Colleagues,

I’m writing to let you know that I’ve resigned my position as Director of Congregational Life effective June 30.

While this is not without complexity or grief, I am clear this is the right decision for me, my family and our Association. It has been a privilege to work alongside so many of you. I’m grateful to have played a part in supporting closer relationships between the field staff and our partners from other departments. I’m proud to have been witness to the faithful and transformative work that these collaborations have produced. And yet I’m certain that the best way for me to support our work now is by making room for new leadership, new leadership and space that will allow the focus to be on the work ahead.

I also leave with a sense of hope. Having been your partner, I know our congregations and leaders are in good hands. I want to especially thank the UUA colleagues among us who are calling us to lead with both a prophetic voice and a pastor’s heart. As they have pointed out, the voices of anger, pain and exhaustion are asking us to be accountable and empathic: listening to the frustration and hurt of years, honoring it with self-reflection and then inviting those who have and continue to be on the margins into partnership to continue dismantling our structures of institutional racism. I deeply regret my role in not achieving those institutional changes sooner. During my remaining months at our UUA, I look forward to “beginning again” and doing my own work of listening, learning, re-committing and re-covenanting. And being in a faith where we get to do that together – offering each other both accountability and love – gives me great hope.

Finally, I want to publicly thank my colleagues on the Leadership Council and on the Regional Lead team. As partners, they have made me a better leader and a better person. As leaders, they have left me proud and humbled. As human beings, they have movingly modeled faithfulness and vulnerability. Their commitment, strength and humanity also gives me hope.

In Congregational Life, we ground our work and relationships in the theology of “healing spiritual and organizational disconnection.” This phrase and commitment remains the source of my deepest hope for our movement and my gratitude for all of you.

Best,

Scott