'Black Lives Matter' Banner Vandalized At Evanston Church

EVANSTON, IL — Hours after someone vandalized a Black Lives Matter sign in front of a church in northwest Evanston, church leaders committed not only to replace it — but also ordered nine identical banners for other local houses of worship. Meanwhile, community members responded by repairing the damaged banner and surrounding it with more lawn signs in support of Black lives.

The 8-foot-long sign saying "Black Lives Matter To God and To Us" was placed in front of Northminster Presbyterian Church in late June following nationwide protests over the in-custody homicide of George Floyd, who died with a Minneapolis police officer's knee on his neck. Early Sunday morning, a neighbor discovered someone had cut the word "Black" out of the sign some time during the previous night.

Rev. Michael Kirby said it was the first time anyone had damaged the sign. He said some residents in the neighborhood had expressed concern about the church endorsing a political movement, although a statement adopted by church leadership, known as the session, when the banner was first put in place specified that the sign was not an endorsement of the national Black Lives Matter organization.

"That group — and its local affiliates — do express core values that resonate with Christian values, including empathy, the necessity of family-friendly spaces, and intergenerational cooperation," church leaders said at the time. "But it also advocates for a range of policies on contentious issues about which neither the Session nor Northminster’s staff has taken a position. Thus our banner is not an organizational endorsement but is Northminster Presbyterian Church’s affirmation that the lives of black people matter to God and to us."

In response to the vandalism, session members issued a joint statement Sunday asking anyone with information about the incident to contact Evanston police and thanking the community for their support. In addition to the lawn signs, by midday Sunday someone had patched the sliced-up sign with a handmade sign to replace the word, "Black."

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"Until such time as we replace our own banner, we believe it is important that the defaced banner remains on display, so that we can all confront the reality that the fear or hatred that led to its defacement is both real and all-too-present in Evanston in 2020, and also be inspired by the generosity of spirit and grass-roots commitment demonstrated by our neighbors’ caring response to the vandalism," the session's statement said.

With the support of an anonymous donor, Northminster has ordered 10 identical banners to replace the one vandalized over the weekend. They are expected to arrive in about 10 days, Kirby said. The senior pastor plans to contact local faith communities across different denominations to offer some of the new banners. He said his fellow church leaders were incredibly touched and extraordinary grateful for the community's response to the incident.

"It shows there's enormous support for racial justice and equity in the neighborhood and the neighborhood clearly does not want this act of violence against the sign to be interpreted as the neighborhood's response. So that's very heartening, to see so many people stepping up with words of support, even people offering to replace the sign," he said.

"We look forward to being able to work with everyone, and also to draw into the conversation those people who continue to have fears about the change that needs to come if we're going to have racial justice and equity and truly dismantle white supremacy and surrender the immoral privileges that are attached to white privilege."