#13 | Matthew Johnson | External Facing Equity

Submission 13
Matthew Johnson
The Unitarian Universalist Church (Rockford, IL) 3414

What is your suggestion or idea?

Equity. We declare that every person has the right to flourish with inherent dignity and worthiness. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, and money to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities and a world with equity, justice, and peace.

What is the reason for your amendment idea?

This adds an external-facing phrase to our covenant around Equity. The other values also speak of bringing our values both into our own communities and out into our shared world, this one should too. Especially since this value speaks to our historic commitment to the “inherent dignity and worth(iness)” of all, it should require us to bring that value to the world around us. I’ve also added the word “peace” which does not elsewhere appear and is important as a goal, even if we do not have a consensus as a faith about means.

Have you discussed this idea with your congregation or other UUs?

Yes, I shared this with a few other colleagues, who supported the idea and thought it important to have an outward focus on this value.

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Thank you. The proposed wording implies that we are to switch from improving the world to focusing on our own hearts and congregations. Most UUs are committed to making the whole world better. This amendment brings the text in line with UU values.

Thank you Matthew! Our congregation does a weekly peace vigil that just celebrated its 20th anniversary. I discussed at a congregational Article II discussion with the leader of the peace vigil how he would like to see peace added, and he said it was really important for it to be in a external-facing way that connected to world community. We may or may not separately post a proposal, as this pretty much captures what I think our peace team is looking for!

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I would support this, as it’s almost the same as our current 6th principle, though I would consider bringing the original wording of the principle back in here instead: “…world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all”

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Here’s the language I think the group is at: Equity. We respect the inherent worth and dignity of each person; thus, we declare that all have the right to flourish in lives of meaning and significance. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, and money to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities among us and throughout the world.

Hey, there has been a range of further discussion so there are now 3 versions, the second two have edited versions. I’m good with the one you cite here as the outward facing equity. See the current range here: #86 | Bek Wheeler | Return to "inherent worth and dignity" - #53 by BekWheeler

I like this version the group is moving towards (though I would list the resources). I plan to defer to that group.

EQUITY: We affirm that every person has inherent worth and dignity. We covenant to use our resources to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive congregations and communities. We work to create a just and peaceful world where all people can flourish

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@uurockrev

Submission 335, by suggesting a third line be added to Equity, “In partnership with the historically marginalized we work for a distribution of wealth and power that creates a more equitable global community,” has a similar goal.

Equity. We declare that every person has the right to flourish with inherent dignity and worthiness. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, and money to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities. *In partnership with the historically marginalized we work for a distribution of wealth and power that creates a more equitable global community.

Like your proposed amendment idea, it emphasizes the global aspect of Equity.

While this third line is a longer addition to Equity than your edit, it brings in two additional components.

It speaks of working “in partnership with the historically marginalized.” This proposed change is meant to name that those most directly impacted by injustice and inequity should have the most agency in deciding what “flourishing with dignity” means for them and how to get there. (A previous version used the phrase “prioritizing the leadership of the historically marginalized.”)

The other component names a commitment to redistribution of wealth and power, acknowledging the gross inequity in the world and the need to make significant changes to who has power and who has wealth in order to bring about global community of equity (and peace).

What do you think?

We have come a long way, and I like your partnership aspect. We don’t have that in here, yet. Here’s where we are now:

Equity. We defend the inherent worth and dignity of each person.
We covenant to use our time, voice, wisdom, and material resources money to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities where all may thrive. We work to create a just and peaceful world where all people can flourish in lives of meaning and significance.

“We” is a group that includes Matthew Johnson, Alice Diebel, Rebecca Wheeler and more.

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@diebela

It looks like the full text of the proposed amendment of submission 335 was not previously visible in the initial post. Take a look at it now.

Equity. We declare that every person has the right to flourish with inherent dignity and worthiness. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, and money to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities. *In partnership with the historically marginalized we work for a distribution of wealth and power that creates a more equitable global community.

I don’t support a version that cleaves more closely to the current 1st principle language. In fact, I would prefer the first line say,
We declare that every person has the right to flourish with dignity.

For me Pluralism has expressed “inherent worth in dignity” in new, and for me more poetic and compelling language, where it says “we are all sacred beings.” The inherent worth and dignity of each person having been established with the phrase “we are all sacred beings” the language for Equity expresses a new and important idea, not about inherent worth but about each person’s right to flourish with dignity, which calls us to take actions to support that flourishing with dignity. This then leads me to desiring a more robust statement of how we go about working towards this equity, “in partnership with the historically marginalized” rather than by dominant groups imposing their vision of flourishing with dignity on others, and through working for “the distribution (or redistribution) of wealth and power that creates a more equitable global community.”

I appreciate hearing your reasoning about Equity and Pluralism.

However, speaking as an atheist UU, I find the phrasing “we are all sacred beings” neither resonant nor compelling. Instead, it is just baffling. I read that and wonder what the heck it is talking about and move on. So, I would suspect my fellow atheists and maybe humanists, would not agree that it captures “inherent worth and dignity.”

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@BekWheeler

I’ve really been thinking about what you’ve said about “we are all sacred beings” not speaking to you as an atheist.

At first, I looked up sacred. I was surprised that so many of the definitions emphasize its religious connotations because for me it has a more generic meaning: a sacred thing is a thing of great worth. That is one of the definitions I found for sacred but it was not as primary in the definitions as I thought it was.

I continued thinking about it because I don’t consider myself a theist so I wondered why it works for me. This morning I had a new idea in relation to it. I found myself thinking, what could be a more bold statement of atheism than saying we are all sacred beings? I say this because I realized that when we say we are all sacred beings we are also asserting that there is no singular Sacred Being like a God, or even a pantheon of Sacred Beings, because We are all Sacred Beings. At least that’s what I get from it.

This leads to a more general point. I fear that we are not spending enough time with the new language, that we aren’t seeing how the new proposed values interrelate with each other, not seeing how an idea from the current seven principle might be expressed in these new proposed values in a new and different way, an unexpected way that opens us up to new insights about foundations of our living tradition.

@RevLev,

Thank you so much for thinking so expansively about this – the issue/denotation/connotation of ‘sacred.’ Yes, it’s the primary religious associations that irk me…

Very interesting, your comment about ‘we are all sacred beings.’ I would go one further – “all of existence is sacred.” All of everything on the Earth, in the cosmos, the cosmos itself, infinity and the unfathomable extents. I think that the more inclusive/broad meaning becomes more comfortable for me because it moves away from the “man made in God’s image,” “The chosen ones” trope. It’s like Peter Mayer’s song “Holy now.” – Everything is holy now (https://youtu.be/evRTFR_5N6o)

And I completely agree with your final paragraph –

yes, yes, yes… perhaps that is what is intended to happen over the next year if the A2 passes, but one would have preferred such explorations beforehand.

Thank you for these probing remarks!
Bek Wheeler

I feel like the “all of existence is sacred” is covered by Interdependence. There is a suggestion to add “sacred” to the first line of that: “We honor the sacred interdependent web of existence.” For some reason, I don’t like the flow of that as much. But it would serve as a counterbalance to “We are all sacred beings.” In that way “we are all sacred beings” and “we honor the sacred interdependent web of all existence” could serve as counterbalances to each other, much the way the 1st and 7th principle do now. I feel “We are all sacred beings” and “we honor the interdependent web of existence” can do that without adding sacred as a descriptor of the web but I’m open to that change if enough others want it.

Just to be clear, when I say I feel we are not spending enough time with the new language I’m not critiquing the process. This has been the most democratic process with the most outreach for input we’ve ever had! I’m critiquing those of us proposing amendments. I think those of us proposing amendments need to make sure we’re spending enough time with the new language to really understand what the new proposed revisions have to offer. I worry that we could end up with a watered down version of what the commission gave us, which while based in good and thoughtful reasoning, ends up with a product that is not an improvement on what the commission gave us but a diminishment of it.

Aha, ok, thank you for that clarification…

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One thing that has really surprised me about this process is how many UUs, especially UU clergy, understand “sacred” to be a non-theistic term. I suspect the first draft of the revised article II, which only listed “sacred understandings” as a source, was not meant to exclude secular ideas - that the writers thought of “sacred understandings” as a term that encompasses all valued ideas.

But of course, there was a lot of pushback to that, because that does not reflect the common definition of sacred, both in general and among our wider membership. I understand re-framing terms like sacred is a deeply meaningful process for many UUs-- but I hope doing so does not become a requirement.

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There is more than one definition for the word sacred. It is true that some definitions emphasize its religious meaning. It’s also true that another definition is “of great worth.” I think it really comes down to context which definition rises to our consciousness. I agree with you that the original use of “sacred understandings” as a source was not mean to exclude secular ideas. Even though that was clear to me it still didn’t work for me. I was one of those people who gave them feedback suggesting they change it. With “we are all sacred beings” it feels clear to me that the more religious implications ("devoted or dedicated to a deity or to some religious purpose; entitled to veneration or religious respect by association with divinity or divine things; pertaining to or connected with religion (opposed to [secular] or [profane]:wink: are not the definitions of sacred used here – because then it makes no sense. When we say “we are all sacred beings” we are certainly not saying we are all “entitled to veneration by our association with a deity.” It seems to me that the definition of sacred being used here is, “regarded with reverence”. We are all sacred beings, meaning we all deserve to be “regarded with reverence,” as beings of great worth, worthy to be “secured against violation,” to quote another definition of sacred, as in the use of sacred in reference to sacred oaths or sacred rights.

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As for;

“yes, yes, yes… perhaps that is what is intended to happen over the next year if the A2 passes, but one would have preferred such explorations beforehand.”

In my experience UUs often don’t engage until there is a deadline ornthe deadline has actually passed.

I am willing to trust that we’ll do well enough and that the group in charge of rewriting it all in 17 years will fix what we miss.

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