I could live with “We affirm that every person has inherent worthiness and dignity”
Although, as people have mention here and elsewhere, I too have am immediate association with Stephen Colbert’s “truthiness” when I hear that turn of phrase.
But as it’s written, it feels profoundly weaker to center the value on MY declaration of their “right to flourish” with worthiness. If that phrase must be used, put it elsewhere. I declare every person has the right to flourish in the inclusive communities we build.
While I appreciate Bek Wheeler’s observation about worth as a word that does not carry a leggacy of oppression and others who have granted that gramatically “worth” sounds more fluid, it is this convenience that I would prefer to consider dismantling as I hear from the voices in the room that are not white like me. Is the word loaded or not is not for me to say.
It seems to me that, like other blog formats, this blog can suffer from the “unofficial” moderator effect. In structuring the commentary - it would be helpful to let each user comment to a limit of some number such that the merit of other comments are not overwhelmend or witheld because of the tenacity of one person.
How do you “dismantle” “convenience?” “Dismantle” means to take something apart. Convenience is a state of being. How do you take apart a state of being?
The answer, I believe, is that “dismantle” is jargon. A little like “flourish with … worthiness.”
I have been trying to answer, unbind the accusation that “Inherent worth and dignity” is racist, white supremacist, and harkens back to the time when human beings were assigned a monetary worth (note the completely different syntax between the two instances). I’ve taken a number of approaches, including:
Bek: "Nobody is talking about “giving a worth,” or a “worth being given.” You are talking about “financial worth” which is assessed, given, taken, etc.
I am talking about “INHERENT worth and dignity.” Of the spark of divinity sort. That is completely different. Nobody is assessing, giving, taking anything. Inherent goodness, inherent spark, of the Universalist sort. The divine goodness within all – inherently."
How do you respond to these accusations of white supremacy?
To be honest, I think they are ridiculous. My opinion.
In language and communication, language is negotiated. Things means what people think they mean. If the vast, vast majority of UUs (people of color included) had no problem with the term “worth” over the past decades, then there is nothing wrong with it. A few people now finding issues with it does not mean that the meaning of that phrase has changed or its connotations have changed. It means that a small group of people are looking hard for “meanings” of certain terms and attempting to impose their “findings” on everyone else through guilt-tripping. Either that or they have a strange notion of how language works.
Janet. I agree with you. At the same time, we need to be ready for this particular argument to come up powerfully at GA - we already have the moderator Charles Du Monte telling us WHY it’s been proposed to change from ‘worth’ to ‘worthiness,’ so the UUA has already bought into that approach.
We need to be ready to respond to this in real time during the May Workshops and during GA. Thank you for your reply. I agree.
@Steward, over these past days of reading the conversations I’ve come to feel the resonance of your reply. Also the connotations (cognates?) of ‘worthiness’ I think of as happy ones and apt to our purpose-- trustworthy, seaworthy, a worthy cause, a person worthy of our regard, a worthy successor in the office, etc.
It’s my understanding there are built-in restrictions to avoid this problem (of people dominating discourse). The description of how these methods work sounded pretty good for an automated system to me. An additional layer would probably introduce quite a bit of subjectivity, and in my view should probably be restricted to actual abuses.
I hear your concern, but in this case, I think discussion (and even debate) is what we are here to do. We have really varying views on these topics, and I believe most are trying in a good-faith way to raise various issues but also seek rapprochement
Language is always evolving. Words do not mean the same thing they did years ago. Even if “worth” understood in the context of “inherent worth and dignity” could conceivable have been construed as referring to the monetary worth of a human being a century and a half ago (which it wouldn’t really because meaning doesn’t inhere in words, it inherent in context & words), the word is no longer understood in this sense,
No one group “owns” words and gets to tell everyone what they mean/connote.
I agree wholly with you and, despite much thought, have not come up with any better response nor any better formulation than yours.
If anything, I would only add this:
In 1944, Unitarians espoused “freedom of belief” and affirmed the “democratic process” in a country where a large portion of the population did not have the de facto right to vote. History or social reality did not disqualify the articulation of those principles. To the contrary, those principles aimed toward the type of society that Unitarians aspired toward. Similarly, “inherent worth and dignity” in UU Principles does not mean anything less due to histories or social realities in the larger society society that failed to embody that principle. To the contrary, its articulation points toward a society in which we treat all as if they had “inherent worth and dignity”.
Furthermore, exchanging “worth” for “worthiness” would, in contrast, seem to unjusitfiably concede ground to the claim that “inherent worth” would necessarily have a particular meaning unintended by its authors and uninterpreted by the vast majority of its readers.
Even if “worthiness” might function better than “worth” in a technical conversation (and I don’t know that it would), effective strategy in the public sphere can include concision. (Try convincing a Black Lives Matter website to change their name to “Black Lives Have Worthiness” and note the response).
If a sibling raises their hand and says “I don’t want to be given a worth because my ancestors were judged on a dollar value”, and instead are accepting of referring to their worthiness, isn’t it appropriate to hear that and learn from it?
I wonder which “sibling” you refer to?
Black Lives of Unitarian Universalism (BLUU) uses the terms “worth” and “value” in relation to people but not “worthiness” or “valuableness”. (They seem to interpret the first principle of UUs to mean that “each person inherently matters”—not that each person has a financial value attached to them from birth). At least in this instance (unless I missed something), you do not seem to mean BLUU when you say “sibling”. And we have many siblings with many different views…
(I could not find the original source of critique against “inherent worth” or anyone arguing for it prior to its inclusion in the revised Principles. I only found one congregation, the UU Church of East Aurora, who has already adopted “worthiness” and their board seems pretty “white”. But if you could point to another link, aside from the Article II FAQ already quoted above by @CharlesD, that could help).
So I cannot see whom you mean by “sibling”. Maybe you mean yourself? After all, if said sibling could speak for themselves, we might better hear if they/you feel comfortable with alternative interpretations of “inherent worth” rather than feeling a need to change its formulation?
Change certainly lies ahead (and yes, hopefully we can all learn from it) but we constantly negotiate which changes, at which cost, when, to what extent, in which direction, and for what purpose.
In this comment, I share the current VERSIONS of amendments to the Equity Value that have emerged in a 15 person interest group that coalesced during and after the May 18 UUA Amendment Workshop on Values. We welcome comments and hope many UUs can coalesce around an amendment to the Equity Value. Here are our two versions, edited by many
1: 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, voice and material resources to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities among us and throughout the world. (Bek Wheeler & Rev. Matthew Johnson)
2a: EQUITY: We commit to taking actions that will promote every person’s access to life’s opportunities and benefits. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, voice and financial resources to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities. Our work for equity demonstrates the worth and dignity of all people. (Rev. Alice Diebel)
2b: Edited version of #2: We respect the inherent worth and dignity of each person; thus, we work for equity, to assure that all may access life’s opportunities and benefits. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, voice and resources to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities. (Revised/TightenedAlice Diebel with team)
3a: 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. (Mainly Janet Bush)
3b: Edited version of #3: Worth and dignity inhere in each person. 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.
I agree with the three-sentence format. I wanted to start with an action - or outward facing commitment: We honor 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. Matt Johnson
We commit to taking actions that will promote every person’s access to life’s opportunities and benefits. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, voice and financial resources to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities. Our work for equity demonstrates the worth and dignity of all people. Alice Diebel
This one is designed to be in parallel agreement with the other values. All the other values have three sentences. It also focuses on action - or as Matt Johnson suggests - turning outward. As I read the above comments though, I’m less comfortable with my last sentence. Maybe, "Our work for equity affirms the worth and dignity of all people.
Janet, I really like your version. I especially like that you did not feel the need to list all of the resources. You may want to add the word “all” to “our resources”. In the first sentence, you could leave out “We affirm that” and just begin with “Every person”. By doing that you are “affirming” the fact.
Mary Desmone
Bek,
I too like the 3 sentence format. If we want people to really remember these, the first sentence is the key.
We are able to remember the current principles, because it was 1 phrase, since we were beginning all with “We covenant to affirm and promote…” The two sentences that follow are our actions! If we could have this as a requirement for all of the items, UU people, in general, would have a sigh of relief. That being said if congregations want to have additional wording beyond the 3 sentences, they could keep that information in a book for their congregation.
While I appreciate the evolution of this new language, the theological impact of “inherent worth and dignity” is still diluted to the point of irrelevance.
With apologies if this is repetitive, but the old First Principle was a rejection of “total depravity” and a denial of “original sin”. At the time, this was quite a bold stance.
These claims, while apparently now out of vogue, are nevertheless the cornerstones in the confrontation of and with evangelical fundamentalism and those radicals citing the doctrines of depravity and sinfulness to advance nationalism and fascism. Less apocalyptically, but still relevant is the trend of “Christian deconstruction”, and that trend is accelerating and even becoming mainstream.
Retreating from these theological conversations entirely — which relocating theology to social policy would do — seems astonishingly ill-timed.
So while I appreciate the intent of the new language, and even the reformations of that language, I do wonder if both efforts are still tossing the baby out with the bath water?
Rev Scott, do you find the recently suggested wording “still diluted to the point of irrelevance”?
“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, voice and material resources to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities among us and throughout the world.”
I, for one have been working to get ‘inherent worth and dignity’ there in the first sentence, in the place of focus.
Perhaps you are talking about the relative dilution of changing from 7 one-line statements to a page (6 values x 3 statements per) of statements. I do understand, even as I’m game for following UUA bylaws and re-envisioning foundational statements.
You may be pleased to know there are amendments out there to KEEP even simplified 7 principles inside the Article II and then add these values.
In either case, I completely agree with you that ‘relocating theology to social policy’ is not only astonishingly ill-timed but a diminution of Unitarian Universalism itself.
With all due respect to the effort of all involved, and to my colleagues that have tried to salvage that work, yoking the theology of universal salvation to the value of “Equity” — itself a thoroughly laudable and terrifically important social policy endeavor, and one that is also inextricably linked to DEI work many of our congregations (and most conscientious corporations) are doing — does harm and violence to our history.
In short, it Is an empty mockery and should be rejected categorically.
And I will offer that, if the problem with the “old words” was the words themselves, I am deeply concerned about any solution that lands on “add more words”.
When one will do, 3 sentences is clearly too much. The point of the Principles was “vision” — they were an aspirational vision statement.
“Mission” — the part that spells out the “how we live that vision” — is always a separate thing. That was what, arguably, the 8th Principle Project was asking for — a mission statement that translated our “lofty” ideals into real, substantive commitment and work (accountable inspiration) toward positive, progressive, policy change.
The new words, as proposed, smash ”vision” and “mission” together to the diminishment of both.
So, no, to be transparent, I don’t think we’re making a lot of progress.