Submitted by the Bedford Clergy Association
The Bedford Clergy Association today announces the launch of the “Love Your Neighbor Campaign,” a multi-media, multi-faceted, all-ages, community-oriented campaign to promote greater awareness of, care for, and love of all our neighbors in Bedford. The Campaign invites all who live and work in Bedford to participate in this community movement to affirm the dignity, worth, and value of every human being.
We offer this Campaign out of our desire to respond to the increasingly visible experiences of anti-Semitism, racism, xenophobia and other forms of marginalization in our community over the past year. By promoting a positive dynamic of curiosity and engagement across all lines of difference, the Campaign seeks to provide a way for those who live and work in Bedford to show their support for the diversity that makes our community vibrant.
In the months to come the Campaign will offer many opportunities for individuals and groups within Bedford to self-identify their commitment to a Bedford that embraces diversity and difference as fundamental community values. The Campaign will also offer ways to help all of us in Bedford visibly and meaningfully live out those commitments together through greater awareness of differences among us, deeper learning about particular cultural and religious histories, and demonstrations of empathy and solidarity.
As its first action, the Love Your Neighbor Campaign invites everyone in Bedford to print and display the “Love Your Neighbor” sign and post it in a window or door of their home or business. This sign is available in 8.5 x 11 format for download on the website of many of our houses of worship, and via the websites of local media outlets. Hard copies will be available at many of our houses of worship and elsewhere around town. Displaying the sign is a commitment to affirming the dignity, worth and value of every human being, and to honoring the value of difference within our community. Because it indicates solidarity with all those who experience marginalization as a result of their identities, we encourage all Bedford residents to participate.
The Campaign has also composed a community blessing, which we offer for use publicly in our houses of worship, public gatherings, community meetings, as well as privately by families at mealtimes or bedtimes:
May our beloved town of Bedford
be blessed with healing from all hatred,
May our homes overflow with loving kindness,
May all our children grow up in the safety that
encourages them to be their own best selves,
May our public spaces welcome strangers and friends
with abundant grace,
And may our citizens of all backgrounds and traditions
share generously with and learn eagerly from one another.
We look forward to sharing more with you in the weeks to come and to partnering with others in the important work before us.
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There is not healing without reparations and compensation from the
aggressors or is not that what we did with Germany after WWII and second
and most when you turn a blind eye to what the jews are doing to
Palestinians then there’s something very wrong with your Christians
religious beliefs, you can’t stand with Christ if you stand with israel
so if we are going to start really loving our neighbors we have to start
with the kids in Gaza then we can talk some meaningful talk instead of some colorful semantics
I think that the Bedford Rotary’s Exchange student gives our town an excellent way to get up close and personal with a new friend from another country! Students can be from any race or religion. And our host families get a once in a lifetime opportunity to get to know a young man or woman from another part of the world. Did you know that we are currently actively looking for Bedford residents who are interesting in hosting a high school student for 3-4 months. curious? – visit our website today – https://www.bedfordmarotary.org/StudentExchange.cfm