Workshop 7: Resistance

Beautiful orange sunset over a deep blue ocean. — Tapestry is Sunsetting

The UUA is no longer updating Tapestry of Faith programs.

Part of Building the World We Dream About: For Young Adults, 18-35

In This Section

Introduction
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

The work of building a just community means individually and collectively working in right relationship with people of historically marginalized groups and holding ourselves accountable for changing the things that create injustice. — Paula Cole Jones, contemporary Unitarian Universalist educator…
Workshop-at-a-Glance
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity Minutes Opening 5 Activity 1: Three Strategies for Resistance 10 Activity 2: Intentional Antiracist, Anti-Oppressive, Multicultural Community 20 Activity 3: Prophetic Witness 20 Activity 4: Practicing Resistance Through Skits 60 Closing 5 Alternate Activity 1: No More Deaths 40…
Spiritual Preparation
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Read Handout 1, Three Strategies for Resistance and reflect on the three strategies in your own life, using these questions: Have you personally experienced these different ways of resisting racism and systems of privilege based on ethnic or racial identity? Do you tend toward one strategy over…
Opening
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 5 minutes Materials for Activity Worship table or designated space Chalice, candle, and lighter or LED/battery-operated candle Leader Resource 1, Kindness List of this workshop’s goals Covenant established in Workshop 1 Description of Activity Light the chalice or invite a particip…
Activity 1: Three Strategies for Resistance
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 10 minutes Materials for Activity Handout 1, Three Strategies for Resistance Preparation for Activity Review Handout 1 and make copies for participants….
Activity 2: Intentional Antiracist, Anti-Oppressive, Multicultural Community
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 20 minutes Materials for Activity Story, “Highlander School” Preparation for Activity Copy the story for all participants. Description of Activity Read the story “Highlander School” aloud or ask a volunteer to do so. Lead a discussion of the story, using these questions as a guide:…
Activity 3: Prophetic Witness
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 20 minutes Materials for Activity Story, “The Audre Lorde Project” Preparation for Activity Copy the story for all participants. Description of Activity Read the story “The Audre Lorde Project” aloud or ask a volunteer to do so….
Activity 4: Practicing Resistance through Skits
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 60 minutes Materials for Activity Newsprint, markers, and tape List of reflection group members from Workshop 3, Activity 4 Workshop 6, Handout 2, Multicultural Competence Worksheet Handout 2, Procedure for Creating Your Skit Optional: Variety of simple costume pieces for skits (su…
Closing
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 5 minutes Materials for Activity Taking It Home Leader Resource 2, The Singing of Angels Preparation for Activity Copy Taking It Home for all participants. Description of Activity Distribute Taking It Home. Invite participants to do the suggested activities before the next meeting.
Alternate Activity 1: No More Deaths
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Activity time: 40 minutes Materials for Activity Story, “No More Deaths” Computer with Internet access Preparation for Activity Copy the story for all participants. Preview the podcast “http://s3.amazonaws.com/uuavideo/audio/sermons/20120602_staton_life.mp3… or Litter? The Value of People and…
Taking It Home: Resistance
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

The work of building a just community means individually and collectively working in right relationship with people of historically marginalized groups and holding ourselves accountable for changing the things that create injustice. — Paula Cole Jones, contemporary Unitarian Universalist educator…
Highlander School

Elandria Williams

From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

The Highlander Research and Education Center is an 80-year-old popular education center in the mountains of East Tennessee, which serves as a catalyst for grassroots organizing and movement-building in Appalachia and the South….
No More Deaths

Jane Greer

From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

From “UU Convicted of Littering While Supplying Humanitarian Aid” , UU World, June 15, 2009. Used with permission. The subject of the story is a White Unitarian Universalist who currently uses the name “Emrys Staton.” Next fall, Walt Staton will be starting divinity school to become a Unitarian…
The Audre Lorde Project

India McKnight

From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

“Honey, those girls were being chased for at least half a mile once school got out,” Ms. Myra recalled. I shook my head knowingly. We had just walked out of the subway station across the street from Boys and Girls High School and were listening to the owner of Cafe 258, one of our original safe…
Handout 1: Three Strategies for Resistance
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Adapted from Resistance and Transformation: Unitarian Universalist Social Justice History by Rev. Colin Bossen and Rev. Julia Hamilton. Not all change is effected in the same way. There is more than one way to resist racism and systems of privilege, and more than one way to work for the…
Handout 2: Procedure for Creating Your Skit
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

Choose a timekeeper to keep the group on task. You will have 20 minutes to create your skit and prepare to lead a discussion afterward. Each person in your small reflection group will share a personal experience where the multicultural skill or practice was either absent or well done….
Leader Resource 1: Kindness
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

By Naomi Shihab Nye, from Words Under the Words: Selected Poems (Far Corner Books, Portland, OR, 1995). Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth….
Leader Resource 2: The Singing of Angels

Howard Thurman

From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

By Rev. Dr. Howard Thurman, author, philosopher, theologian, educator and civil rights leader. There must be always remaining in every life some place for the singing of angels, some place for that which in itself is breathlessly beautiful and—by an inherent prerogative, throwing all the rest of…
Find Out More
From Building the World We Dream About for Young Adults

The UUA Multicultural Growth & Witness staff group offers resources, curricula, trainings, and tools to help Unitarian Universalist congregations and leaders engage in the work of antiracism, antioppression, and multiculturalism. Visit…

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The UUA is no longer updating Tapestry of Faith programs.

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