Isaiah 6:1–8
The prophet Isaiah’s dramatic vision of God’s heavenly throne offers lessons to Christian abolitionists about where we look for leadership and whose voices guide the movement.
Abolition is fundamentally a grassroots movement, guided by those who are most affected by the system: incarcerated people organizing for their own liberation, formerly-incarcerated people, people with loved ones who are incarcerated or system-impacted. Allies on the outside dedicate themselves to following the leadership that already exists.
What does this have to do with Isaiah? In Isaiah’s vision, he sees the seraphs around the throne of God crying out: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” Every place on the earth is full of the glory of God. The glory of God which is the impetus toward justice is everywhere—there is nowhere on the earth that is God-forsaken. This means that every prison, every jail, every place where humans try to exclude or banish people is nonetheless a place where God is present and working toward justice. This fact illuminates for us the divine reality behind the practical reality that incarcerated and formerly-incarcerated folks are leading the organizing toward abolition.
Isaiah’s vision also speaks to the ability of everyone to participate in God’s work for justice, no matter what we may have done in the past. He says: “I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips” — yet the seraph cleanses him and sends him out for God.
Outside allies sometimes are uncomfortable following the leadership of incarcerated organizers who may have done serious harm. For those people, it is important to recognize that having done violence or harm does not prevent someone from also being a leader for abolition. In terms of Isaiah’s vision, Christian allies on the outside can recognize that anyone, no matter what they have done, can participate in the work of justice and thereby answer God’s question: “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”
But “living among a people of unclean lips” is also a description of those on the outside, who live freely in a society that has determined that some people should not have freedom; who participate as citizens in a country that talks about liberty and justice but provides exclusion, control, and punishment. Failure to take action for justice makes one complicit in the injustice of white supremacy and mass incarceration. Yet, the call to Isaiah is also a call to those who are complicit. God calls us, all “people of unclean lips,” from our complicity. God cleanses us. And God makes us ready for God to send us out, to go for God and do the work of justice and abolition.
We follow the leadership of those most affected and we look for God whose glory is present everywhere, leading the whole earth to renewed justice.
Hannah Bowman is the founder and director of Christians for Abolition.