We are experiencing a moral emergency.

In a time of escalating war, civilian death, deepening repression, widening inequality, and mounting hardship, people of faith must unite and speak with one voice.

Here at home we face a climate of fear and oppression that cannot be ignored. Peaceful community members are detained, harassed, humiliated, and sometimes killed. Masked agents and expanding law enforcement powers patrol our streets while those who speak out face retaliation.

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. warned in 1968 that "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death."

Nearly sixty years ago Dr. King also warned of three evils threatening the soul of a nation: militarism, racism, and greed. Today we see these forces converging around us.

Militarism that treats domination as policy; racism that determines whose lives are valued; materialism that prioritizes profit while millions struggle to survive.

Our traditions teach that justice begins with self examination and must lead to action.

Together we commit to gathering one million signatures by the end of October, representing a diverse coalition of faith leaders and communities prepared to move together. With those signatures we will organize across congregations and traditions to demand real changes in public policy, in the conditions shaping our communities, and in ourselves so that we may more fully live the justice, compassion, and courage our faiths call us to embody.