Artist Statement: During the COVID-19 pandemic many breaches in our society were revealed that heretofore had been unseen, unknown and unexperienced by many Americans. Racial injustice, sexual discrimination, misogyny in its many forms, police brutality, political polarization, and destruction of the environment were brought to the forefront of our minds and experience. And religion, like virtually every major social institution, has been profoundly disrupted. Pastors report breaches in church unity centered on differences in politics, social justice issues, and whether to gather or not gather or to wear or not wear masks. Yet the pandemic may also mark a critical breaking point, leading to profound changes in how spirituality is experienced and sustained. Now exposed, these societal and institutional breaches have begun to alter our beliefs and behaviors.

Similar breaches in society occurred in Israel around 700 B.C.  The Hebrew people had fallen away from God’s righteousness, and despite the calls issued by prophets to return to God’s law of love, the people continued to ignore His ways and the nation suffered great losses at the hands of cruel enemies. But there was hope; hope that national tragedy would prompt a seeking for God’s love. The prophet Isaiah, in the midst of national turmoil, said this: “And, they that shall be of thee, shall build the old waste places: thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations; and thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in.” That breach was a lack of fidelity to God’s laws. The repairers of the breach Isaiah refers to are God’s laborers, men and women who teach and live out God's laws of love, justice and liberty. The paths spoken of are the paths of Righteousness. And, during the same period King David wrote Psalm 60 where he uses earthquake imagery to describe the extraordinary troubles, calamities and divisions that had befallen his people and he prays to God to heal their breaches and restore their land.

700 years later Jesus said and demonstrated the same thing, that faithfulness to God’s law of love leads to healing breaches and fixing things that are broken: broken spirits, broken hearts, broken communication, broken people, broken churches, broken institutions and broken systems. Many people of all faiths believe that similar breaches exist today and can only be healed as “repairers of the breach” rise up and inspire and lead us towards Jesus’ way of love.