June 5, 2010 Meeting

Attendance: David Weber, Rich Coleman, Sylvia Foster, Frank Heffron, Alex McCallum, Skip Berrien, Jim Webber, Margaret O’Day, Marion Mengert, Pat Yosha. Jim Webber facilitated; Pat Yosha chaired the meeting.

Decisions made:

1. Pat will step down as SJ chair after 3+ years.

2. SJ Nominating committee – to identify new SJ chair: Rich Coleman, Jim Webber, Marion Mengert

3. Subcommittee to design Survey Monkey for fall use to identify focus topics and new folks to participate on SJ activities.

Chair: Margaret O’Day. She and subcommittee members will invite input from Frank Merrick, who offered Team FUSSION kids’ assistance in doing a survey. They will report at the end of August.

4. Summary of Pragmatic Approach subcommittee reports:

a. Priority statements distributed

b. Collaboration with other churches

c. Develop small task forces which can bring closure to a project.

d. Use study circles (including, possibly, book study)

5. Apply “Five Main Approaches to Taking Action” “Draft Regarding 2010 Social Justice PLAN” as methods of decision making and then developing each project. These are meant to be guidelines for whole SJ committee and for task forces and study committees.

Contents

Agenda 2

Topics Suggested as Possible Focus for 2010-2011 3

Issue Statements on 5 Priority Issues 4

Report on Pragmatic Approaches- Sylvia Foster 5

Choosing an Issue and Taking Action Charts 7

Treatment of Topics 10

SOCIAL JUSTICE COMMITTEE

AGENDA: JUNE 5, 2010

I. Follow-up of May 1 Planning meeting:

A. Issue statements on 5 priority issues:

1. Economic inequality – Jim Webber

2. Afghanistan war – Bob Moore

3. Children’s Issues – Alex McCallum

4. Environmental Justice- Sylvia Foster

5. Women’s Rights – Margaret O’Day

B. Report on “pragmatic approaches” – Sylvia – for Sylvia, Bob and Malcolm

C. Group discussion: What are the implications of the Congregation’s commitment to Green Sanctuary/Green Team activities for our social justice work? Making a working connection.

D. Developing issue strategies:

Part 1. Exercise: 5 ways to approach. Jim Webber

Part 2. Draft: “How to proceed” Pat Yosha

Group compare and develop strategy

E. Involving the congregation:

Survey idea: Frank Merrick and Team FUUSION.

*Develop subcommittee to design survey questions by late August.

II. Looking Ahead.

A. Selecting a new Social Justice Committee Chair

B. Selecting Social Justice representative to Program Council

C. Do we want to do a summer lay-led service?

D. Clarifying connection of Green Team and We the People to Social Justice

E. Volunteer Sunday (tomorrow) – talk to people about Social Justice activities, reasons to join this committee!

TOPICS SUGGESTED AS POSSIBLE FOCUS FOR 2010-11

(Numbers do not indicate preference)

1. Health care reform

2. Economic inequality

3. ENDA (Employment Non Discrimination Act: focus is to end workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation and orientation)

4. Immigration Issues

5. Afghanistan: Ending the war

6. Haiti- aftermath

7. Corporate power in America

8. Family planning and abortion

9. Violence in the media and society

10. Children’s Issues

11. Women’s Rights

12. Affordable Housing/Homelessness

TOPICS SELECTED FOR FURTHER EXAMINATION

(Names indicate responsibility for brief descriptions, due May 4)

Economic Inequality – John Flackett

Afghanistan – Bob Moore

Children’s Issues – Alex McCallum

Women’s Rights - Marion Mengert

Environmental Justice –  Sylvia Foster (Note: This topic evolved from combination of several topics from list above: e.g. health care; economic inequality; corporate power)

Note: Malcolm, Bob and Sylvia will prepare a report on addressing these 5 topics in an applied, behavioral, pragmatic approach.

ISSUE STATEMENTS ON 5 PRIORITY ISSUES

1. Economic Inequality – John Flackett and Jim Webber

“We admit being supporters of Bill Moyer’s populist campaign against rising, corrupting corporate power. A major cause of economic inequality is an economic system that no longer works for the majority of Americans. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. ‘We have become a plutocracy, the rule of the rich, political power controlled by the wealthy.’ Let’s join others in civic action in ridding ourselves of corporate power and plutonomy.”

2. Afghan war – Bob Moore

“The war in Afghanistan is a war that seems to have lost its newsworthiness. There is a need to draw attention to this war, as it is costing billions and, as in any war, human lives are at stake. Legislation has recently been introduced in the House and Senate to call on President Obama to set an exit strategy including a timetable for withdrawal of US forces and military contractors. A women’s organization in Afghanistan, the Afghan Women’s Network (AWN) is an advocacy organization run by women to improve the status of women in a culture that has discouraged women from gaining equal opportunities for education and employment. Work, funding, education, and energy is needed to improve their status in the country.”

3. Children’s Issues – Alex McCallum

“For children, we (need to)_ create and support local Exeter, Rockingham County and New Hampshire programs that focus on the needs of children, especially those who are disadvantaged or at risk.”

4. Environmental Justice – Sylvia Foster

“Environmental justice is the right to a safe, healthy, productive and sustainable environment. This right protects under-represented human beings, animals and Earth’s natural resources burdened by environmental problems that they did not cause and that they do not have the voice to address.”

5. Women’s Rights – Margaret O’Day

“UU’s consistently speak out in support of reproductive rights, including family planning, abortion, and comprehensive sexuality education. On the international scene, women still struggle for basic rights undermining their humanity. This group will address these issues and others both on the local and international scene through conversation and action.”

Report on Pragmatic Approaches by Sylvia Foster

Bob Moore, Malcom Wetherbee and I met twice to design the following proposals to bring to the full Social Justice Committee.

We began with the question: What are some plans of action toward the resolution of the issues?

We first discussed ways to make social justice work appealing, i.e.,not overwhelming. So we listed some overarching methods of delivery of plans of action:

• Collaborate with other churches and civic organizations as well as national organizations that are already established, like Heifer and so on.
• Break things into small packages to avoid, create projects with two-month deadlines that bring a sense of immediate closure.
• Offer study circles when we come to an impasse.

Proposed Action plans based on 5 Subject Areas Selected in our Previous Social Justice Meeting:

We found many intersections of issues, as would be expected.

What we envisioned was that each of us Malcom, Bob and I would choose an area and find 2 other people to follow that topic and develop a fuller plan of action. That leaves some territory to be covered still, so please feel free to jump in!

War in Afghanistan

Goal: To launch a church-wide and even community-wide campaign for people to support nationally recognized, proven organizations that re-build the Afghanistan economy, food production and health for the people. Examples:

KIVA.org – choose a women’s group or farming enterprise in the country

Heifer Project – select a project that helps women and children

These areas intersect with environment justice.

Malcom is researching this to draft a proposal to give to the group for discussion.

He is also going to find a way to publicize the cost of the war to taxpayers — possibly a town center posting of daily dollars going to Afghanistan.

Economic Inequality as it relates to Affordable Housing

Malcom will speak with owners of Riverwoods regarding the prospect of renovating houses nearby Riverwoods’ campus. The housing would offer those nurses and personnel who cannot afford to live near their work access to affordable housing. Incidents in the past at Riverwoods have made the promised end-of-life care a challenge if an emergency develops and a nurse cannot make the commute in a snow storm. The bottom line is that it is inequitable to not provide housing to all income levels. (Cliff Sinnott may be a good contact for some strategic planning on this proposed project.)

Environmental Justice

• The Green Team will invite the church to choose a project around local farming, sustainable backyards vs. growing lawns.
• Building on the Church's current RE commitment to grow vegetables for the soup kitchen may be a program that could be repeated in other church communities if it isn’t already in place!
• Movies such a FRESH and “Kilowatt Ours” could be entry points to motivate people to action.
• Sylvia will work with the Green Team on these areas of action.

Children’s Rights and Issues

• Bullying
  • Bob Moore is doing research on current, effective programs, in the local area, and through Peace and Justice Studies material, and will draft a proposal to give to the group for discussion. One program with a track record is “Safe and Sound: Social and Emotional Learning Program” teaching caring and concern for others, responsible decision-making and other core competencies preventing bullying and other challenges to a peaceful learning community.
• Local Food for school cafeterias is also an area of intersectionality with Environmental Justice.

Women’s Rights: Pay Equity both International and Domestic

• We propose to explore a church-wide and community-wide Central Asia Institute project as it would help women of Afghanistan. This has been done through the Water Street Bookstore in the past with the selling of the Greg Mortenson books and Exeter’s raising of funds for a school in Afghanistan. Donna Schlachman may be familiar with the contacts for previous work on this.
• The work through KIVA and Heifer to find projects that bring women the opportunity to sustain themselves through farming, clothing production or other enterprises also intersects with women’s rights issues and their ability to be independent workers, freeing them from abuse and neglect and leading them to new models of family life.

Some of these programs intersect with environmental justice.

Choosing An Issue And Taking Action

Jim Webber introduced two sets of ideas taken from the UUA Social Justice Empowerment Handbook, pages 13, 14 and 21. The first had to do with four criteria for choosing an Issue and the second , five main approaches to taking action. The group felt that these were promising areas for committee development. Excerpts follow:

Choosing an Issue: Determining Grounding, Accountability, Fit, & Opportunity

When evaluating justice-issue-based priorities, consider the following for each issue:

1. Grounding: Does the issue have authentic and deep Unitarian Universalist roots?

• Does it link to the current identity and theology/philosophy of Unitarian Universalists?
  • Theology/philosophy – What is the spiritual, philosophical, historical, and ethical basis for our position?
  • Worship and Congregational Life – What is our members’ engagement and lived experience on the justice issue in the congregation?
  • Social Action – Is there historic and current UU engagement on the issue in the public arena?

2. Accountability: Is the issue of concern to marginalized groups in the congregation and in the community? Is anti-oppression built in to the project and its way of operating?

• Is the congregation educated about how the issue is impacting people of color,low-income communities, and other oppressed groups?
• Are there relationships with groups who are working on the issue from this perspective? Can the congregation be a sensitive partner?
• Can reconciliation and right relationship be an outcome of working on this issue? Are there opportunities for dismantling institutional oppression? For reparations?

3. Fit: Is there a match between the congregation’s resources, aspirations, and ability to make a real difference?

• Informed and Inspiring Leaders – Are there Unitarian Universalists who are or could publicly represent a UU perspective on the theme?
• Institutional Resources – Is there a task group devoted to the issue? Has the minister spoken out? Is there money available for the effort? What UUA offices, committees, affiliates, publications, curricula exist to support the congregation in taking a position?
• Partners – Are there national and/or local interfaith and allied organizations the congregation or UUA has a history of partnership with or that are actively seeking partners?

4. Opportunity: Is there likelihood that the congregation can be a respected participant in the public dialogue on this issue? Are there other groups the congregation can work with? Is this a “hot” issue and a good time to act? Can the congregation make a real difference? Is there a UU national campaign the congregation can join? Are there debates in the public arena, can influence?

• Relevance in News and Public Dialogue – What is the degree to which the theme is or could become a meaningful factor in news coverage or public debate?
• Other Voices – Congruent: What religious and secular organizations share our views and are vocal?
• Other Voices – Contrary: What religious and secular organizations oppose our views and are vocal

Creating a Balanced Social Justice Program:

Five Main Approaches to Taking Action

1. SERVICE: The purpose of social service is to meet the needs of persons in distress.

Examples: collecting money, donating food or clothing, tutoring, sheltering the homeless, homes for senior citizens, programs for senior citizens, child care programs, food programs, youth clubs, scouts, hospitals.

2. EDUCATION: The purpose of social education is to educate people about the importance of a social issue. The goal is to inform people about the aspects of theissues and also interpret the issue within the context of liberal religious values.

Examples: Public meetings, workshops, resolutions, drama, public forums, worship services and sermons.

3. WITNESS: The purpose of social witness is to make public by word or deed the convictions of an individual or organization regarding a particular issue.

Examples: Participating in demonstrations, vigils, and marches, writing letters to the editor, passing resolutions, communicating to the wider community through press releases and/or press conferences, organizing petition campaigns, and changing our lifestyles.

4. ADVOCACY: The purpose of advocacy is to work through the legislative process to impact public policy.

Examples: Visiting elected representatives in a delegation, writing letters to elected officials, giving testimony at public hearings.

5. COMMUNITY ORGANIZING: The purpose of community organizing is to participate in the process by which decisions are made in places of power. The focus is on the powerof institutional structures and how that power is used for good or evil. This approach is based on the recognition that individuals have little power to change their situations without the empowerment of groups who know how to organize and influence power.

Examples: Developing a strong organization, influencing policy and decision makers and holding them accountable, empowering people so they can achieve self-determination.

In fact, these five approaches to doing social justice ministry do not exist in isolation from one another. Rather, they are complementary. Ideally, we would have programs in our congregations on specific issues which would include all five approaches and are done in a way that heal divisions.

NOTE: Jim presented a graph for Issue Choice plotting Fit and Opportunity and a matrix for the 5 Taking Action approaches.

Treatment of Topics: 2010 Social Justice PLAN

Each TOPIC we choose to work on should aim to have:

1. Local component

a. Activity for local audience, organization, individuals (e.g. forum; film)

b. Could include working with other local organizations

c. Could include visibility : letter; article; photograph;

d. Could include demonstration; petition

2. Religious Ed course component

a. A one or two session RE course in ARE division

b. Link with kids’ RE topics whenever possible

c. Could include a BOOK session (or two) on the topic (Team FUUSION will help publicize books.)

3. Church service component

a. Two Sunday services a year with topic-related theme

4. Resources list

a. Book lists

b. Newspapers

c. Television

d. Internet

e. Public lectures

f. Films

g. Other organizations

5. Communication component (plan)

a. Website

b. FUUSE online update and OOS insert

c. Press release

d. E-mail announcements

e. Disseminate articles and opinion pieces

f. Bulletin board