About a week ago, Reverend Robert Brashear entered West-Park Presbyterian Church on West 86th Street, where he is the pastor, and found that the cover and basin of the bronze baptismal font was gone. Occupy Wall Street protesters have been sleeping at the church, and Brashear’s laptop had already gone missing a few weeks before. As he relates on his blog, the loss of the baptismal font, used to baptize the congregation’s children, was a huge blow, and it shook him deeply. That’s particularly the case because Brashear (pictured below) is a supporter of the movement’s aims and a longtime advocate for New York’s homeless population.
“Someone has deliberately done this. I feel a sense of shock. Luis finds the basin in the session room. In a corner. I see the look of pain in his eyes. The last two children baptised from that basin were his grandchildren. And before that five generations of his family. I let teh occupiers know that I want that cover back now.”
Here is what Brashear said to the Occupy protesters sleeping at the church when he confronted them about the missing font:
We have been glad to welcome you here. You are in a place that is sacred. Sacred because you are here but even more for the generations who have come here to worship. And those who came before you and from these balconies organized the march against nuclear proliferation that drew a million people to New York City. We welcome you here as part of our tradition, as part of who we are.
We invited you here to be part of our community of communiteess, not just to sleep here, but to collaborate, to work side by side with. But something is not right.When my laptop got stolen, I said OK, I’m an urban pastor, I get it. You can replace the hardware. (But not the information.) I took that and we ordered locks.
But what happened now is diferent. Today I found pieces of our baptismal font missing. We found the basin in a corner of the room next door. On the floor. Let me tell you about the man who found it. The last two children baptised in that basin were his grandchildren. Five generations of his family were baptised in that font. They were the first Puerto Ricans, neoricans, at this church. He’s a union man. When he was your age, he was a squatter. Half of his family have lost their jobs. That basin isn’t about religion, it’s about family, story, heritage. Do you get it? He’s 99%. This whole church is 99%. The only person in this church who is a true professional showed up at Zucotti at 6 am to volunteer to be part of a human chain to protect you the first time you were goig to be evicted. The look of pain on his face was like a knife in my heart.
Check this out, even in tbe ’80’s, at the peak of the crack epidemic, when knife wielding crackheads came in here to rob and steal, even they did not disrpect our story, our history, the way that has happened this week. Not in 100 years. You have to think about that. To mess with something like our font is to mess with our lives, to put it bluntly, to piss on the 99%. I cannot allow that. I am resonsible to my people and all who came before.
You say you want a better world, that it’s possible. That does not include using, abusing, taking advantage of. I cannot allow you to do that to my people, to do that to me. To disrespect yourselves. I do not believe in collective guilt, collective punishment,but I do believe in collective accountability, responsibilty. So here’s where we are: by tomorrow night after spokes, I need a coherent response from your community. I want that cover back. Or how you’re going to deal with it. Or it’s all over. That’ s it. That simple.
Unsure whether to call the police or to kick the protesters out, he asked them to find a solution themselves. Eventually, they agreed to leave the church within the next two weeks, and find a way to replace the top of the baptismal font: “They have a plan. Continue to search for the basin cover. If not found, they will reach out to artisans and metal workers, create a new top. In future years, as the story of the church gets told again, the new top will be a symbol that #ows was here, back in the day. That West-Park remained faithful.”
We asked the Occupy Wall Street press folks for a response but haven’t heard back.
The full story is recounted on Brashear’s blog, which is probably my favorite website in the entire neighborhood, because his voice is so unique and powerful. At his best, Brashear evokes the novelist Marilynne Robinson and her masterpiece Gilead. He relates current events to scripture, he digresses, he gives voice to his anger, his sadness, and his doubts. Sometimes, he writes with tons of typos, but I always take it as evidence that he’s just feeling really passionate. It is very much worth reading (because the blog is in reverse chronological order, you have to scroll down and start at the entry for 1/15 to read it in order).
I am sure that had it been a Catholic church, and it was the Eucharist that was stolen, the pastor would not have been this upset.
As a lifelong Catholic, I am sure that OWS protesters would never have been allowed to camp out for weeks in a Catholic church in the first place. What a shame someone decided to bite the generous hand that was feeding them.