As Faith in Action’s director of faith leadership strategies, Rev. Deth Im’s work centers on faith as a unifying force. The organization, which was started was started 53 years ago by Father John Baumann, a Jesuit priest in Oakland, has evolved into a network of 44 federations that use a community-congregation model to catalyze a multi-race, multi-faith, gender equitable movement. As one of nine racial justice and faith-based leaders that comprise the first cohort of the Solidarity Collaborative, Deth is focused on how efforts to help faith communities, in solidarity with others, become “a locus of power that will then work to make change out in the world.”

Deth’s commitment to solidarity was demonstrated last month when he and two other members of the Faith in Action team traveled to Los Angeles to participate in peaceful protesting of the immigration arrests by ICE and the administration’s subsequent militarized response to this resistance. Zach Hoover, the executive director of LA Voice, a Faith in Action federation, hoped to benefit from Deth’s experience organizing faith leaders in his home state of Missouri during the Ferguson protests that followed Michael Brown’s murder.

Hear Deth talk more about his experience in Los Angeles and what being part of the Solidarity Collaborative has meant to him.