For many of the women newly elected to Congress, their first months on the job have been all about kinship. They wore white to their first State of the Union address, and encouraged other women in the Congress to do the same. It was a powerful visual demonstration of strength in numbers.

They are often shown at congressional hearings sitting shoulder to shoulder in solidarity. When Trump attacks one, the others immediately tweet their support for the one attacked.

This radical sense of kinship they are demonstrating shows the power of love in a time of hate.

They refer to one another as “my sister.” They openly grieve for what one another has to suffer at the vengeful, menacing hands of Trump and the entrenched establishment. “I am carrying my sister Ilhan Omar in my heart tonight,” Ayanna Pressley tweeted after Trump sent out a picture of Omar against a backdrop of the bombing of the Twin Towers.

Our newest female legislative representatives include Muslims, lesbians, Hispanics, Jews, Native Americans, Palestinians, and blacks, as well as white, straight, privileged representatives. Yet, the most important behavioral intention they have in carrying out their new responsibilities is to treat one another as beloved siblings.

They recognize that they are kindred souls in the struggle for equality and social justice. They are setting an example of radical kinship in a time of hate.

The term “radical kinship” comes from Father Gregory Boyle, a Jesuit priest who founded Homeboy Industries in Los Angeles. It is an intervention and rehabilitation program based on unconditional love and compassion. Any gang member or street thug who finds his or her way to Homeboy Industries is met with job opportunities, communication and support that demonstrate unwavering faith in the divinity in all of us. (Father Boyle’s books include Tattoos on the Heart and Barking to the Choir.)

To say, “We are all equals,” is to describe this underlying relationship based on love and respect for one another. Some have called it “radical love.” The term conveys an understanding that love is not just passionate, not just familial; love is the feeling that we are all siblings in the human family.

When asked for her thoughts on Trump, Jane Fonda said, “his behavior is the language of the wounded.” She talked about all of the obvious signs that this man’s development was greatly damaged by his upbringing.

“We need a radical kinship with everyone,” she said, “including those we disagree with. And that means with his supporters, too.” It is extremely difficult to contemplate, but nonetheless the only viable option to this time of hate. What Valerie Kaur calls “revolutionary love” is the process of responding to people and events out of a centered, abiding love for one another as if we were kin.

It would be difficult to have an egalitarian relationship with anyone on the basis of rational thought alone. Debating back and forth, even when such arguments are civil, doesn’t move people closer to resolution. What brings us into an egalitarian relationship is a mutual feeling of loving kinship with another.

To move past this era of abdicated responsibilities for our democracy – the failure to care for one another, the failure to care for the environment, and the failure to ensure that all people abide by the rule of law without the privilege of money or whiteness or position – we will have to grab hold of this idea of radical love.

That is the path to helping Flint and Puerto Rico, the path to honoring Native Americans and women and elders. That is the route we must take to address homelessness and health care, and the route that leads to racial and economic justice.

It can be difficult to imagine in this time of divisiveness and hate, but the road to equality is paved with the sense of loving kinship.