Asian American & Pacific Islander Month
In celebrating Asian American & Pacific American Heritage Month, we share this prayer, thank you to Kate Stefanko of Trinity Episcopal Church for sharing this prayer.
Loving God, we praise you for your endless creativity made manifest in the diversity of all people. Each tribe, ethnicity and culture is an expression of your expansive grace that nourishes us all. We especially praise you for the goodness and wisdom of the peoples of Asia and the Pacific Islands.
For the name and story of each person who claims this heritage, we praise your love. For the art, music, innovations, food and culture they share with the world, we praise your goodness. For the security and peace of their homes, businesses, and places of worship, we ask your protection.
Keep all descendants of Asia and the Pacific Islands in your care, hold them in your love and make us fierce advocates and allies for welcome, inclusion and the common good. Amen.
Adapted from a prayer by The Catholic Health Association of the United States
Reading Lists for All Ages
- “Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Reading List for Kids” at the New York Public Library website
- “Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Reading List for Teens” at the New York Public Library website
- “Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Reading List for Adults” at the New York Public Library website
- “The May Book Project,” produced by the Very Asian Foundation and We Need Diverse Books – includes reading lists for all ages as downloadable PDFs
Articles
- Making paper cranes. Here is an article about paper cranes from the National Park Service. Recently, the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia requested paper cranes from across Episcopal churches to be strung up in front of a DHS detention center in Tacoma, Washington.
- ENS Tule Lake article. Although I know we already have our great video of the Tule Lake pilgrimage, here is the Episcopal News Service article that covered the pilgrimage: Click here.
- AAPI Leaders Offer the Gift of Their Stories https://livingchurch.org/news/news-episcopal-church/aapi-leaders-offer-the-gift-of-their-stories/
- “What Is the Model Minority Myth?” by Sarah-Soonling Blackburn, Learning for Justice (Mar. 21, 2019)
History and Cultural Criticism Books
- Detours: A Decolonial Guide to Hawai’i, edited by Hōkūlani K. Aikau and Vernadette Vicuña Gonzalez (Durham: Duke University Press, 2019)
- Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong (New York: One World, 2021)
- Opening the Gates to Asia: A Transpacific History of How America Repealed Asian Exclusion by Jane H. Hong (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 2019)
- Our Voices, Our Histories: Asian American and Pacific Islander Women, edited by Shirley Hune and Gail M. Nomura (New York: NYU Press, 2020)
- Remembering Our Intimacies: Mo’olelo, Aloha ‘Āina, and Ea by Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2021)
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The Gray Bird Sings: The Extraordinary Life of Betty Kwan Chinn by Karen M. Price
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Issei and Nisei: The Internment Years by Daisuke Kitagawa. This is an important book since the Rev. Daisuke Kitagawa, an Episcopal priest, wrote about his interment experience ministering to people of Japanese descent at Tule Lake. His son, the Rev. Canon John Kitagawa, was a participant in our pilgrimage. Canon John is also the chair of TEC’s Coalition for Racial Equity and Justice.
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A Place for What We Lose: A Daughter’s Return to Tule Lake by Tamiko Nimura. The book title will be released April 28, so I haven’t read it yet, but Carole Hom may know something about the book since she coordinated with Tamiko as one of our speakers at our diocesan Tule Lake webinar held last year.
