On June 13, 2021, the UUSA members attending the 2021 Annual Meeting of the Congregation voted 50 in favor, 1 against, and 6 abstaining to accept and implement the UU 8th Principle, which reads as follows:
We, the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association, covenant to affirm and promote journeying toward spiritual wholeness by working to build a diverse multicultural Beloved Community by our actions that accountably dismantle racism and other oppressions in ourselves and our institutions.
Recognizing that our congregation is unlikely to be satisfied by simply voting in favor of this bold statement, a logical step is to begin the hard work of journeying toward the Beloved Community by learning to dismantle racism and other oppressions in ourselves and our institutions. For those who are ready, you are invited to join other members of our congregation in studying and practicing the methods taught by therapist Resmaa Menakem, for healing the racialized trauma we all carry in our bodies. We will use his best-selling book, My Grandmothers Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending our Hearts and Bodies, as our guide in this important work.
We welcome anyone who wants to do this work in a primarily white space, where most of the experiential learning will be oriented around those who identify as having white bodies. Sarah Puckett, John Gerber, and Reverend Rachael will facilitate a weekly series of experiential workshops based on this book on:
Wednesday evenings from October 9 to November 20, 2024
7:30pm – 9:00pm
at the UUSA meetinghouse
Because we will emphasize the examination of intergenerational systemic racism as it is experienced in our own individual bodies, rather than focus on analysis or discussion, our meetings will look and feel different from other book groups. This work is not like many workplace DEI trainings which do little to address the problem in a meaningful, enduring way. Neither is it about cultivating a sense of shame and guilt. It is about deep healing, which benefits all. This will not be a zoom event.
If you are ready to read the book and commit to the practice of examining our own embodied response to racism, please sign up here:
Anti-racist Embodied Practice Signup
Menakem’s challenging approach to dismantling racism is offered as way of healing bodies that have been traumatized by 400 years of erasure of Native Americans, and enslavement and oppression of African Americans. White body supremacy is baked into our culture and will not be easily healed. But any approach that does not recognize that “racism and other oppressions” are embodied responses, not rational responses, will surely fail.
Menakem calls on white people, whom he refers to as “white bodies”, to work to build an anti-racist culture, but first to prepare themselves for this difficult work through a step-by-step healing process based on recent advances in neuroscience and somatic healing. He writes “Healing from white-body supremacy begins with the body – your body.” If you would like to begin to learn how, you are invited to join us.
For a short audio clip from the book, click on the link below….
