The Rev. Jamal Bryant said he hopes 100,000 ‘conscientious Christians’ will have signed up by March 5 to mark the ‘season of denial’ by fasting from shopping at Target.
(RNS) — Addressing the congregation at his New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in suburban Atlanta on Sunday, February 23, the Rev. Jamal Bryant was trying to recruit the thousands listening in the sanctuary and online to join him in his plan for Lent, the Christian season of abstinence and spiritual preparation that begins March 5.
For their Lenten fast, he said, they should refrain from shopping at Target.
Four weeks before, the big-box retailer had announced that it would pull back from its diversity, equity and inclusion programs, including one dedicated to diversifying the suppliers it uses to stock its shelves. The announcement came days after President Donald Trump signed an executive order titled “Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing.”
Bryant is one of several faith leaders who have come up with new Lenten traditions in light of the Trump administration’s assault on DEI — besides the executive order, the president blamed a recent air disaster at Washington’s Ronald Reagan National Airport on DEI hiring — as well as policy changes reducing domestic and international humanitarian aid.
Bishop William J. Barber II, president of Repairers of the Breach, is set to join faith leaders and other activists in an Ash Wednesday procession to the Capitol and Supreme Court to deliver an open letter making a national call “to address the negative effects of the Trump administration’s executive orders, the budget plans in Congress and efforts to obtain personal information of the public, which directly impacts the poor and working people,” his organization said in a statement.
Bishop Vashti McKenzie, president of the National Council of Churches, is among the speakers listed by Repairers of the Breach for the event, but her ecumenical organization has planned its own prayer webinar for Monday to bring people across different backgrounds together to pray as “a powerful witness in a very divisive atmosphere that we find ourselves — and not just as a country, but around the world.”
The NCC also plans to distribute a prayer guide and a toolkit for “anxious congregations.”
“The church must step up to the plate to be able to provide the spiritual structure and discipline to help people navigate through this time,” said McKenzie, a retired bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
