the Iconocast: Carol Lee and Sarah Lee (episode 69)

In episode 69, recorded in the fall of 2017, Joanna interviews Carol Lee and Sarah Lee.

Carol is second generation Chinese American of Toi San background. Carol works with PICO California growing faith communities’ institutional capacity for long-term justice work in Oakland, California. Their program creates accessible on ramps to uncover the root causes of injustice in housing, policing, and immigration policy, while cultivating communal spaces to creatively, seriously, and maximally steward their communities' power and resources for collective liberation.

Sarah is a second generation Chinese American of Hokshan and En Ping descent. Sarah works as a Sanctuary Organizer with Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity, developing networks of community safety for immigrants through congregations and immigrant justice coalitions. Her specific focus has been uplifting the stories of formerly incarcerated immigrants and those most in danger of deportation through a project called Migrants in the Pulpit.

In 2017 they created the “Reading is Resistance” Readathon for people of Asian and Pacific Islander descent. The commitments of the readathon included: to speak and act from a deep foundation of the historical work for liberation, to imagine and create a more loving and just world, to resist cultural amnesia by reading and sharing knowledge, and to support organizations doing critical work.