What a joy to spend time with our minister, Rev. Jennnifer Nordstrom, plus Rollie Hansen, Bruce and Terry Wiggins, Omega Burckhardt, (board member and ministerial student), and our Social Justice Intern Claire Keyes in St. Louis for the Regional Assembly, April 5-7, 2019.
As a wonderful start, our UUA President, Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray, gave the opening keynote and worship, stressing the importance of LOVE at this time of historical unrest. We sang many songs, which reinforced our coming together as a UU community to help bring about change. We had many conversations in the next two days on Intersectionality, stimulated by a TED Talk by Prof. Kimberle Crenshaw, who coined the phrase. If you are interested in the derivation and use of this term, see her TED Talk here. It stimulated a lot of discussion and motivated many to commit to justice for black women.
Workshops during the weekend were plenty (just to mention a few) from Climate Change, International UU Justice Work, DRUUMM 2.0, Spiritual Care, Spiritual Practices, Risking Generosity, Sustaining Future, Spectrum of Belonging, Systemic Racism, Why LGBTQ Welcome is Failing Trans People, to many youth and young adult in-gatherings, plus many more along with many vendors providing UU opportunities to buy and join organizations.
We had a grand ballroom gathering to sing, worship, and converse with each other comfortably. We ended with singing and worship to help bring about love and change in the world, WE CAN DO IT as Unitarian Universalists, we are needed and wanted.
With joy and love,
Janet Nortrom, FUSM delegate