We come to a time when we realize that the faith we have inherited is inadequate for what we are facing...at such moments we have three choices: We can hold to our religious beliefs and deny our experience, we can hold to our experience and walk away from our religious tradition, or we can become theologians — Rebecca Parker, in Blessing the World: What Can Save Us Now

This concluding workshop looks back, into the stories told in this program, and forward, into ways contemporary Unitarian Universalists do and will seek to transform society. Participants apply the models of prophetic, parallel, and institutional social justice leadership, introduced in Workshop 2, to historical Unitarian Universalist stories of resistance and transformation and to our contemporary justice work. Where are we resisting unjust or oppressive social structures and patterns? How are we engaging issues of environmental justice?

To ensure you can help adults of all ages, stages, and learning styles participate fully in this workshop, review these sections of the program Introduction: "Accessibility Guidelines for Workshop Presenters" in the Integrating All Participants section, and "Strategies for Effective Group Facilitation" and "Strategies for Brainstorming" in the Leader Guidelines section.

Goals

This workshop will:

• Offer an opportunity to recall, re-examine, and synthesize material from the previous workshops
• Re-examine the models of social justice leadership introduced in Workshop 2
• Invite participants to view their own justice efforts as part of an ongoing Unitarian Universalist work.

Learning Objectives

Participants will:

• Reflect back on the entire program and articulate how Unitarian, Universalist, and Unitarian Universalist historical figures and events inspire them
• Name the social and environmental justice work currently being done by Unitarian Universalist individuals and congregations
• Identify and consider work still to be done to create a more just world
• Reflect on their place in this work.