I did the same thing back then, except that I had already had my opinions changing for several years after doing my own research and finding no good justification for the invasion of Iraq.
So I drove away from my polling station with my rebellious Obama sticker on my shirt and went back to work at my evangelical missions organization in Dallas where I regularly received forwarded emails from co-workers about the evils of Obama. I was known to all as a sweet, young, newly-married missionary kid and I knew everyone’s opinion of me would drop a notch or many if they noticed my political stickers, my quiet rebellion. I had read through the not-so-unbiased voting guide distributed by my church and heard the political opinions of my pastor and I knew I, younger, without authority or influence, firmly disagreed.
Irony - I would so happily take John McCain now over this mess. Nevertheless, I am proud of the choice that younger version of me made. Despite nearly everyone I respected disagreeing, what I discerned then has played out as true in the years since.
Today, federal agents are tear-gassing a pre-school full of children, with parents-mostly white there to pick them up
Reporters covering the protests say it appears as if federal agents are using LRAD (Russian specialt cany) on a group of peaceful protestors.
Adam Kinzinger reports that LRAD weapons cause permanent hearing loss and brain damage. Video of both can be seen online.
People were interviewed about fed agents interfering with an Evangelical church service in Brooklyn Park this past Sunday. Brooklyn Park is a white middle class suburb. Videos from Sunday are online
This afternoon reporters and observers are on scene at an elementary school in Eden Prairie. Eden Prairie is an upscale white suburb. The agents are restricting access for parents to retrieve their children from school. Videos are available online.
Bovino may be gone , but the onslaught and terror continues
I think my revelatory moment began Jan 6, 2021 when I watched in horror as a megalomaniacal narcissist refused to believe he’d lost. That he thought he won was no surprise but then to have people riot, desecrate our Capitol, call for the hanging of Mike Pence, wave Christian flags alongside Confederate (who also espouse a lie that they didn’t lose!), batter and harm our Capitol police, and then blame it on left lunatic radicals! Say what?!! That’s when I began to read — voraciously outside my comfort zone. A black friend and I had had words about the riot where I blithely commented how after the BLM riots, we shouldn’t be surprised (I still cringe at my arrogance). I now wouldn’t vote Republican if Jesus ran on the ticket (although I now know better — he wouldn’t!). I began to take the words of Jesus to heart about being for “the least of these.” I now refuse to sit in spaces dominated by MAGA or Christian Nationalists because we don’t just have political differences — we are morally diametrically opposed!
Being a therapist in a community mental health center radicalized me. I worked with people in poverty, no health insurance, most on government assistance, lots of severe mental illness. Lots of problems still with the govt assistance and programs, but overall their stories changed my perspective. On undocumented immigrants, on abortion, on freedom of religion and diversity. 2016 marked a change in my voting habits and I’ll never look back from the freedom to choose for myself without being chained by Christian nationalism.
I’m a former Minnesotan. Family and friends still there are being impacted by the thuggish actions of ICE. It’s real, it’s cruel, and it’s wicked.
It’s not my own eyes, but from eyes I trust, that things are actually worse than what we see in video clips online.
I’m an older, white, retired public school administrator and teacher. Many of my former friends and colleagues fit those same demographics.
The stories of the ICE midnight raids into white upper middle class homes, such as the encounters 2 of my female have endured, permeate the local news there and the Mpls Star-Tribune. Because of the gruesome murders, these lesser stories don’t make national news. However, their stories are just as horrific in other ways.
The women talked about their husbands being restrained and gagged while ICE agents laughed maniacally with each of the females. They fondled each of them, called them “non-breeders” and “disposable” because they were post-menopausal. Agents filmed the assaults, saying “their FANS would love it”. They shouted at the women that they should start believing in Jesus (both families are Christ followers btw). The agents confiscated cell phones and drivers’ licenses, shouting the refrain “show your papers” (again 2 AM).
Neither couple had been actively involved in protesting or community support for those specifically targeted by ICE before their 2AM raids.
THEY ARE NOW!
Neither couple has had their confiscated phones or drivers’ licenses returned.
They’ve been doxxed online.
They’ve since learned that the midnight raids were random attacks, ordered by Greg Bovino, to terrorize those liberal whites who need to learn who’s in charge.
A part of me has felt hopeless and helpless because I now am in So Cal. I know our time in the barrel will be coming soon again.
I’m trying to turn the rage I feel for this administration, the thuggish ICE agents they deployed, and the twisted beliefs of groomed Christian Nationalists who have turned the faith I know into a portrait of abject cruelty and depravity. It’s a daily challenge.
Because of the real rage I feel, I’ve donated more to local organizations helping refugees, immigrants, and those with disabilities.
Even in So Cal, I’m on group chat links to alert others when ICE agents are descending in their neighborhoods in MN as I know the area well. I’m hoping we can have some of the same networks ready next time when ICE fully invades our area as they have in MN.
But the rage continues. I’ve been posting some of the stories I know online. I feel that I need to bear witness.
Replies from random accounts call me a liar. I feel as if I’m living inside Orwell’s novel, “1984”.
Through my rage though, I hope to continue to bravely bear witness to use my own eyes, ears, power of reason, power of communication to let others know how bad it is, but there are brave people behind the scenes still trying to do the right things to carry the Cross in MN and throughout the country.
We still have our own eyes and our own agency. I hope more are ready to non violently do what is necessary to do the same when their time comes.
Julia, I pray for the protection of all of our hearts as we read your account and so many each day. What has been unleashed is unGodly, so incredibly awful as to stun. Yet we know who God loves and we know what He hates. I will leave the hating to God. He hates rightly and righteously knowing the hearts of all. Yet we also must remember God’s forgiveness if there is a time when any of these people “following orders” feel a true repentance in their lives. They are full of the enemy right now, as are all those who are being led by wickedness. I pray all of us can sweep hatred out each night as we read His Word, knowing what He will do and has done.
Thanks for the comments. Yes, I feel RAGE toward the behaviors, not the people themselves. I know they’ve been groomed and daily fed with garbage wrapped in biblical verbiage, and told it’s Godly.
For the leaders however, who are ordering these cruel acts and are lying about it, I feel nothing but contempt for Its about power and control. It’s clear many of them probably have dangerous personality disorders.
In normal times, these people would never been given authority to lead groups. In our current environment, these people have the power of killing and destroying lives.
I particularly resonated with "hat if there were higher taxes as a result, it was only because there were more federal programs helping more people to get the food and shelter they needed" because I don't care if my taxes go up to take care of others. Maybe, if everyone in every religious and non-religious group and organization made sure that the people in their area had their healthcare, food, and housing needs met, it might cost less, but that's not happening and it never has.
Being a foster/adoptive parent radicalized me. Everything I had been taught by my Christian mentors about parenting, children, addiction, and human nature turned out to be untrue. That opened Pandora's box to a lot of questioning. Ten years later, I'm in a much different place.
"They want you to be terrified to make a different choice."- This is such a radically core statement behind it all, isn't it? -Mesmerized by your collage and the inclusion of snakes in each image. I'm intrigued with imagining the effort and energy while collecting all those images.
Thanks. It was work to find things of the blue/red persuasion, but which also represented the ways we see one another, while also knowing my own bias was coming through, even if I didn't want it to. I couldn't be unbiased making it, but I just kept thinking, "To the monsters, we're the monsters." We're dehumanizing one another and being dehumanized, even if we're not using the image of snakes to do it.
"To the monsters, we're the monsters."-This echoes back to James Baldwin"s "moral monsters" quote and what white Americans had become in the 1950's. Seems the country hasn't learned much since then.
I also went onto the mission field, not as an American but a Christian.
I appreciate the lives lost and blood spilt for our freedom, but a person should be asking God if that is His will even before going to war. Maybe people would ask more questions, then. I appreciate and say my pledge of allegiance, but to God first, who chooses—or lets us choose—the leaders of this world. Look at Saul—the peoples’ golden globe choice versus David, God’s appointed and anointed. But he was human, too. Our trust must be in God alone, but to get there, Jesus challenged the Pharisees with a question, a parable, then this statement in Luke 5:39, “And no one, having drunk old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, “The old is better.”
Serving as a missionary in Belize and Mexico radicalized me. It took me a while because the indoctrination was deep. To be a republican was to not be a Christian. To vote for a democrat meant I was a murderer. Finally I am free from that thinking and I praise God for it.
I'm free of it too. I want everyone to be free of it. I think until you're free of chokeholds, you aren't voting freely. That's not to say that those who vote red aren't voting freely, not at all. There are chokeholds on the left too. I just want us all to be free of the chokeholds, so we can vote with OUR conscience, not with fear of rejection from the groups around us.
I was radicalized by George Bailey and his speech to the Bailey Building & Loan board: “Just remember this, Mr. Potter, that this rabble you're talking about, they do most of the working and paying and living and dying in this community. Well, is it too much to have them work and pay and live and die in a couple of decent rooms and a bath?”
It's been the refrain of my year. It's also been such a good reminder for me especially in the last few weeks when I really think one side is acting monstrously.
That collage really drew me in... red and blue, snakes in both.
I did the same thing back then, except that I had already had my opinions changing for several years after doing my own research and finding no good justification for the invasion of Iraq.
So I drove away from my polling station with my rebellious Obama sticker on my shirt and went back to work at my evangelical missions organization in Dallas where I regularly received forwarded emails from co-workers about the evils of Obama. I was known to all as a sweet, young, newly-married missionary kid and I knew everyone’s opinion of me would drop a notch or many if they noticed my political stickers, my quiet rebellion. I had read through the not-so-unbiased voting guide distributed by my church and heard the political opinions of my pastor and I knew I, younger, without authority or influence, firmly disagreed.
Irony - I would so happily take John McCain now over this mess. Nevertheless, I am proud of the choice that younger version of me made. Despite nearly everyone I respected disagreeing, what I discerned then has played out as true in the years since.
Today, federal agents are tear-gassing a pre-school full of children, with parents-mostly white there to pick them up
Reporters covering the protests say it appears as if federal agents are using LRAD (Russian specialt cany) on a group of peaceful protestors.
Adam Kinzinger reports that LRAD weapons cause permanent hearing loss and brain damage. Video of both can be seen online.
People were interviewed about fed agents interfering with an Evangelical church service in Brooklyn Park this past Sunday. Brooklyn Park is a white middle class suburb. Videos from Sunday are online
This afternoon reporters and observers are on scene at an elementary school in Eden Prairie. Eden Prairie is an upscale white suburb. The agents are restricting access for parents to retrieve their children from school. Videos are available online.
Bovino may be gone , but the onslaught and terror continues
I think my revelatory moment began Jan 6, 2021 when I watched in horror as a megalomaniacal narcissist refused to believe he’d lost. That he thought he won was no surprise but then to have people riot, desecrate our Capitol, call for the hanging of Mike Pence, wave Christian flags alongside Confederate (who also espouse a lie that they didn’t lose!), batter and harm our Capitol police, and then blame it on left lunatic radicals! Say what?!! That’s when I began to read — voraciously outside my comfort zone. A black friend and I had had words about the riot where I blithely commented how after the BLM riots, we shouldn’t be surprised (I still cringe at my arrogance). I now wouldn’t vote Republican if Jesus ran on the ticket (although I now know better — he wouldn’t!). I began to take the words of Jesus to heart about being for “the least of these.” I now refuse to sit in spaces dominated by MAGA or Christian Nationalists because we don’t just have political differences — we are morally diametrically opposed!
Being a therapist in a community mental health center radicalized me. I worked with people in poverty, no health insurance, most on government assistance, lots of severe mental illness. Lots of problems still with the govt assistance and programs, but overall their stories changed my perspective. On undocumented immigrants, on abortion, on freedom of religion and diversity. 2016 marked a change in my voting habits and I’ll never look back from the freedom to choose for myself without being chained by Christian nationalism.
Thank you for this piece.
I’m a former Minnesotan. Family and friends still there are being impacted by the thuggish actions of ICE. It’s real, it’s cruel, and it’s wicked.
It’s not my own eyes, but from eyes I trust, that things are actually worse than what we see in video clips online.
I’m an older, white, retired public school administrator and teacher. Many of my former friends and colleagues fit those same demographics.
The stories of the ICE midnight raids into white upper middle class homes, such as the encounters 2 of my female have endured, permeate the local news there and the Mpls Star-Tribune. Because of the gruesome murders, these lesser stories don’t make national news. However, their stories are just as horrific in other ways.
The women talked about their husbands being restrained and gagged while ICE agents laughed maniacally with each of the females. They fondled each of them, called them “non-breeders” and “disposable” because they were post-menopausal. Agents filmed the assaults, saying “their FANS would love it”. They shouted at the women that they should start believing in Jesus (both families are Christ followers btw). The agents confiscated cell phones and drivers’ licenses, shouting the refrain “show your papers” (again 2 AM).
Neither couple had been actively involved in protesting or community support for those specifically targeted by ICE before their 2AM raids.
THEY ARE NOW!
Neither couple has had their confiscated phones or drivers’ licenses returned.
They’ve been doxxed online.
They’ve since learned that the midnight raids were random attacks, ordered by Greg Bovino, to terrorize those liberal whites who need to learn who’s in charge.
A part of me has felt hopeless and helpless because I now am in So Cal. I know our time in the barrel will be coming soon again.
I’m trying to turn the rage I feel for this administration, the thuggish ICE agents they deployed, and the twisted beliefs of groomed Christian Nationalists who have turned the faith I know into a portrait of abject cruelty and depravity. It’s a daily challenge.
Because of the real rage I feel, I’ve donated more to local organizations helping refugees, immigrants, and those with disabilities.
Even in So Cal, I’m on group chat links to alert others when ICE agents are descending in their neighborhoods in MN as I know the area well. I’m hoping we can have some of the same networks ready next time when ICE fully invades our area as they have in MN.
But the rage continues. I’ve been posting some of the stories I know online. I feel that I need to bear witness.
Replies from random accounts call me a liar. I feel as if I’m living inside Orwell’s novel, “1984”.
Through my rage though, I hope to continue to bravely bear witness to use my own eyes, ears, power of reason, power of communication to let others know how bad it is, but there are brave people behind the scenes still trying to do the right things to carry the Cross in MN and throughout the country.
We still have our own eyes and our own agency. I hope more are ready to non violently do what is necessary to do the same when their time comes.
Julia, I pray for the protection of all of our hearts as we read your account and so many each day. What has been unleashed is unGodly, so incredibly awful as to stun. Yet we know who God loves and we know what He hates. I will leave the hating to God. He hates rightly and righteously knowing the hearts of all. Yet we also must remember God’s forgiveness if there is a time when any of these people “following orders” feel a true repentance in their lives. They are full of the enemy right now, as are all those who are being led by wickedness. I pray all of us can sweep hatred out each night as we read His Word, knowing what He will do and has done.
Thanks for the comments. Yes, I feel RAGE toward the behaviors, not the people themselves. I know they’ve been groomed and daily fed with garbage wrapped in biblical verbiage, and told it’s Godly.
For the leaders however, who are ordering these cruel acts and are lying about it, I feel nothing but contempt for Its about power and control. It’s clear many of them probably have dangerous personality disorders.
In normal times, these people would never been given authority to lead groups. In our current environment, these people have the power of killing and destroying lives.
I remember that it’s my duty to carry the Cross.
Thank you for your kind words.
This is an example of one way to handle the anger and rage-turn it into positive helpful action.
It is a perfect example of carrying the Cross.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/2026/01/minnesota-ice-cpb-immigrants-church-food-bank-pastors/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=post&utm_campaign=article&fbclid=IwZnRzaAPozfpleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEejIDVp16FA56WE26LAQDgFRJ8QJv89TYN3xStwnm9m2NEUVE2zaoH_0lQmR4_aem_tsOovqGl85mPXl0e8lr2bw
I cannot imagine, but I will have to. I pray I would react the way God wants me to.
Beautifully said and a comfort to me as I step into myself and away from my family of origins voting pattern.
And also, your collages are mesmerizing to me. Thank you for sharing them
THank you. For stepping away, and the kind words.
I particularly resonated with "hat if there were higher taxes as a result, it was only because there were more federal programs helping more people to get the food and shelter they needed" because I don't care if my taxes go up to take care of others. Maybe, if everyone in every religious and non-religious group and organization made sure that the people in their area had their healthcare, food, and housing needs met, it might cost less, but that's not happening and it never has.
Yep!
Being a foster/adoptive parent radicalized me. Everything I had been taught by my Christian mentors about parenting, children, addiction, and human nature turned out to be untrue. That opened Pandora's box to a lot of questioning. Ten years later, I'm in a much different place.
"They want you to be terrified to make a different choice."- This is such a radically core statement behind it all, isn't it? -Mesmerized by your collage and the inclusion of snakes in each image. I'm intrigued with imagining the effort and energy while collecting all those images.
Thanks. It was work to find things of the blue/red persuasion, but which also represented the ways we see one another, while also knowing my own bias was coming through, even if I didn't want it to. I couldn't be unbiased making it, but I just kept thinking, "To the monsters, we're the monsters." We're dehumanizing one another and being dehumanized, even if we're not using the image of snakes to do it.
"To the monsters, we're the monsters."-This echoes back to James Baldwin"s "moral monsters" quote and what white Americans had become in the 1950's. Seems the country hasn't learned much since then.
I also went onto the mission field, not as an American but a Christian.
I appreciate the lives lost and blood spilt for our freedom, but a person should be asking God if that is His will even before going to war. Maybe people would ask more questions, then. I appreciate and say my pledge of allegiance, but to God first, who chooses—or lets us choose—the leaders of this world. Look at Saul—the peoples’ golden globe choice versus David, God’s appointed and anointed. But he was human, too. Our trust must be in God alone, but to get there, Jesus challenged the Pharisees with a question, a parable, then this statement in Luke 5:39, “And no one, having drunk old wine, immediately desires new; for he says, “The old is better.”
Your collage is museum-worthy.
Thank you, Jennifer =)
Serving as a missionary in Belize and Mexico radicalized me. It took me a while because the indoctrination was deep. To be a republican was to not be a Christian. To vote for a democrat meant I was a murderer. Finally I am free from that thinking and I praise God for it.
I'm free of it too. I want everyone to be free of it. I think until you're free of chokeholds, you aren't voting freely. That's not to say that those who vote red aren't voting freely, not at all. There are chokeholds on the left too. I just want us all to be free of the chokeholds, so we can vote with OUR conscience, not with fear of rejection from the groups around us.
YES!
This is beautiful, thank you for your vulnerability in sharing this.
Thank you.
Love that quote from Station Eleven.
I was radicalized by George Bailey and his speech to the Bailey Building & Loan board: “Just remember this, Mr. Potter, that this rabble you're talking about, they do most of the working and paying and living and dying in this community. Well, is it too much to have them work and pay and live and die in a couple of decent rooms and a bath?”
Love this…
It's been the refrain of my year. It's also been such a good reminder for me especially in the last few weeks when I really think one side is acting monstrously.