T. Thorne Coyle, beloved as a magical worker and master teacher within pagan, occult, and witchcraft communities, writes this elegant prayer as a testament to her personal experience and commitment sitting in meditation with Buddhists, pagans, and Christians as a form of direct action against the militarization of police forces in the United States and abroad. This action, organized by the Buddhist Peace Fellowship in the summer of 2014 as part of a larger week of action orchestrated by a diverse coalition of over 30 different community organizations, remains an exemplary instance of engaged spiritual practice and inter-faith, cross-lineage action.
More details on the action itself are included at the end of the post. This piece has been posted with permission of the author. You can read the original post on Coyle’s blog here.
Photo: Joshua Eaton
Alan Blueford, Mike Brown, Kimani Gray, Ezell Ford, Anita Gay, Kelly Thomas, Oscar Grant, Gary King, Sean Bell, Kayla Moore, Andy Lopez…
Nine of us sat in prayer and meditation on cold concrete blocking the doors to the Oakland Marriott while across the driveway, where guests stepped out of cabs or limousines, others meditated, sitting or standing, holding signs decrying police militarization and violence. People also meditated facing the street. Others handed out fliers with information.
Monks chanted and drummed. Your names rose within me as I sat: a litany, a mantra. Something in me settled more deeply. A sense of great love washed through.
I felt the doors push against my back as people tried to exit the hotel. Every time this happened, I followed the drums. I sank deeper. I chanted your names in my heart and mind.
Mike Brown, Ezell Ford, Alan Blueford, Oscar Grant, Anita Gay, Gary King, Kimani Gray, Sean Bell, Andy Lopez, Kayla Moore, Eric Garner, Kelly Thomas…
Two people thanked us for being there. One man was upset, and tried to get past us, saying, “They have a right to protest, but they don’t have a right to inconvenience people!”
He was inconvenienced. Like Mike Brown, Kimani Gray, and Anita Gay were inconvenienced.
Like their families were inconvenienced.
Like Oscar Grant was inconvenienced, lying face down and cuffed on a train platform, shot to death at close range.
Like the people of Ferguson were inconvenienced by tear gas, concussion grenades, LRADs, armored vehicles and other weapons of war.
Like Iraq War veteran Scott Olsen was inconvenienced on the streets of Oakland when shot in the head by a lead bean bag which fractured his skull causing brain trauma, and then was gassed along with the medics who rushed to help him.
Alan Blueford, Mike Brown, Kimani Gray, Ezell Ford, Anita Gay, Kelly Thomas, Oscar Grant, Eric Garner, Gary King, Sean Bell, Kayla Moore, Andy Lopez…
Photo: Buddhist Peace Fellowship
The doors pushed against us.
I settled deeper, still.
This hotel, along with several places in our county, yearly hosts a convention that trains police and fire fighters in urban warfare on citizens, and enables them to gaze upon and purchase tools of war. We protested last year. We are protesting this year. This is not an inconvenience. This is civil disobedience. This is a minor effort to tip the scales of justice. This is a minor effort to ask you, please, to see what is happening.
We sat in meditation on the concrete for two hours, keeping those doors shut. In between necessary conferring with the woman acting as police liaison, I continued to chant your names, knowing they were only a few of the hundreds of names that should be shouted to the night. My mantra was silent, keeping time with my breathing and my heart.
Mike Brown, Ezell Ford, Alan Blueford, Oscar Grant, Anita Gay, Gary King, Kimani Gray, Sean Bell, Andy Lopez, Kayla Moore, Eric Garner, Kelly Thomas…
Photo: Post News Group
We are up against a monster that does not trust the people. We are up against a monster who hates those who live in poverty. We are up against a monster who feeds upon our fear. We are up against a monster who delights in control, oppression, and in pain.
We are not up against individuals. We are up against a being formed by a collective, what magic workers call an egregore*. This egregore is hungry for injustice. It is hungry for screams, and rapes, and beatings, and gassing, and shots fired into flesh.
It insinuates itself in airports and alleyways. It grows larger at the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference and at Urban Shield. It infects good people with a madness that cannot be appeased without more violence.
Alan Blueford, Mike Brown, Kimani Gray, Ezell Ford, Anita Gay, Kelly Thomas, Oscar Grant, Eric Garner, Gary King, Sean Bell, Kayla Moore, Andy Lopez…
Your names are the antidote.
Sitting in meditation on concrete for two hours blockading doors is an antidote.
Photo: Arab Organizing
Education is an antidote. Community is an antidote. Love is an antidote.
Love is greater than fear. Always.
We form an egregore, too, all of us who love. All of us who stand for justice. All of us who march the streets of Ferguson, or sit down upon concrete in Oakland and declare, “Enough. We love each other. We feel angry. So, enough.”
Alan Blueford, Mike Brown, Kimani Gray, Ezell Ford, Anita Gay, Kelly Thomas, Oscar Grant, Eric Garner, Gary King, Sean Bell, Kayla Moore, Andy Lopez…
Friday, an officer in Oklahoma who raped 8 Black women in six months was finally charged. Saturday, people from all over gathered with Mike Brown’s parents to march again in Ferguson, Missouri. while others gathered in a church in Los Angeles California to mourn Ezell Ford.
The systems of oppression are in place. So are the avenues of our resistance and our action.
My opposition is my prayer. My prayer is my opposition.
I love you all so much. I give thanks to every activist. I give thanks to every person spreading kindness. I send blessings to every parent, friend, and lover who mourns.
Mike Brown, Ezell Ford, Alan Blueford, Oscar Grant, Anita Gay, Gary King, Kimani Gray, Sean Bell, Andy Lopez, Kayla Moore, Eric Garner, Kelly Thomas…
I meditated on cold concrete for two hours. Your body lay on the street for four hours. You lay face down on the platform, dying, friends and strangers screaming for your life. You were crying, with no one to hear you.
There is no comparison. None.
We shut down the hotel doors for you, for two hours. It isn’t enough, but last night, it was what we could do.
Friday and Saturday, when Urban Shield rolls into town, when tactics and training and weapons to be used against us are all being practiced and on display? We will do more.
And we’ll do it in your names.
Alan Blueford, Mike Brown, Kimani Gray, Ezell Ford, Anita Gay, Kelly Thomas, Oscar Grant, Eric Garner, Gary King, Sean Bell, Kayla Moore, Andy Lopez…
Your names are my prayer.
T. Thorn Coyle is a magic worker committed to love, justice, and liberation. Her work reaches people all over the world through spiritual direction, soul readings, vibrant workshops, and online classes. Thorn is the author of many books, including Evolutionary Witchcraft, and Crafting a Daily Practice. She is founder and head of Solar Cross Temple and Morningstar Mystery School. A lifelong activist, Thorn’s current alliances are with Martin de Porres House of Hospitality in San Francisco, and the Anti Police-Terror Project in Oakland, CA, which organizes with the families of those affected by police violence.
*egregore: an occult concept representing a “thoughtform”, or “collective group mind”, that takes on a life of its own and influences the thoughts and actions of a group of people. In this context, the “new Jim Crow” would be an example of an egregore that was able to change shape from it’s original form – the old slave codes – to a secondary form – the Jim Crow laws of the old south – to its current form as a highly racialized system of mass incarceration.
While the first reference in the article names an egregore as a harmful entity created by the dominant culture (a psychic being that feeds on injustice and violence), the second reference (“we form an egregore, too”) indicates the way in which our activism takes on a life of its own and works its own influence upon society according to the principles of justice and integrity with which we charge it.
About the action
On August 31, 2014, the Buddhist Peace Fellowship and allies blockaded the Marriott Hotel for 2 hours as a direct protest and obstruction to the Marriott’s hosting Urban Shield Oakland. Urban Shield is a weapons expo and SWAT training for police to practice militarized techniques, promoting increasingly deadly practices within civilian police forces across the country and around the world. Two very detailed descriptions of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship action can be found in subsequent articles written for Lion’s Roar and Tricycle. You can also watch a short video on the action here. The entire week of action had a measurable effect: Urban Shield will no longer be held at the Marriott and it will no longer take place anywhere in Oakland. Organizing and protests against Urban Shield continue to take place across the country.