By Else Madsen, NVP Fellow ’25

Politics and religion have a complicated history. Between tax barriers for the church, financial barriers for the pastor, and congregational goals to be “inclusive” by not wading into the polarizing sphere of politics, many times churches have shied away from throwing themselves into issues of social justice and human dignity. And let me be clear; there is validity in at least some of the concerns. For instance, pastors do indeed have little guarantee of financial stability in the case that it’s determined that their call should be terminated as a result of a gospel-rooted, justice-encouraging political statement on Sunday morning. And it is true that pastors and pastors’ families need to eat too, with all due respect to John 6:35. However, in their entirety, these barriers have led to too many moments of religious silence on issues which align quite clearly with our call to manifest Micah 6:8. 

these barriers have led to too many moments of religious silence on issues which align quite clearly with our call to manifest Micah 6:8

I’ve grown up in a time where this silence rang particularly loud. At the very moment I began to enter an adulthood understanding of politics and the impact it had on the world, the 2016 elections occurred. Regardless of how you voted in that election, it’s clear that 2016 raised nearly every social justice issue in the book. And with that, we as a country began to see ourselves in a new light. Those of us in positions of privilege who thought that so many human rights issues had been solved, or were at least improving, faced a harsh reality check. Those of us who had been on the unprivileged side of any particular movement saw our progress being pushed further and further back. Those of us who didn’t care, well, I would have hoped it was a wake-up call. And for those of us in the Church, it was a defining moment, whether we wanted it or not. What would we, in our identities as people formed by God and called to follow Jesus’ footsteps, do in a time when so much was at stake? 

2016 was perhaps the clearest intersection of social justice and religion of my lifetime. Which means that it was the clearest intersection of social justice and religion for my peers. For my peers, who make up a generation that is consistently demonstrating that they are informed and politically involved, there was frustration and deep hurt centered around the lack of religious action from more predominantly progressive denominations like the ELCA. Born out of the same frustration and hurt of my peers, it instilled a deep passion for encouraging social action through our religious callings. And this frustration isn’t at all new or uniquely belonging to Generation Z. But, it is a frustration that has led to lower religious engagement from young people and a Church with fewer congregants in pews than ever before. 

Fast-forwarding to 2024, I began a summer internship at St. Olaf College’s Lutheran Center. As I interviewed for the position I was told that part of my summer work would be a “passion project;” a project centered on a topic I had a particular interest in and that overlapped in some way with the Lutheran Center’s work. Immediately, the intersection of social justice and religion came to mind. With the incredible guidance of Char Cox, my supervisor and the Director of Programming, Engagement and Innovation for Congregational Thriving at the Lutheran Center, I began an investigation into the experiences of religious leaders for whom religion and social justice were key intertwined themes of their lives and call. By the end of the summer, I had conducted four interviews with four participants in varying different positions within the church and of varying backgrounds, all of whom graciously volunteered their time to meet with me. 

In each interview I asked a selection of questions (the questions themselves were the same in each, though which questions I asked differed depending on the flow of the interview) each of which fell under one of four categories: 

1. How the interviewee views the intersection of social justice and religion (e.g. how they may define it in their lives)
2. What challenges the interviewee sees to church systems and leaders engaging in social justice through faith
3. How/whether justice inaction has affected the decline of church numbers
4. What encouragement interviewees would offer to other people of faith on how to live their faith through justice actions

Over the next few months I’ll share all that I discovered in those interviews by way of these “blogs” or articles. My hope is that by the final blog, these articles will raise the message of social action as an act of faith. 

The ELCA’s own Dignity, Compassion, and Justice statement (quoted in full above) says, “Through proclamation of the gospel, through worship and as servants of God working for healing and justice in the world, we uphold and seek to protect the dignity and human rights of all people.” As we face another defining election, as we see greater national attention to global events, and as we continue to grapple with the rise of Christian Nationalism, the Church has another opportunity to define how we will live out our faith in the public sphere. Now is the time to claim our identity, now is the time to take action, and now is the time to worship in the pews and in the streets.