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Renee Descartes absurdly observed "I think, therefore I am."  This put the individual consciousness in contradiction to all that existed outside of that consciousness, to all "perceived" data and even to other people.  The enlightenment world view that gained hegemony in the "Western" mind has been characterized by this subject/object split. We are part of nature, and we thrive when we are live in harmony with our natural world, with Mother Earth.  However, the enlightenment world view makes identity with nature impossible, and results in a profound alienation from our interconnected cosmos, and from that which people call by many names, in our faith tradition many of us prefer "God,"  "the Holy,"  "the Creator," and "Source of all."  

Unitarian Universalism arose within the enlightenment and shared the world view of subjective liberalism (the other is hostile to my freedom, that community is best that leaves me alone) as opposed to social freedom (I can not be free unless everyone else shares in freedom.  Solidarity and mutual responsibility enhances individuals to realize their full potential.)  In the last part of the twentieth century, Unitarian Universalists began to question their alienation from the natural world, and whether their embrace of subjective liberalism was compatible their longing for loving community.

What are the consequences of the Western or Modern world view, the view that objectifies Mother Earth and all creatures of the earth and sky?  It strikes me that this world view alienates human beings from the creation, from each other, from their own inner most selves and from the mystery in which we live, and move and have our being.  

Will Tuttle, Ph.D., 'The World Peace Diet'  writes:

"The spiritual connection between animals and humans grows out of

understanding that we are all expressions of eternal benevolent

consciousness, and as we acknowledge this interconnection and live in

harmony with it, our lives become prayers of compassion and healing."  

It is my contention that the enlightenment world view has rationalized racism, total war, and untold violence against human beings.  In other entries I have and will develop these points more fully.  But I wish to conclude with what it means to us to be alienated from our relatives, the animals.

The way we produce food and bring it to consumers is destructive to life and flows from profound alienation from our own nature.  Unitarian Universalists now have the opportunity of discussing and acting on their own relation to the our Mother the Earth in a a study action initiative that many of our congregations are engaged in, Ethical Eating: Food and Environmental Justice raises many possibilities of looking at our assumptions and make affirmative responses to restore our relation to the world, and that which we may call Holy.

The Unitarian Universalists have named Ethical Eating: Food and Environmental Justice as the Congregational Study and Action Issue for 2008-2012.  As an old sceptic of General Assembly Resolutions I find the Study and Action process to be much more productive than simply passing resolutions, congregations are able to dig into the issue and try to both understand the issue and find ways to address it.  Given the gathering world crisis in food production and distribution, coupled with the destruction that chemical agriculture is doing to top soils and ground water taking action on "Ethical Eating" is critical.   

Here is a resource for Ethical Eating that I will be distributing to members of my congregation during our discussion of the implications of food, and how we eat it for the world we long to live in.

One of the most divisive battles in our country has been the debate between Evolution and Creationism.  Most often this debate is posed between two extreme positions, fundamentalist Christianity versus fundamentalist scientism.  The fundamentalist Christian argues that life on earth and all of the species were created all at once as part  by a transcendent anthropomorphic God in a seven day creation miracle.   The fundamentalist science story argues that life emerged by blind chance for dead matter and that evolution was a violent process of random mutations and natural selection.  If I argue and I do: that intelligence and creativity were and are involved in the ongoing process of creation.  the fundamentalist scientist will assume that you are trying to sneak in a transcendent designer, and see this view as theism by another name.    And the fundamentalist Christian will assume that I am just a godless Darwinist who is fancying up my heathen evolutionism with a little New Age spirituality.  Yet I would argue that most religious people and most scientists are not fundamentalists and take a position that embraces both divine creativity and evolution.  The view that the cosmos is self conscious, creative and self organizing  was a common belief among the indigenous people of this hemisphere and the bed rock understanding of process theology.  

I believe that Unitarian Universalists can play a positive role in the divisive Evolution versus Creationism debate.    We can show that religious communities are not all stubborn fundamentalists that deny the that life forms evolved over time, and we can show that Unitarian Universalists have theological and spiritual understandings of cosmic significance.

In 2004 Micheal Zimmerman initiated The Clergy Letter Project to reach out to clergy and urge them to support the teaching of science.  So far over 14000 clergy have signed the letter.  And in subsequent years congregations have held worship services on the same Sunday to show their support for Evolution within the religious community.   At first, many Unitarian Universalists hesitated to sign because it was "Christian clergy" letter, although many of us signed and wrote Micheal Zimmerman to expand the work to include all clergy.  As a result there was a Jewish Letter, and today the Evolution Sunday projects are inclusive and interfaith.   I urge all Unitarian Universalist congregations to consider standing with others in the faith community in this important initiative.

Today there are front page articles in the nation's major newspapers, and on the cable news about the census bureaus report that in a few short decades the white majority will no longer be a majority.  Latino/as, African Americans, American Indians, Asian Americans and other so called minorities will together constitute the majority, and America will then be a nation of racialized ethnic groups each of which is a minority.   By the middle of this century the white population will be older than the population as a whole, and the United States will have 400 million people (it is a little over 300 million today.) 

The Los Angeles  Times puts it this way "[t]he white population is older and very much centered around the aging baby boomers who are well past their high fertility years," said William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. "The future of America is epitomized by the young people today. They are basically the melting pot we are going to see in the future."

Historically Unitarian was a religion of the white elite, and after the merger the spirit of Unitarianism prevailed over the more inclusive and generous Universalist way of being religiously liberal.  While there have been people of color in Unitarian and Universalist congregations in every stage of our history, those "pioneers in a white denomination" were exceptions to the rule, and did not motivate any concerted effort to reach out and seek to become more ethnically diverse.  

In the late 1960s, because of the work of Unitarian Universalists in the civil rights movement there was an influx of African Americans into our congregations.  These Unitarian Universalists while they saw the promise of religious liberalism also experienced the elitism and complacency of the white majority, and there arose a movement of African Americans and their allies to build Unitarian Universalism in African American communities.  While this movement had wide support, it became divided relative to tactics, and the defenders of the status quo were able to turn back the effort.

Many Unitarian Universalists left the movement and the leadership settled back into self congratulation and complacency.

Again in the 1980s African Americans began to organize and came to the conclusion that it was "internalized racism" that was the main obstacle to Unitarian Universalism becoming more diverse.   In the 1990s Unitarian Universalists resolved at General Assemblies to become more diverse and recognized that they must overcome their own cooperation with systemic racism to accomplish that task.  While much has been done, and the African American initiatives provided an opening for other people of color to find their voice,  we still have much work to do before our congregations reflects the ethnic and racial make up of the nation as a whole

Given my experience with  working with congregations (currently Throop Unitarian Universalist Church in Pasadena, California),  I believe that most Unitarian Universalists would support the work to become an anti racist, anti oppressive and multi cultural community if they were given leadership by their minister(s) and lay leadership.  This leadership in turn will need support from the Unitarian Universalist Association providing excellence in programs such as Building The World We Dream About, and Now is the Time!  Leading Congregations Into a Multiracial, Multicultural Future.

This is sermon by Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley (1949-2006)

When I was studying for the ministry, one of the expectations was that each week, the entire community would attend chapel (the worship service). Although I had been a Unitarian Universalist for more than a decade, I was still healing from the pain of my fundamentalist past, and I had not yet mustered the courage to attend chapel in this United Methodist seminary. But with the support of three Unitarian Universalist friends, one Friday toward the end of the first semester, I dragged myself to worship.

I wasn't sure what kind of message I would hear, but it was a week before exams, and I hoped for a place where I could center myself, and find some internal spiritual resources for the days ahead. To my surprise, there was no sermon. It was early December, and the entire liturgy focused on Advent, ending with a celebration of the Eucharist. Now I had not attended a Christian communion for over 20 years, but I tried to approach it with an open mind.

The prayer, offered by Dr. Mark Burrows, began with these words: "We, who are the children of Abraham and Sarah. . ." I don't recall the rest of the sentence, because in a split second, my mind went blank. It simply refused to be present to this experience that was sacred for most others in attendance. I began to weep-quietly at first-but a whimper soon turned to tears, then uncontrollable tears. My friends sat beside me trying to be supportive, but didn't have a clue what was so upsetting about that simple phrase: "We, who are the children of Abraham and Sarah?" I had no harsh feelings toward Dr. Burrows, but the moment I heard those words suggesting that I was a descendent of Abraham and Sarah, I felt the pain of exclusion.

My rational mind told me that the I should not take it literally; that the statement was merely a symbolic reference to our Jewish and Christian heritage. But that rationale didn't help. I simply could not get beyond the complex dynamics of race and class and gender in the biblical story. I knew the story of Abraham and Sarah in the book of Genesis, but I also knew the story of Abraham and Hagar, an Egyptian woman whose ethnicity and social standing made her an outcast in ancient Israel, a stranger in a strange land.

As a woman of African heritage, I identified myself as one of Hagar's children, and I wondered why she had not been mentioned in the prayer. Was she not worthy of mention because she was a slave?

According to the story, when Hagar's son Ishmael was about 14 years old, Sarah became jealous. Hagar had sacrificed her body and her beauty. She had postponed her life in order to give this elderly couple the gift of a child. And yet, Sarah was jealous. Here were two brothers, Ishmael and Isaac, whose childhood play was, no doubt, innocent of any social or economic distinctions. And yet, Sarah's worry about inheritance spawned her jealously, which led to a crisis in the household. In the end, Sarah threw Hagar and Ishmael out of the house-banished them to the wilderness, with no food and only a half gallon of water.

A woman and her son alone-out in the wilderness, homeless. No crisis hot line. No overnight shelter. No abuse counselor. She needed someone to hear her story, someone to help her figure things out-where she was going to live, how she was going to feed herself and her son. But there was no pastor, no prophet, no priest, no lay minister to help her figure it all out. According to the story, in the depths of her despair, an angel appeared at Hagar's side, and asked: Where are you coming from, and where are you going?

That, my friends, is a question we need to ask ourselves. 

Where are you coming from, and where are you going?

Some say that the angel appearing at Hagar's side 

was the voice of God. 

Others say that it was the 'still small voice' within. 

I like to think of it as Love's call, asking her to reflect not only on her dilemma, but on who she was and what she was doing with her life. 

Love calls out to us as well, asking us to remember who we are -that we are beings connected to all being, connected to a process larger and more fundamental than our beliefs about the world

The first source speaks of the transcendent mystery and wonder of the universe asks us to call into existence that which has been forgotten: that we are not here to act as if we are brothers and sisters, but to remember that we really are brothers and sisters whose very reason for being is to love and care for one another. 

This is the purpose of the church.

This is the work of the soul. Soul work is hard work, but it must be done if we are to be fully alive. One thing that makes it difficult is that it is transcendent-we must move beyond ourselves, to the place of empathy and compassion; to the place of hospitality-hospitality of the human spirit. This is what counters alienation, nihilism, and brokenness in the human family. Soul work. Compassion. Hospitality. It is the work of the church. It is our salvation. It is what ministry is-to save souls through hospitality of the human spirit. So may it be.

In the late 1950s, a young African American minister applied for Unitarian ministerial fellowship. He was ordained a Methodist but his theology was Unitarian. He wished to transfer to the American Unitarian Association.  David Eaton sat in the office of Dana Greeley, the President of the A.U.A., and Greeley said "you seem like a wonderful minister, but there isn't a single Unitarian pulpit that would want you as there minister.

Seven years later Rev. David Eaton became the Senior Minister of All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church in Washington, DC when that church decided that its commitment to civil rights could only become real in a majority Black city, if it called a Black minister.  Without any help from their denomination, they went out and found David Eaton and he was called to All Souls.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott began in 1957, and the next ten years can be called the era of the civil rights movement. Because Unitarian Universalists were active in the civil rights struggles, and because we were strived to be accepting of all peoples, large numbers of African Americans began joining Unitarian congregations 

Many of our urban congregations such as Philadelphia, New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Detroit, Cincinnati, Baltimore, saw significant increases in membership, and became genuinely diverse institutions, this in an age when Jim Crow's walls were falling.  At the same time many of our congregations in urban communities surrounded by People of Color were not engaged in the civil rights movement, and those congregations grew smaller. 

The African American Unitarian Universalists started talking to one another, and comparing notes.  They came up with a program.  They had discovered that Unitarian Universalists congregations had sold their properties in the inner city and moved out to suburban campuses, thus joining into the great white flight after World War Two. How could we build Unitarian Universalism among African Americans they asked, if Unitarian Universalists run from the Black community, run away to the suburbs, sell the property and take the money with them.  

In 1968 and just two months after King was assassinated the Black Caucus presented their program to the General Assembly. They wanted funds to rebuild Unitarian Universalism in the inner city. They wanted African Americans to be included on the committees of the UUA. And while the General Assembly passed the resolution, and instructed the administration to support these demands, the President and the Board were adamantly opposed, they worked hard to overturn the resolve of the General Assembly.

To make a long story short, the next two years were very contentious, Unitarian Universalists wanted to respond to racial justice, but the UUA administration derailed the process. We saw General Assemblies with delegates walking out,  congregations making resolutions condemning the UUA President and Board, and a determined contingent of our youth staging a sit down in the UUA headquarters.

But in the end the defeated Black Caucus gave up, and as many as a thousand African Americans, people of color,  and youthful white supporters left our movement. The Black Empowerment controversy as it has been called,  was a major set back for Unitarian Universalism. It resulted in losses in membership throughout the country, it resulted in demoralization of Unitarian Universalists about being involved in questions of racial justice and it resulted in fear, that working again against racism would just mean more conflict and division.

But the problems that the Black Affairs Council identified were real, and a solid core of African American and white Unitarian Universalists were determined to do something about it. Over the years much progress has been made people of color have formed organizations to address questions of racial and cultural identity, today we have DRUUM,  the Diverse and Revolutionary  Unitarian Universalist Ministries which coordinates meetings of the Asian and Pacific Caucus, the African descent caucus,  

the Native American Indian caucus and we have La Familia Global, the Latino/Latina Unitarian Universalist caucus with DRUUMM

We have increased the number of ministers of color to several score, that number was four in 1990. and we have  over 60 students of color preparing for Unitarian Universalist ministry.

The forty years since the beginning of the Black Affairs Council in 1967 have been difficult years for Unitarian Universalists who have been striving to transform this liberal religious community from a white denomination full of self satisfaction about what it has done for colored folk, to one that genuinely seeks to overcome the legacy of racism so that we might include the cultures and concerns of people of color.

In the words of the Rev. Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley;

In most of our congregations that I have been a part of or worked with, structures that create and sustain whiteness are normative. 

There is presumption from some clergy and some laity that the cannons of music, and literature, and art, and language, and social discourse, rooted in the European experience, are normative. 

Euro-centrism is seen as logical and rational,  and those who express a need for a spirited form of worship or those who use a different language set are somehow made to feel less educated, less than worthy.

 These presumptions make it extremely difficult for culturally oppressed groups to find a place in our congregations. 

Speaking personally, while I enjoy and appreciate 

a wide variety of cultural traditions, 

when I cannot find myself in a worshipping community, 

it drains the life of the spirit out of me, and I must go elsewhere to nurture my soul.

If I and other colleagues who are rooted in cultures 

outside Europe are to be nurtured in our movement, 

then I must keep the faith that things can be different. 

Being open to and supporting new possibilities in ministry, different cultural forms in worship, new ways of seeing--these too are important to keeping the faith, to nurturing the spirit. 

If you will stand with me in solidarity in an expanding circle of culture so that it includes all of us, you too will be keeping the faith.

This call for a more inclusive culture in Unitarian Universalism has been made again and again. And while we see progress, there is so much to do,

Many Unitarian Universalists are so comfortable in their middle class Euro-centric world view, that sometimes it seems the task is insurmountable.

But this is a spiritual struggle for the soul of Unitarian Universalism,  this is soul work. 

Today is Marjorie Bowen-Wheatley's birthday.  Earlier today I published a section of Marjorie's "Not by ourselves alone" in which she describes the event on the streets of Washington, D.C. that changed her life path toward ministry.  Most of the words Marjorie wrote several weeks before her death, Marjorie was thinking of others even as she prepared for her great passing over.

________________________________________________

A bit of a late bloomer, Marjorie began her college career at Temple University at the age of 25, double majoring in Radio, Television & Film and Pan-African Studies. She continued graduate studies at the American University where she earned a Master of Arts degree in International Development and Visual Media.

Marjorie's career in public television began with a production internship with a weekly program, "Black Perspective on the News," and continued with a nightly news and issue analysis program, "Evening Exchange." In addition to being nominated for an Emmy Award for a program she produced with writer Maya Angelou, Marjorie received the World Hunger Media Award for her hour-long documentary, "After the Rains," which explored drought and environmental decay across the Sahara desert.

After seven years in the media, and after joining All Souls Church in Washington, D.C., Marjorie felt a calling to work full time in a way that expressed her religious values. She moved to Boston to work as Director of Public Affairs for the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee. A year later she accepted a position as program officer for the Veatch Program at what is now the Unitarian Universalist Society in Shelter Rock in Manhasset, Long Island. During her three-year tenure there, she was responsible for recommending approximately one million dollars per year to fund organizations working for progressive social change.

Her work at the Service Committee and at the Veatch Program, accompanied by independent study on the theology and ministry of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Howard Thurman, ultimately led Marjorie to understand her own calling to ministry. In the fall of 1991, she entered Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington DC and in 1994, she was awarded a Master of Divinity degree (cum laude), and was ordained in Washington, DC, in December 1994 at her home congregation, All Souls Church Unitarian. 

Marjorie became Affiliate, then Associate, Minister at the Community Church of New York City in 1994 and also served as District Extension Minister for the Metro New York District and Field Consultant for the UUA Department of Faith in Action. These assignments continued until she accepted a position as Co-Interim Minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Church in Austin Texas in 1999, which she served along with her husband, the Reverend Clyde Grubbs. 

In 2000, Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley joined the UUA staff as Adult Programs Director in the Religious Education department. In 2003, she accepted the call to the UU Church of Tampa, Florida, which she served through 2006. She had accepted a call to serve as Associate Minister of First Unitarian Church of San Diego, California, but withdrew because of illness.

Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley's impact on Unitarian Universalism continues in significant ways, she was an activist and participant in efforts to build a Peoples of Color community in Unitarian Universalism.  

Following a 12 month struggle with gallbladder cancer, Marjorie died quietly at her sister's home in Vineland, NJ, on Dec. 10, 2006, with her daughter, husband and a close friend by her side.

Here is an article about Marjorie from the Washington Post.

Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley was born August 6, 1949.  In her memory today I publish what Marjorie considered her call narrative delivered as part of the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Convocation in Birmingham, Alabama. 

Not by Ourselves Alone 

March 8, 2002 

In the late 1970's through the mid-1980's, I was living in Washington, D.C. working as a journalist and public television producer. I had chosen a profession in the news media because I wanted people to have the option of a different spin on the news of the corporate monopolies. I wanted to do stories so compelling that people might not only be inspired, but might actually feel compelled to act. 

Some of you will recall that the 1980's was a time when carjackings were a regular occurrence in some urban areas, and I was out covering such a story. An African American woman about my age (I was 35 or 36 at the time), was filling up her car with gasoline, and in the flash of an eye, a moment when she had turned away, someone had driven off not only with her car, but with her eight-year old daughter. Now I must tell you that I too had a daughter, so I had a deep identification with this woman. 

When I arrived on the scene, there were at least five radio and television stations that had set up their equipment, and four reporters had microphones in her face. I looked around at my camera man, who was about to join the mob, and I looked at the woman. She was visibly, and understandably upset, speaking in a soft voice; but not all of her sentences were complete or coherent. I made my way closer to her, all the time monitoring the pace of my crew's set-up. As other reporters probed her with questions, I placed my hand in hers. I remember thinking to myself, why don't they leave her alone. And then, there was this sudden awareness that I was one of them. They were my fellow reporters. And yet, I knew that the last thing she needed was not a gang of microphones in her face. In a flash, I remembered the words of one of my professors who, emphasizing that television news had to have pictures maintain its dramatic focus, had said to the class "keep the camera rolling until you make them cry." 

What this woman needed was someone to talk to about her troubles; someone to console her; someone with whom she could let out all her fears--without fear of exploitation; someone to tell her "it's gonna be alright." And when she grasped onto my hand for what seemed like dear life, I knew that I couldn't do the story, that I couldn't keep the camera rolling. 

I begged my fellow reporters to give her some breathing room, and she must have sensed that I had her interest at heart, because as I quietly guided her away from the crowd and toward my station's van, she did not resist. Eventually, the microphones and the reporters disappeared, audiotape and videotape in-hand for the evening news. The woman had held back the tears from the cameras, but within moments, she was weeping incessantly. As we sat waiting for a family member to arrive, I tried to comfort her between the tears as she told me bits and pieces of the story--without camera, without microphone. And when we parted, I said to her,  "Keep the faith." You will see your daughter again. And indeed, she did. 

I could not get this woman out of my mind for the rest of the day, and when I went home that evening, it  became really clear to me why. My values had gotten confused. I had had a long period of absence from churches, and so at the time, I didn't have the religious language to name what had happened with the woman at the gas station. I didn't realize until much later that I was doing pastoral ministry. The person behind the story had become more important to me than getting the story. And I knew that I could no longer be a reporter, at least not that kind of reporter. I knew that I would have to leave the media. I remained one more year at the television station to finish the documentary that I had already begun. I had been an activist, involved in social justice work. This, along with a deep need, and longing for reconnection with a faith community, I had found my way to All Souls Church in Washington, DC. When I saw an announcement on the church bulletin board of a job opening at the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, there was no doubt in my mind. I had to work in a place where I could align my values with my work. And it wasn't long--perhaps a few months--before I was moving to Boston to live and nurture my faith, and to put my faith into action. 

At the Service Committee, and later at the Veatch Program, I began to understand justice work as ministry. But it wasn't until I was in theological school, that I found a definition of faith that made sense to me. It is gaining confidence through relating to others that there is sustaining grace in the universe, a power beyond ourselves that holds us ... and that we experience this power through our relationships with others and they with us. In other words, faith is relational. 

I now understood that the work I had done with the woman at the gas station might have been important in nurturing her faith as well as my own. For me, it was a turning point--an experience that helped to clarify my values, test the profession of journalism in a new way, and inform my faith, which was not fully coherent. 

I answered the call, and here I am, still nurturing my faith.

Throop Unitarian Universalist Church (Pasadena, California) is a field test site for the UUA's new curriculum aimed to help congregations become more welcoming to people of different cultures and races.  The whole congregation and the reflection group that is guiding the effort has engaged in the various exercises that have helped Throop become more aware of how racism works in the United States, and how  by becoming more aware we can take steps to become an intentionally anti racist, and multicultural congregation.  Throop Church was and is racially and cultural diverse, but like many Unitarian Universalist congregations the congregation's work against racism was guided more by good intentions than by conscious efforts.  Because of our work together progress is being made to be consciously anti racist as we work toward becoming joyfully and throughly multicultural.

For many years Unitarian Universalists have sought tools that would help them become more racially and ethnically diverse.  One idea was that there be a curriculum similar to "Welcoming Congregation that could help a congregation become more aware of internalized racism and more culturally competent as well. . In February 2004, stakeholder groups sent representatives to met at the UUA in Boston to talk about the possibilities.

 Mark Hicks, who recently joined the staff at Meadville Lombard Theological School was chosen to be  the curriculum author. 

45 congregations were selected to field test Building the World We Dream About from September 2007 through December 2008. The goal for general distribution of Building Our World is 2009.  I strongly recommend that each Unitarian Universalist Congregation commit to this effort, because this work is soul work.

(Clyde Grubbs, the publisher of People So Bold! is the minister at Throop UU Church)