Outreach Revolution -- Part 2 -- Social Media (Leora)

The second half of the Outreach Revolution workshop dealt with social media, especially Facebook (FB).  The UUA will be offering webinars in August to go into more detail about building an outreach strategy that includes social media. Here are my notes on this part of the workshop:

Facebook is good for:

• Learning about opportunities for congregants to show up.
• Outreach.
• Publicizing events.
• Sharing information.
• Building relationships.
• Posting links to content such as blog posts and podcasts.

It is important to be aware that FB treats our church’s page as a business page, which gets very different treatment than an individual’s page.  When an individual puts up a post, it is very likely to appear in the news feeds of the poster’s friends. This is not true of posts to business/church pages. In the ordinary course, FB will place posts to the church FB page in very few, if any, followers’ news feeds. The only exception to this is FB Live videos. FB is trying to encourage the use of Facebook Live so it does promote Facebook Live videos. Because of this and because FB users like watching videos of events, the Outreach Team recommends congregations have members broadcast events and rallies through Facebook Live.

Outreach Revolution Workshop on Congregational Outreach: Part 1 (Leora)

One of the most illuminating workshops I attended at GA was about congregational outreach. It included a discussion of how congregations should be "designed" in these times and about use of social media. I'll put up a separate post on the social media piece.

Congregational participation is up since the election. New people are showing trust by showing up. We have to show them our actions fulfill our words.

The old paradigm was to measure success by the number of people who attend services on Sunday. It should be whether the congregation is growing its mission and growing its actions and energy. 

Why should people come to our UU rather than to an Indivisible meeting? They will only come and stay if we offer a culture and experience that is healing and spiritually grounding, in addition to facilitating their involvement in justice work and resistance. 

Bryan Stevenson's Brilliant Ware Lecture (Leora)

One of the highlights of the GA for me was Bryan Stevenson's Ware lecture which, unfortunately, was not recorded so it isn't available to people who didn't attend the GA or watch it live streamed.  I took pretty copious notes at the lecture and thought I'd post them here for those who might be interested. (David also posted a link to Stevenson's Ted talk on First U's Facebook page.) One of Stevenson's final points, which profoundly moved me was that the opposite of poverty isn't wealth; it is justice.
Here's my notes:

Stevenson said there are four essential things we need to do to achieve a just society.

Get proximate to the poor, the excluded, neglected and abused.

• We will discover what we truly can do when we get proximate.
• The solutions come in proximity not before you get there.
• Story re: visiting death row prisoner to tell him he would not be executed in coming year led Stevenson to find passion in studying law and identify his life’s work.

Tackling White Supremacy at the GA (Leora)

The extent to which white supremacy permeates the institutions of Unitarian Universalism and the urgent need to finally do something about this has been a major topic of discussion and action at the GA, primarily as a result of the resignation of former UUA president Peter Morales and others in the wake of criticisms of the hiring practices of the UUA and its white supremacy culture.  It has been addressed by many speakers and been the topic of a lot of workshops and discussion. The issue is so monumental and so important that I don't feel I can say what I feel and think about it in the exhausted and time-pressed state I am in.  However, if anyone is actually reading this blog, I strongly urge you to follow the articles being posted by UU World covering some of the statements and actions that are taking place on this incredibly important issue. 

Renewing Covenant Task Force Proposes UU "General Conferences"

Rev. Susan Ritchie, of Columbus, Ohio, reported to the GA yesterday morning on the Recommendation of UUA Board Task Force on Re-Imagining Covenant. The Task Force recommends that the UUA implement regularly scheduled General Conferences [GCs] where participants would talk about theology and create relationships of accountability. These GCs and the business-oriented GAs would be scheduled for alternate years. The GC would "be smaller than our current General Assembly, so that meaningful discussions can be held..... Every effort should be made to make these conferences affordable, so that attendees are not limited to older people of means. Further, so that these conferences can build for the future of our movement, we should actively engage youth, young adults, UUs of color, and other historically under-represented groups." The GCs  would "engage in one or two large questions in depth over the course of several days.  It should be without activities that not directly advance the focused conversation. Rev. Ritchie explained that American Unitarianism conducted GCs until the merger with Universalism, which had a more decentralized structure. After the merger, only the business-oriented General Assembly survived.  Rev. Ritchie pointed out that, while the GA is a business meeting, the true work of Unitarian Universalism is not business, but theology, and that is the focus of a GC. 

The Task Force report also "strong[ly] urges the systemic reexamination of the roles and responsibilities enshrined in [the UUA's] current bylaws as we know this organization to have been derived from explicitly racist, sexist, and classist principles," explaining that the structure of nonprofits like the UUA is derived "from a nineteenth century small business model that consolidated power in a small number of patrons."

Amended Statement of Conscience on Escalating Economic Inequality, as amended, Passes

The GA just approved the Statement of Conscience on Escalating Economic Inequality as amended in yesterday's mini assembly.

Service of the Living Tradition (by Leora)

The sermon given by the Rev. Cheryl M. Walker this evening at the GA Service of the Living Tradition was fantastic. If you have time, check it out on YouTube starting at 1:34:12. It will inspire you.

Hannah Roberts Villnave was one of the Ministers Receiving Preliminary Fellowship who was celebrated at the Service. See if you can find her in this photo.

Notes on GA program on Advocating For Equity & Human Rights for Climate Change (by Leora)

I attended a great program today on climate change.  The speakers were Bruce Knotts, Director of the UUA United Nations Office (UU-UNO) and Salote Soqo, UU Service Committee (UUSC) Senior Program Leader for Environmental Justice & Climate Action.  They talked about the importance of the work being done through the UN to foster international cooperation on climate change and the UUSC’s work with indigenous people in Alaska and the South Pacific who are having to flee their homes because of rising ocean levels. 

I signed up for the UU Ministry for Earth’s Commit2 Respond campaign and got information about coordinating our environmental justice work with a network of UU Climate Action Teams (CATs).

Hello, from Adrian!

Hi there, First Unitarians!

I realize that, although I have been a member of First Unitarian for 14 years now...many of you there today probably don't know me very well, since I'm not able to be with you on Sunday mornings.

So, a little about me. I joined First Unitarian in 2003, and over the years have served in many capacities - I've taught Children's RE, Adult RE, and Jr./Sr. High OWL; I've been a member of several committees, including Membership, Ministerial Internship, Ministerial Search, Committee on Ministry, and more; and I've twice served on the Board, as a Trustee and as an Officer. Currently, I serve the UU Congregation of Rockville as Director of Communications & Membership.

I became a UU in the late 1990s, and this GA is my 5th in that time. As a black man in a predominantly white faith tradition, our recent national conversations around race and white supremacy have been difficult. What I'm most seeking by being here in New Orleans this year is fellowship with other UUs of color, and deeper insights into Unitarian Universalist congregational dynamics. I am also hoping for some spiritual renewal! Hopefully, the fellowship and joy of being surrounded by so many UUs will take care of some of that!

For now, I'm off to the Opening Celebration! It starts at 8:30 p.m. (Eastern), and you can watch GA online! So follow along.

Peace,
Adrian

Proposed Statement of Conscience: Escalating Inequality

A Proposed Statement of Conscience on Escalating Inequality is on the GA agenda. There will be a mini-assembly on this proposal tomorrow afternoon at which amendments or adjustments to the proposal may be made. The Proposed Statement of Conscience addresses the increase in wealth concentration and economic inequality, its causes, how our economic system is intertwined with other systems (such as technology, health care, education, judicial and criminal justice, community development, environment and transportation), and how economic inequality disproportionately affects members of historically marginalized and oppressed groups. It suggests these actions for individual UUs, congregations, state legislative ministries and the UU denomination to take:
 

Hi,  I'm Leora Herrmann. I'm one of First U's delegates to the 2017 GA in New Orleans. I'm supposed to fly out of BWI at 5 this afternoon and am keeping my fingers crossed that Tropical Storm Cindy will not cause my flight to be canceled. My plans for GA include attending as many sessions on social justice work as I can get to.  (I just joined First U's Peace & Justice Ministry's steering committee.) I'll try to write blog posts each day.  In addition to what we Baltimoreans blog, the writers for UU World will be blogging at the GA. Their blog is at https://www.uuworld.org/ga.