The Rev. David Black is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church. On September 19, he was standing outside an ICE detention facility in Chicago, praying and preaching, when an ICE agent who was on the roof shot Rev. Black in the face with a pepper ball – essentially a ball of pepper spray that explodes on impact. Someone recorded it on their phone, and there was no warning shot at his feet, nor any verbal warning. As Rev. Black was imploring the ICE agents to give their lives to Christ, they shot him.
Later in the day, he was praying on his knees outside the facility and was pepper-sprayed in the face and shot multiple times with nonlethal rounds. I can’t get these images of my fellow pastor being violently assaulted out of my mind. The official DHS/ICE response is that the Rev. Black was impeding operations and had been told multiple times to move, and he refused to comply.
The comments I’ve read have fallen into two groups: one group says how evil ICE is, and the other says how Rev. Black needed to stay in his lane and not get involved in politics, as if it’s that simple. I don’t know Rev. Black, but I admire his courage to witness to those ICE agents and call them to repentance.
I don’t know the ICE agents either, and I am deeply saddened and bothered that they responded the way they did. What leads a person to the point in his or her life where s/he decides the best course of action is extreme violence? What leads a person to carry out the brutal acts of violence that they’ve been recorded doing? I’ve seen people express care and concern for one group or the other, but not for both. Jesus loves all of the people involved in that tragic incident and calls all of us to repentance, as no one has a corner on the need for it.
It’s hard to say what bothers me most about this, but it breaks my heart that people readily defend the actions of the ICE agents. Intentionally harming an unarmed person is evil. Rev. Black wrote, “I extended my arms, palms outstretched toward the ICE officers, in a traditional Christian posture of prayer and blessing. Without any warning, and without any order or request that I and others disperse, I was suddenly fired upon by ICE officers. In rapid fire, I was hit seven times on my arms, face, and torso with exploding pellets that contained some kind of chemical agent. It was clear to me that the officers were aiming for my head, which they struck twice.”
Excusing their actions as necessary is evil, as is blaming Rev. Black for being there. Yes, we pray for those who hate us, but we don’t condone their hate. Jesus loves all people, but he stands with the oppressed, not the oppressor.
—Fr. Jason