How Big is Your Sky?
David R. Weiss – April 17, 2025

I was encouraged today to go outside, look up, and remind myself the sky isn’t falling. This from a friend who is cocksure we’ll all come out on the far side of a Trump presidency no worse for the wear. Well, I did make it outside while the sun was bright and the sky was clear, but somehow, I wasn’t reassured.

See, for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, or the 178 other men with no criminal record at all who were among the 238 men deported—none of whom received the due process that undergirds our entire system of justice, for all those men—stripped, shaved, shackled, paraded—the sky has fallen. (And for their families)

For Mahmoud Khalil, Rumeysa Ozturk, and the dozens of other international students arrested, all here legally, all engaged in the vibrant civic discourse (about the sacredness of human life, no less) that is at the heart of democracy, for all of them (and their families) the sky has fallen.

For the literally thousands of civil servants, whose job was to serve the American people or our international neighbors in a host of ways, whose jobs were erased, often by email, without warning, and aggressively-as though their mere decision to hold a government post made them somehow an enemy of this new administration. For them and their families the sky has fallen.

For transgender persons, who witness their identity denied, their recognition in legal documents undone, and their access of medical care suddenly hindered—in some places criminalized—their sky has fallen.

For women, whose access to medical care in some places has been criminalized—to the extent that some have faced charges for seeking reproductive care while others have faced death for lack of health care, for these women the sky has fallen.

For special needs kids of all stripes, whose educational funding will be decimated by the dismantling of the Education Department, their sky is falling right now—in real time.

For those families whose ability to receive FEMA funding following recent weather disasters was denied, their sky has fallen (right into the flood waters that ravaged their communities).

For black persons who see the recognition of their achievements being literally whitewashed from national monuments and websites, their sky is falling—because these erasures are only the beginning of a full-scale assault on any recognition of racial justice.

For countless little people—small business owners, farmers, independent contractors—whose livelihoods have already been torpedoed by tariffs imposed without any concern for upheaval, their sky has fallen.

For the government agencies across the countries (including my wife’s) who’ve had funding that was already awarded canceled and withdrawn, for the people who work in those agencies and for the communities they served, the sky has fallen.

For the nonprofits working to meet people’s needs (like the church-based food shelf in my neighborhood—or the community-based one near the church I attend) who’ve also had funding that was already awarded canceled and withdrawn, for the people who work here and for the people they serve, the sky has fallen.

And even around the world. For women in rural parts of Africa, whose access to lifesaving birthing assistance was shuttered overnight by USAID cuts, their sky has fallen. For countless persons across the globe whose lives and well-being hinged on the good-neighbor aid of America through development programs and food or medical assistance now instantly-erased, their sky has fallen.

I’ll grant that I haven’t personally been hit by any chunks of falling sky. I’m white, straight, cisgender, American-born, and (thus far) buffered from the financial tumult that has hit so many others.

But my life is tethered to people who fit into every single group of human beings named above. And goddammit, we share the same sky. And as long as this administration (or any administration) pursues by careful intention(!) cruelty, mayhem, intimidation, or the wanton destruction of institutions that serve the common good—as long as this persists, my sky is falling.

Because it’s all one sky.

Look, I am American. I even have an American flag that I fly pretty often. But when I go outside and look up, the sky I see covers all of us—no matter who we are; no matter where we live. And that sky is falling right now. Even if it isn’t hitting me.

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David Weiss is a theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, “writing into the whirlwind” of contemporary challenges, joys, and sorrows around climate crisis, sexuality, justice, peace, and family. Reach him at drw59mn@gmail.com. Read more at www.davidrweiss.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.” Support him in Writing into the Whirlwind at www.patreon.com/fullfrontalfaith.