They held palm branches. Little hands, raised high among the gathered people held symbols of peace and protest. We wanted them to walk. We sang along as they enacted the gospel story. Palm Sunday tradition had them marching and laying their branches at the foot of a reasonably-sized cross.
We read the scripture about people who marched with palms. “When he entered Jerusalem, the whole city was in turmoil, asking, ‘Who is this?’”
A city in turmoil reaches my heart today. One week ago, I was meeting on Zoom with my team, who calls Nashville home. My friend Eileen got a text from her daughter and froze. “It’s a school shooting.” Silence fell.
A pause that held the question we parents ask these days: Did this latest shooting reach my child?
She breathed and we realized, not this one. A school nearby, down the road. We learned that another team member has family in The Covenant School. They escaped, not physically harmed. Fear, anxiety, and grief washed through us.
Within hours, my social media feeds filled with ads for bullet-proof notebooks and classroom walls that transform into bunkers. Bullet-proof barriers for sale, the commodification of our nightmares. The market is ready to respond. Stock prices on guns shoot up, while I stifle an honest Lenten confession: I want the power to protect my family. I need something in my hand so no harm can touch my children.
One week later, a walk out is planned. At 10:13 am, the time the school shooting began, thousands of students across Nashville walked out.
You know what I wish the students had carried on their walk today? I wish they had all carried palm branches.
A parade with palms, we watch.
The symbol of palms means something different to us now. Then, it meant a claim of victory and triumph. To lay palm branches at the feet of a prophet coming into town during a religious festival? That was a demonstration. A way to name a broken covenant between the people and the power that purported to protect them. The gathered crowds in Jerusalem used palm branches as subversive symbols, alongside cries of Hosanna – save us.
Save us from what, a townsperson might ask.
How exactly, a bystander might whisper. I bet it was a city in turmoil.
Save us
When you call out the powers that be, you disturb the peace. You reveal what is really there. When you move out into the streets, people question what you hope to achieve. Whether your march is worth it.
We see you marching, students.
Even if you are carrying homemade posters and not palm branches, we see you. Your fears, frustrations, and grief are present in your every step toward the capitol. You likely will not change the laws of Tennessee today. But our grieving hearts hear your grieving voices. We grieve that forty-six school shootings happened just last year, and we know that each day in America twelve children die from gun violence.
Your demonstration calls out for someone to save us, from an epidemic. Gun violence has touched the lives of 338,000 students since 1999 who have experienced gun violence at school. You cry out for change, and I pray for the change that will upend these powers, too.
Keep going, children.
You don’t march unless you think you can change something. You step forward with some hope that moves you to action.
You are enacting a story. A story in which the posters you hold up tell our grief. A story in which voices of the crowd can actually sift through the noise handed to us by those in power. A story in which we start from any place at all that upends our idolatry of the second amendment to make our schools safer for children. A story in which children cry out “Save us” and it moves us to change our unchangeable commitments.
That terrifies us.
Save us from what, your leaders might ask.
How exactly, your neighbor might whisper.
You won’t change a thing, they will say.
But grief always changes things.
Grief always changes things
The most vulnerable among us, our children, are out in the streets. These students, their families, and their teachers walked, drove, and rode out to make their voices heard.
These children who we have trained to know how to leave a building with their hands up are on the move. These students who are accustomed to lockdown drills have left their classrooms. They know where to walk. This one turns toward the capitol.
Keep going, children. We will be back here, clutching our fears and breathing prayers for safety. Our communities and commitments are in turmoil.
How exactly, we whisper.
We will be back here, in the safety of our offices and board rooms, barely stopping to hear your cries over the next news cycle. The cost of this grief disrupts the peace we think can hold.
We will quickly place the palm branches into pretty displays for Sunday, ready to move towards resurrection in a hurry.
Learn more with me?
Here’s one place to start. Learn more about gun violence and our schools, here.
