In his regular Horizons article for the UU magazine The World (to be delivered to your house in January), Rev Dr. John Buehrens, president of the UUA, writes, "When we say that we are on a 'journey toward wholeness,' we are saying that we yearn for history and humankind to be made whole. When we say we are 'fulfilling the promise,' we mean the promise in our UU movement and its principles."

Because of my membership on the Journey Toward Wholeness Transformation Committee---the "oversight" committee for the Anti-oppression, Anti-racism, Multi-cultural initiative that was adopted by the our UU General Assembly in Indianapolis in 1995---I was sent an advance copy of John's article for comment and/or critique. I was impressed with the article's interweaving of the themes of Fulfilling the Promise with that of the JTW. ( "Fulfilling the Promise" is the multi-year process the UUA is following to assess the "state" of UUism as we enter the twenty-first century---and to inspire us to creatively transform our movement to meet the demands of this new millennium. )

It was good to have the elected/called president of our Association link the anti-racism work UUs are doing across the continent with the deeper vision of our whole religious journey. Toward the end of his article he challenges us with these words, "Let's fulfill the promise of Unitarian Universalism by taking bold steps on its journey toward wholeness. For ours is a church that aspires to be a conscience for the world, devoted always to the soul of the whole."

Whether we fully accept the idea that we could authentically be the “conscience for the world,” I do believe that as UUs we are responsible to do what we can that will help our people become whole. “Our people” are the members of our own congregation, of course. Working within our congregation is where we want to insure that the journey we take together truly helps us to become more responsible, more caring and more aware of both the damage that racism causes for people of color, and what it does to whites through their (our!) unconsciously living out white privilege. But “our people” are also the folk here in the city and county with whom we share this life. The city and country government folks, the business folks, the University students and staff, and the residents whose home this is. So the “dance” of anti-racism work---in fact all of the work we do regarding inequality, and the more powerful naming of it as “oppression,” must call us out and call us home.

In this month of January we will begin to take on the journey of becoming more whole by focusing on racism more deeply than we ever have before. If our journey with the Welcoming Congregation gives us any hint of how this new work will go, we are in for a fascinating, exciting, difficult, inspiring, frustrating, and personally transforming time of it.

I am personally very grateful, and I believe that our whole community has been gifted, by the energy, the creativity and the persistence that those who chose to work on the Welcoming Congregation Task Force (and those who took the WC class) have given to this community. And that is how I feel it most deeply, as a gift to us all, a gift I am privileged to have received, and to have grown from.

I hope everyone of you will take advantage of the coming opportunities to share in the WC journey: to share your support, your doubts, your questions, your presence in this important and, dare I say it, holy work. For is not the holy anything that draws us more authentically into life, anything that challenges our blind spots, anything that affirms what is best in us? Indeed.

For me, you see, this anti-oppression work is at the very core of what it means to live religiously: it calls us to care, to think deeply, to be open to self-change, and to risk loving where we are most closed. We are a celebrative community, it is true. And we will continue, I fervently hope, celebrating one another in all manner of creative and affirming ways. And, as well, we are a prophetic community. The intertwining of those two are a gift that is rare in our times.

I am grateful.

Namaste,
Kurt