5th Principle Project

Since I’m leaving for Salt Lake City in a couple of days, I thought I would write what I’ve been thinking about GA recently.

I am a self-described GA junkie. I work my a** off to get there every year. One of the reasons that GA is really important to me is that it is the one time in the year that it’s guaranteed that there will be more than a couple of people of color at a UU meeting. And as someone who doesn’t live on the east coast (where the majority of UUs of color are), it gets very lonely (and tiring) being one of maybe a couple of persons of color in the room. 

So I’m more than a little interested in the 5th Principle Project. And I have to say that what I’m hearing disturbs me. Mainly because I’m trying to see what benefit there would be for me to go to yet another regional assembly in a region where there are few UUs of color. (For those of you who don’t know, my home is in the Central Midwest District, which includes Chicago, and at our district assembly in April there were 5 people of color. Did I mention that this district includes Chicago?)  The only time that there is a critical mass of people of color is at GA….and now they’re talking about changing it.

This is not to say that there aren’t some things I think need to be changed about GA. I do. I think there are too many reports done and what gets plenary time boggles my mind. I would get rid of the Actions of Immediate Witness (of course, I’m not a fan of the statements of conscience). But on the whole, I think GA works as it is. Any issue I have with it is minor compared to everything I get from going.

So the big thing for me is being in the same place as so many other UUs of color. And I have the feeling that is going to be taken away from me.

The Long, Hot Summer Reading List

Hello again.

I took off the month of May because I was going to take a May Term class that was going to take up most of my time. Plus I had to move out of my Richmond place, so May was really busy. At the moment I’m in St. Louis working on my paper for my May Term class (it’s due on June 19) and preparing to go to GA.

Since I took May off, readers of the blog haven’t heard the big news (at least big news for me)…..one of my favorite professors asked me to be one of his Teaching Assistants this fall. Yipee!!!!!  The class that I’m going to TA in is History of the African American Religious Experience. So I thought I would share the list of books that are required for the course.

__African American Religious History (edited by Milton Sernett)__Black Gods of the Metropolis (by Authur Fauset)

__The Fortress Introduction to Black Church History (by Anne Pinn and Anthony Pinn)

__Varieties of the African American Religious Experience (by Anthony Pinn)

And the optional books for the class:

__African American Religious Thought (edited by Cornell West)

__Risks of Faith (by James Cone)

__Sisters in the Wilderness (by Delores Williams)

__Slave Religion (by Albert Raboteau)

I’m not going to be able to get to all of them before the semester starts, mainly because I will be taking a writing class in August and there’s reading for that too.

___Creating Fiction (by Julie Checkoway)

___Faith Stories: Short Fiction on the Varieties and Vagaries of Faith (by C. Michael Curtis)

___What If?: Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers (by Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter)

___The Country of Pointed Firs and Other Stories (by Sarah Orne Jewett)

___As I Lay Dying-the Corrected Text (by William Faulkner)

So as you can see, my summer is going to have lots of reading. I’ll write about it when I get the chance

 

 

Education As A Justice Issue pt. 2

As I stated in my last post in this thread, I’m doing research on education as a justice issue (in particular the education of young black men). Since I didn’t have the statistic at the time I didn’t want to speculate, but now I have it so I thought I would share.

Currently, African American students constitute approximately 20% of the public school population, while African American male teachers constitute 1% of the teaching force.

Sobering thought. More on the rest of the research later.

Body Theology….or, Beyond Sermon #3

I haven’t talked about the last sermon I’m going to do for my preaching class in a while so I thought I would give an update.

There will be two readings that I will work with. One is 2 Samuel 6. The other is “Let Me Die Laughing.”  While on the face of it those two don’t seem to have much in common, they actually do if one asks the right questions of the Hebrew scripture passage.

Anyway, while I was doing some research on the 2 Samuel passage I figured out that I had been working on something in my mind for more than a year without realizing it……a theology of the body. Just what I needed. <not>

So every once in a while you’ll probably see a post whose topic is body theology. They won’t start until after my May term class, but I’m already gathering my list of books to read in my open time this summer. If you have a book recommendation, let me know.

Unitarian and Universalist History And Polity…Independent Study

It’s that time of the semester, registering for next semester.

Since I’m at a non-UU seminary, I get to set up my own UU History and Polity course as an independent study.

I have most of the usual suspects on my reading list, but I was wondering if there are any hidden gems out there that I should also think about putting on my list. Or if you know of any books that deal with African Americans in our movement that is NOT Black Pioneers in a White Denomination, I would really like to know about it.

I am especially looking for more polity books, so if you have suggestions, I’m really open.

Devil In A Sweatsuit….or, Dreams of “Onward Christian Soldiers”

So today while planning the music for tomorrow’s programmed worship , one of the songs that I chose was Forward Through The Ages. Then the thought occurred to me that the song might not be familiar to this Quaker population, even though it’s in their hymnal.

I asked one of the people on the committee if she’s ever sung it, and she asks me to give her the tune. The first words out of my mouth are, “Think Onward Christian Soldiers.” Well, she did know that song, so she was able to see where I was thinking of going (at least with the music).

Then a devilish thought came into my mind, “We so need to sing Onward Christian Soldiers here.” I can even picture where it would be sung. And haven’t been able to stop laughing since.

Singing Onward Christian Soldiers at a peace school. Isn’t that a great thought?

Education As A Justice Issue….Research On New Orleans

Some of you know that I’m taking my Peace and Justice course this semester. And for it we have to do a research paper about some issue and relate it to peace and justice studies.

Since I spent most of my week in New Orleans at an elementary school, I decided that I would do my paper about education and the need for more men to be involved in the educational process and in the lives of children in general. Not too big a topic, right? 

So now I’m doing my research. Hopefully I’ll have most of it done by the end of next week.

Women Unbound: Midrash From the Hebrew Scriptures

This was my talkative week (thank goodness it is now done).  I preached twice and last night participated in a special program on women in the Hebrew Scriptures. We had stories from Eve, Hannah, Jael, Rahab, Dinah, Tamar and even the Concubine of Bethlehem. And for a few minutes, I got to be Makeda, the Queen of Sheba. (assuming you know the Ethiopian version of the story)

The program, Women Unbound, is now available as a webcast. If you are interested you can go here to see it.

What Story Would You Want To Hear?

I did my second sermon for class today. It went well. But I knew it would. I really liked my readings for it (Mark 14:3-9, Genesis 38:6-26 and “Let America Be America Again” by Langston Hughes), especially since I got to choose them.

Now I have to think about sermon #3. And I thought that I would throw a question out to you: what sermon do you really wish a minister would preach? Is there a passage of scripture that you think needs to be heard from the pulpit?

John Hope Franklin, 1915-2009

For those of us for whom African American history is a special research interest, John Hope Franklin is a big name.

Dr. Franklin died this morning at Duke University Medical Center.

It is a great loss.

Born right outside of Tulsa in 1915, Dr. Franklin many times told the story of the race riots that happened in Tulsa in 1921. He was one of the last surviving witnesses to it.

A graduate of Fisk University, Dr. Franklin received his Ph.D from Harvard in 1941.

During his long career Dr. Franklin taught at Howard University, the University of Chicago and Duke University, where he was named Professor Emeritus in 1985.

Dr. Franklin was an avid gardener, with a special passion for orchids.

Rest in peace Dr. Franklin, rest in peace.