Atop the pulpit of The First Baptist Church of Deanwood rang petitions for change and a bevy of #PrayerfulResistance as more than 24 faith-based and community organizations took to the Northeast Washington, D.C., sanctuary demonstrating the power of prayer — or what event convener the Rev. Dr. O. Jermaine Bego calls “the first form of active resistance.”

“When you think about the life of Harriet Tubman, everything that she did was grounded first in prayer, before she went to serve out her mission, her purpose and to bring freedom to those who are oppressed,” Bego said, “and I believe the same thing is true today.”

Set to the backdrop of a national opioid crisis, anti-immigration efforts, housing discrimination and disparities and the Aug. 11 federal occupation of D.C., with recent orders

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