die for; a vision we have yet to achieve but a vision we will continue to work toward as his followers… a new world with liberty and justice for all. Amen.