Thursday, September 24, 2020

 As we approach another Election Time, it has become obvious that voter suppression is once more reared its ugly head. While the current administration employs differing methods to assure a victory in November, these are not new efforts. When I was the Director of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee’s (UUSC) “Justworks” program I was able to document instances of injustice. This was one of voter suppression in Alabama.

 

This family lived in a rural township. Their closest neighbor was about half a mile down the road. One night this individual heard a car drive up to their house. Next he heard the sound of four car doors opening and being slammed close. Next there is a knock at his door and three individuals enter is house. All of them are familiar townsmen and they inform the homeowner they are there to help him. With the local election scheduled in a few weeks they brought the homeowners’ absentee ballot to him. That way the homeowner does not have travel to the town offices in order to cast his vote. They watch and assist the homeowner in filling out his ballot. They leave, taking the ballot with them and assure the homeowner they will file his ballot. 

 

As they leave, the homeowner clearly hears the sound of three car doors being opened and slammed close. Originally the homeowner heard four doors, but only three individuals 

Entered the home. Where was the fourth individual?

There may be a plausible reason to explain this situation. But it might explain why this rural township with an 85% black population, repeatedly elected white individuals to all leadership positions.

 

What other creative ways will be used to suppress voter participation? How long will we tolerate obvious injustice?

Wednesday, September 23, 2020

 Over the years I have had different memories and experiences on September 11.

Sept. 12, 2001 – Massachusetts 

The previous day I watched in disbelief. On my way to the church office I decided to purchase some apple juice. No doubt my thoughts were still on the previous days’ events, so I did not pay attention to what the group of young men were yelling in my direction. On my way back to my car the group of young men attacked me. No doubt they believed I looked like what they took to be an Arab Terrorist. No doubt they were angry after the previous days’ events. For the next few months I was clean shaven, so I did not look Middle Eastern.

 

Ideally, I would like to report that I fought furiously, but in truth the only thing that saved me was my liberal use of the “F Word”, and my questioning their parentage in my best New York City Street Style. It was obvious I was another angry American. In time I understood what those young men were feeling and how they chose to relieve those feelings.

 

Sept. 12, 2005 – Houston 

Katrina had struck on August 31. Houston had taken in over 100,000 evacuees from New Orleans. Our shelter spaces (George R. Brown Arena, Reliant Stadium and the Astrodome) were filled to capacity. Houstonians had volunteered to assist in the shelters, those from the various congregations staffed most of the shelters. Typically, I would spend 8 to 12-hour shifts in the shelters, return to the church office for a few hours, then go home for a few hours of sleep. We were physically and mentally exhausted. 

September 12, 2005 was the first Sunday since the 9/11/01 and the various Houston Moslem communities took over all the volunteer staffing in all the shelters. This, we were told, would permit the volunteers to return to their churches and families, so they could relax, refresh and reflect in prayer. For me, it introduced me to the Sufi community in Houston which deepened my understanding of human kindness and dedication. It also put to rest some of the anger I had been carrying since 9/11 and 9/12.

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

The following is the proposed introduction to the timeline:


“Give a church school part for the children of a Negro or Mexican church school, without patronizing them... substitute the name of whatever minority group in your community, racial or national, is most clearly a victim of prejudice or neglect in the place of ‘Negro’ on this page. These might be: Portuguese, Filipino, Chinese, Japanese, Mexican, Italian or others.”
--Christian Register (Unitarian) issue on “Race” (1943)--


As we Unitarian Universalists expand our awareness of the increasing diversity in our congregations and in our surrounding communities we struggle with the method by which we incorporate this new understanding into our faith. It seems that the code words for this new stage of our development are “Beloved Community” and “Multiculturalism”. It is my belief that Beloved Community is the goal once we embrace Multiculturalism. Ideally multiculturalism results in individual cultures, not just co-existing, but interacting among the various cultures and sub-cultures with the result of a harmonious new understanding. It is more than tolerance or acceptance, but a commitment to understand and support each other. However this ideal is not achieved without deliberate work and often through many missteps.

When a particular culture encounters another culture and they begin to interact, there is usually a dominant culture in the pairing. This dominant culture, either through a larger population or greater force of arms, often imposes its set of values as being normative. In the earliest stages the dominant culture often has very little understanding of the other culture and believes its mission is to educate the other culture. In education terms, especially religious education, this type of understanding is sometimes referred to as a “Null Curriculum.”  The dominant culture is provided very little factual information about the other culture and gives the message that understanding of the other culture is not important. To the other culture the message is given that they must change and adopt the ways and values of the dominant, “superior” culture. This message is often couched in the most caring and supportive language; the dominant culture trying to save or improve the other culture. For both cultures there is a lack of real understanding and leads to erroneous conclusions by both cultures.

Thus the goal of the dominant culture is Assimilation of the other culture. Often this type cultural interaction may be declared an anathema by the leadership of the other culture. There are attempts to change the other culture either through lack of support, intimidation or legislation. In the history of the United States there have been attempts to impose a common language or to outlaw certain practices associated with other cultures. A reaction by the other culture is sometimes to recover the history or language that is unique to that culture. Ethnic pride can be expressed through parades, cultural events and sharing of food.

When the dominant culture first attempts to understand the other culture it can enter into what educators call the “Implicit or Hidden Curriculum.” This stage can be very unreliable as it is often characterized by citing the work of supposed “experts” in the other culture who may or may not be part of the other culture. Another pitfall is when individuals or institutions from the other culture are presumed to represent the entire culture and thus their particular values and ways is erroneously applied to the entire culture. A far more damaging aspect is when the dominant culture presumes that there is an alliance of all other cultures. Thus the values and ways of all other cultures are presumed to be the same for all. This dichotomous view increases the misunderstanding of unique cultural values and ways.

A discussion of who we are as Unitarian Universalists, and who we want to be and where we want to go requires that we recognize the forces that have influenced public discourse, and the values that are embedded in the very fabric of the United States of America from its very beginning.  While many would argue that there is no universal American culture there are values, attitudes and practices that are very much a part of our society. It’s just that most of us don’t see them.  Most of us have bought the idea that public space is value free; that public discourse –  that is objective, of course – is value free.   

What we need to recognize first is that public space is not value neutral; how we have learned to talk about public policy and attitudes is not free of certain values and attitudes. The question is:  whose values?

Now we UUs like to think that we are free thinkers, critical of the norms of our larger society, and we pride ourselves in our history of civil disobedience. We are, and we should.  However, we are not as free as we think we are.  We UUs are as bound by the values, beliefs and behaviors imposed by the founders from the very inception of the United States as members of the larger society. 

American exceptionalism refers to the theory that the United States is qualitatively different from other countries. In this view, America's exceptionalism stems from its emergence from a revolution, becoming "the first new nation," and developing a uniquely American ideology, based on liberty, egalitarianism, individualism, populism and laissez-faire. This observation can be traced to Alexis de Tocqueville, the first writer to describe the United States as "exceptional" in 1831 and 1840. Historian Gordon Wood has argued, "Our beliefs in liberty, equality, constitutionalism, and the well-being of ordinary people came out of the Revolutionary era. So too did our idea that we Americans are a special people with a special destiny to lead the world toward liberty and democracy."

In the United States, the belief in American Exceptionalism reinforces the notion and further obfuscates the importance of other cultures. Essentially this reduces understanding of cultural differences to a binary paradigm where there is the dominant culture and everything that is not part of the dominant culture. It reduces fact gathering and is often self-referential. As such it would be sufficient to understand the culture of Native Americans by studying the culture of Asian Americans or by noting the differences between the Native American culture and the dominant culture.

When society is able to grasp differences and freely permit the cultural differences to co-exist and interact then the possibility of change enters into the cultures. Understanding becomes explicit and results will confirm expectations. In an explicit understanding of cultural differences there may not necessarily knowledge of what are the differences, but there will be acknowledgement that there are differences. In educational terms this is referred to as an “Explicit or Overt Curriculum.” This is the most dynamic and fluid of interactions as change is expected, documented and intentionally supported.

What follows is a timeline of the dominant Unitarian Universalist culture and the growing Latino/a population in the United States along with the cultural changes that have resulted over time. The introductory quote in this chapter is taken from a period when the association was obviously in the Implicit stage. Given recent events and the availability of resource materials one might be tempted to think that Unitarian Universalism has reached the Explicit stage in regards to interaction with the Latino/a communities; but there is a danger that if only one Latino/a community is being addressed and if the socio/economic status of that community becomes the standard, then in reality Unitarian Universalism is still in an Implicit stage.

Looking over the data we can clearly see how in the earliest records there is very little mention of interaction with the Latino/a communities. The Rev. Mark Morrison-Reed in assisting research for this timeline noted the following:
l  In both volumes of Russell Miller's history of Universalism The Larger Hope there is nothing in regard to Hispanic peoples. In Ernest Cassara's Universalism in American: A Documentary History the “Mexican War” is mentioned on p. 190 but only in regard to people being concerned about opening that territory to slavery.  In George Hunston William's American Universalism he writes on p.64 “During the Mexican War of 1845-1848 which brought many anti-slavery people into the anti-war and pacifist fold...” In fairness to Universalism it was largely concentrated in small town and rural New England, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Ontario exactly where there would have been no Hispanic population. And it was already going into numeric decline following the U.S. Civil War.
l  In the 1967 UUA “Committee on Goals” Report in which 27% of those who responded said that being a 'Negro' would hamper one's ministry this same question was not posed in regard to Hispanic ministers. The same question was asked in the 1989 “Quality of Religious Life in UU Congregations” survey done by the UUA Commission on Appraisal and again Hispanic people were omitted.
l  In 1976 the First Unitarian Church of LA published a hymnal entitled How can we keep from singing! It included two pieces related to Hispanic people: “De Colores” (82) which it lists as the “Song of the United Farm Workers” and “Comaňeros.” (150) It is in English but the lyrics are about Mexico and the style Mexican Corrido. On page 116 there is also a reading form Federico Garica Lorca. “De Colores” (305) also appears in Singing the Living Tradition as does “Duenmete Nino Lindo” (230). There is a reading by Roberto Jaurroz. (487)
l  There seem to be no Ware Lecturers with Hispanic background that I can identify.
l  No one knows who is Gonzalo Mollina, who sat on the UUA Commission on Race and Religion.
l  In June 2011 Las voces des camino has sold 852 since it was published in June 2009. In comparison, Singing the Journey sold 43,347 in the same number of months.
l  In The Journal of Unitarian Universalist History “American Unitarian and Universalist Historical Scholarship, A Bibliography of items Published 1946 – 1995”, by Conrad Wright. There are 112 pages of references. Only one referred to anything Hispanic. Charles J. Beirne, S.J., “The Theology of Theodore Parker and the War with Mexico,” Essex Institute Historical Collections, 104 (1968)” 130-138. There are many items on Abolition and abolitionist and some on civil rights and only Black Pioneers on African American UUs. There is much more on India and the Brahmo Samaj than about Latinos/as or African Americans. It is the invisibility we have learned to expect.

This timeline is not complete and is intended to stimulate conversation and to clarify the contemporary interaction between the dominant UU culture and some of the Latino/a UUs and the cultural values and understandings they bring from their varied communities.


Saturday, February 23, 2013

2008 -- Esther Rosado joins the Fifth Principle Task Force
2006 -- Jessica Purple Rodela begins Kaleidoscope Initiative at Meadville Lombard

2013 -- Marisol Caballero is fellowshiped.

Thursday, February 21, 2013

1993 -- "Unitarian Universalism and the Latino Community" is published in the Winter 1993 LREDA Journal

1994 -- At the GA in Dallas/Fort Worth Julio Naboa is a noted presenter. Julio will later be named to several UUA Committees including the Nominating Committee.

1994 -- UUSC provides aid and volunteer workers to the largely latino communities of Homestead and Florida City in Florida. These had been by hurricane Andrew.

1996 -- Toby Dubon is ordained.

1997 -- Kate Greenleaf is ordained.

1997 -- LUUNA is officially recognized as a UU Independent Affiliate Organization.

1997 -- At the GA in Phoenix the Business Resolution "Toward an Anti-Racist Unitarian Universalist Association"is passed. In compliance the UUA Board of Trustees establishes the "Journey Toward Wholeness Committee."

1997 -- Ruth Alatorre is named to the Journey Toward Wholeness Committee.

1998 -- LUUNA provides theme speakers and workshop leaders to the Urban Church Conference in Baltimore. The presentations are gathered with additional material and published as The Baltimore Papers.

1998 -- In addition to panel discussion, workshops and meetings, members of LUUNA lead the Saturday Morning Worship Service at GA.

1999 -- The dramatic presentation Yo Soy, Somos Nosotros premiers at GA

1999 -- Peter Morales becomes first Latino Member of the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association (UUMA) Executive Committee.

2001 -- Peter Morales elected to the UUA Board of Trustees as the first latino member.

2001 -- The dramatic presentation Una Sola Tristesa premiers at GA.

2002 -- The Hispanic Ministerial Caucus (HMC) of the UUMA is founded.

2003 -- Sofia Betancourt is ordained
1994 -- Edwin Moreano is ordained. Later leaves movement.