A band of anti-ICE agitators burst into Cities Church in St. Paul during Sunday worship, chanting “ICE out” and “Justice for Renee Good” and driving congregants from their pews. The disruption came amid justified public outrage over the January 7 shooting of Renee Good by an ICE agent, but righteous anger does not give anyone the right to invade a house of worship. What happened inside that sanctuary was not protest — it was intimidation of innocent worshippers and a blatant violation of basic religious liberty.
Any decent nation must draw a clear line when mobs start treating churches like political battlegrounds. Federal law specifically bars interference with religious services, and the Department of Justice has rightly opened a probe under that statute, warning it will come down hard on those who trample on people’s right to worship. Conservatives should celebrate swift enforcement when the rule of law is used to protect Americans, not when it’s weaponized selectively.
There’s been a lot of social-media sleuthing claiming a pastor at Cities Church shares a name with a local ICE official, but rumor and mob fury are not substitutes for facts or due process. Even when allegations involve federal officers, the proper response is evidence and law, not storming a sanctuary and attempting to shame people in front of their families. If activists truly believe in justice, they should demand transparent investigations, not theatrical harassment.
The modern media circus played its predictable role, amplifying and emboldening the crowd instead of calming a volatile scene. A prominent broadcaster followed and prodded the demonstrators, turning a church service into a live political spectacle while worshippers fled. That kind of performative journalism doesn’t inform the public — it fuels chaos and excuses the lawlessness we’re now seeing in so many cities.
Patriotic Americans of all stripes should be alarmed that sacred spaces are being treated as soft targets by political mobs. Religious liberty is a first-order right tied to the very character of our republic, and allowing churches to be disrupted without consequence invites further erosion of civil order. The DOJ’s intervention is not partisan — it’s necessary to protect the helpless from coercion and to reassert the primacy of law over lynch-mob tactics.
This episode fits a troubling pattern: when left-wing activism meets rumor and resentment, churches, public servants, and everyday citizens become collateral damage. Conservatives must stand firmly against both the abuses that produced public anger and the lawlessness that seeks to exploit it. We can demand accountability for bad actors and simultaneously reject the mob’s claim to substitute for due process.
Hardworking Americans should pray for healing in Minneapolis and insist that the institutions charged with keeping the peace do their jobs. Call your representatives, support enforcement of laws that protect worship and free assembly, and refuse to normalize intimidation as a political tool. If we love our country, we will defend its sanctuaries and its laws with equal zeal.
