Thoughts in a Turbulent Time
By Megan Foley
Sometimes you sit across from people you know well, even people you love, and you just cannot believe how far apart from them you feel. You can't believe how much you disagree. In between you is so much pain. So much misunderstanding. So much ... distance. It's tempting to turn away and move towards those who seem more compatible, to whom you feel closer in spirit, or in story. To create an enclave of other people who look like you, who think like you, and who agree with you.
But our Unitarian Universalist theology is always, in all cases, that all human beings belong to one and the same family. This past week I've been really struck by the words of Rev. Theresa Ines Soto, who wrote: All of us need all of us to make it. Thanks, Theresa.
Let that soak in. All of us need all of us to make it.
So if there are some of us who feel they're perennially excluded, then we need to change until that's not so. All of us need all of us to make it. And if there's someone you're particularly upset with, you're still bound up with that person. Their future is also your future. UUs at our best don’t pick and choose. We’re all “all in”.
All of us need all of us to make it, even when we can't see how. This is our Unitarian Universalist faith statement, the thing to lean into when we don’t know what else to do. To believe otherwise puts us at a disconnect that keeps us from our true potential at best, and proves dangerous at worst.
I hope you're also feeling a lot of complex emotions about Unitarian Universalism and about the UUA, because to feel otherwise wouldn't be honoring the full story. I hope you're feeling sad, because there's been a lot of hurt and pain. And, in the midst of that, I hope you're feeling that your call, as ever, is to heal the disconnections that you encounter, within our denomination, and beyond. To do less is to do our faith a disservice. And to create connection where connection never existed before—that is holy work—the work of shared Unitarian Universalist ministry in all of its fullness.
Rev. Megan Foley
Central East Regional Lead