Note from Reverend Joy

For the last four weeks, once every week, we've had the new Black Lives Matter sign on the fence outside our church slashed or stolen. Each week we've replaced it. Sometimes the Pride banner in support of our LGBTQ community is slashed, too, or ripped down and crumbled, or covered with White Supremacy stickers that our sexton carefully removes.

This week I've checked in with other downtown Boston clergy. Their signs also have gotten slashed. A few years back a church on Newbury Street had a defiant White Supremacist group climb high on a ladder with their knives to deface the BLM sign, at 7 PM on that busy commercial street. Now the BLM sign at that church is made out of metal, and hung where it is protected by metal bars. Two other churches told me their signs are hung high, out of reach.

We'll hang our signs higher, too. But make no mistake. These were deliberate acts of hate against our LGBTQ and Black communities, right here in Boston; we know, because the signs about our worship services that hang nearby, at the same level on our fence, are never defaced.

​One more thing about which to make no mistake: we'll continue to stand with any who are despised, because in God's eyes they are loved. I'm proud to be at King's Chapel.