Don’t speak to me of “healing” racism, or “wounded souls” or the “painful hurt” until you are willing to feel the scars on my great-great-grandmother Laury’s back. Don’t speak to me of “values” or “justice” or “righting wrongs” until you are able to feel the heartache...

You’ve seen it. Two black men pass each other on the street. They nod. Subtle, sometimes imperceptible, but there is acknowledgement. “Do you know him?” “No . . . (yes) . . . no.” I learned this from my father and my grandfather and my other grandfather and my uncles and my great uncle and...

Around us, light is returning. It rekindles the spirit of life in the skeletons of trees. It brings forth new shoots from the soil. It wakes us from our winter slumber, and invites us to see what lies beyond. We light this chalice in the spirit of our Earth’s awakening and to reaffirm our...

Leader: In this sacred place, we need not be alone. We seek a listening ear, a warm heart, open arms. Congregation: In this sacred place, we join together against the waves of negativity and oppression in our world. L: We are a community of individual beings, living our own lives, yet coming...

Leader: Quick! Look about you! The snows of Winter are gone and the Earth has awoken once more! Congregation: Hail the Spring in all her green glory! L: The brave small flowers push up from the warming soil; birds return from their southerly homes; the first buds appear on the trees....

Leader: For the love of all began with the world. Congregation: All of Nature is sacred. L: Every creature is a thinking, feeling being. C: We are blessed with wondrous variety. L: We are part of nature and of every being on the planet. What we do to one affects the many. C: In this web of...

Leader: What is abundance? What do we call riches and bounty? Congregation: Abundance is all around us. L: That we are alive is priceless; that we are loved is beyond worth. C: That we love others in turn fills our souls. L: The gifts of food that Mother Earth provides from Her body, endlessly...

For all who left a relationship in order to save your heart, may your own heartbeat be your blessing. Its rhythm, its particular kinships, its unique rhythm. May you know your own heart as God's blessing....

The invisibility of whiteness means that one doesn't have to notice that one is white. So there are people, and then there are black people. There are people and there are Latino people. And people—just people, just folks—turn out to be white, but we don't notice it. White people have the luxury...

"The thing that's really slick about whiteness, if you will, is that most of the benefits can be obtained without ever doing anything personally......

To become an anti-racist faith community, the key question for a white/white majority community is not “How do we get people of color to join our faith community?” It is, instead, “How can we make a prolonged, spiritually-rooted, engaged commitment to uprooting white supremacy within our...

Let us tell the stories of mothers… stories that could be true. Let us tell of warm mothers, soft and round, likely to be found with flour on their nose, and always ready to pour you a glass of milk to go with the cookies on your plate. These mothers are increasingly rare. Let us tell of mothers...

We light this chalice for mothers and mothering; to celebrate those who have taken on the task of nurturing a young one-baby, child, or youth-into adulthood; to celebrate those who have nourished the light of truth and compassion in growing minds and hearts; to celebrate those who have committed...

This ritual was designed as part of a worship service/fire communion. Please see that holiday description for more details. Leader: Today’s service is about letting go, metaphoric cleansing and quenching of thirst, setting of intentions, self-anointing, healing, new beginnings and possibilities.

Having let go, Set our intentions, Named our curiosity, Committed our energies, And given ourselves over to lives of balance, purpose and meaning, Let us begin again In love...

Fertility in social movements and among people is not something we control. We cannot make new life like we make plans or money. It's hard to be fertile when we are not grounded. Fertility is about making new life that becomes self-determining: that does not belong to us. If we drain ourselves as...

Here is where I found my voice and chose to be brave. Here’s a place where I forgave someone, against my better judgment, and I survived that, and unexpectedly, amazingly, I became wiser. Here’s where I was once forgiven, was ready for once in my life to receive forgiveness and to be...

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." This quote has been widely attributed to Martin Luther King, Jr.

"There is no question for which compassion is not the answer."...

As we move through life finding ourselves, always newly wise and newly foolish, we ask that our mistakes be small and not hurtful. We ask that as we gain experience we do not forget our innocence, for they are both part of the whole.