1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,880 2 00:00:05,880 --> 00:00:08,330 Speaker 1: From the University of Chicago 3 00:00:08,330 --> 00:00:13,720 and his D.Min from Meadville Lombard Theological School. 4 00:00:13,720 --> 00:00:17,150 He served as co-minister, with his wife Donna, 5 00:00:17,150 --> 00:00:21,070 in Rochester, New York and Toronto, Canada. 6 00:00:21,070 --> 00:00:24,500 Currently, he's affiliated with the faculty 7 00:00:24,500 --> 00:00:28,510 at Meadville Lombard, the coordinator of the Sankofa 8 00:00:28,510 --> 00:00:30,004 Archive. 9 00:00:30,004 --> 00:00:33,490 In addition, he writes and leads and preaches 10 00:00:33,490 --> 00:00:37,972 and has spoken at 200 UU congregations and conferences, 11 00:00:37,972 --> 00:00:42,454 in Canada, the United States, and Europe. 12 00:00:42,454 --> 00:00:46,936 Dr. Morrison-Reed's most recent book, The Selma Awakening, 13 00:00:46,936 --> 00:00:50,422 How the Civil Rights Movement Tested and Changed 14 00:00:50,422 --> 00:00:54,406 Unitarian Universalism, came out this May 15 00:00:54,406 --> 00:00:57,892 and is available in the back of the room right now. 16 00:00:57,892 --> 00:01:03,370 So please join me in welcoming Dr. Mark Morrison-Reed. 17 00:01:03,370 --> 00:01:22,786 [APPLAUSE] 18 00:01:22,786 --> 00:01:24,286 Mark Morrison-reed: Because you know 19 00:01:24,286 --> 00:01:30,013 I went to bed the other day [INAUDIBLE] I got up 20 00:01:30,013 --> 00:01:33,748 to the door, turned around, went in to bed. 21 00:01:33,748 --> 00:01:36,736 And the rest of them came in, and I had no idea. 22 00:01:36,736 --> 00:01:37,732 [LAUGHTER] 23 00:01:37,732 --> 00:01:40,720 So let's see. 24 00:01:40,720 --> 00:01:42,214 A real story, actually. 25 00:01:42,214 --> 00:01:44,206 You're going to start it. 26 00:01:44,206 --> 00:01:46,800 We're going to do a poem. 27 00:01:46,800 --> 00:01:49,541 We're going to read this together. 28 00:01:49,541 --> 00:01:50,680 Are you ready? 29 00:01:50,680 --> 00:01:52,460 Audience: Yes. 30 00:01:52,460 --> 00:01:54,210 Mark Morrison-reed: Little (WITH AUDIENCE) 31 00:01:54,210 --> 00:01:57,055 dry peanut, I throw you to squirrels. 32 00:01:57,055 --> 00:02:00,025 They hide you among the tree roots. 33 00:02:00,025 --> 00:02:02,995 They crush you between their teeth. 34 00:02:02,995 --> 00:02:06,460 They think you are just a little, dry peanut 35 00:02:06,460 --> 00:02:08,935 they pretend to eat. 36 00:02:08,935 --> 00:02:14,380 Little, dry peanut, your wonder is hiding within you. 37 00:02:14,380 --> 00:02:19,330 The earth as a goddess wrapped in your furry little hand. 38 00:02:19,330 --> 00:02:24,455 You sleep a long sleep, like a person dying, alone 39 00:02:24,455 --> 00:02:26,410 in the dark. 40 00:02:26,410 --> 00:02:29,730 And you knew it not. 41 00:02:29,730 --> 00:02:33,660 The days and the nights in order pass by you 42 00:02:33,660 --> 00:02:37,580 till you found, at last, the power within you. 43 00:02:37,580 --> 00:02:41,990 You reach your soft arms towards the sun. 44 00:02:41,990 --> 00:02:45,784 You changed your green stems into flowers. 45 00:02:45,784 --> 00:02:50,275 You mothered many, small baby peanuts down 46 00:02:50,275 --> 00:02:52,770 in your crib, the earth. 47 00:02:52,770 --> 00:02:58,259 Then on a day did you know, little, dry peanut, workers 48 00:02:58,259 --> 00:03:04,746 came kneeling as beggars, asking your lives for their lives, 49 00:03:04,746 --> 00:03:08,270 wage-earners gather by your miracles 50 00:03:08,270 --> 00:03:11,570 to sell in our markets. 51 00:03:11,570 --> 00:03:17,026 Little, dry peanut, wrapped in your self-made blanket, 52 00:03:17,026 --> 00:03:20,002 some of your secrets are out. 53 00:03:20,002 --> 00:03:26,946 I know you, tiny, wee worker of wonders, gatherer of treasures, 54 00:03:26,946 --> 00:03:28,930 garden of riches. 55 00:03:28,930 --> 00:03:32,898 Little, dry peanut, you make me hungry 56 00:03:32,898 --> 00:03:37,380 till I feel my own strength. 57 00:03:37,380 --> 00:03:46,105 Mark Morrison-reed: Sophia Lyon Fahs, November 1, 1936. 58 00:03:46,105 --> 00:03:47,602 Not a great poem. 59 00:03:47,602 --> 00:03:50,097 [LAUGHTER] 60 00:03:50,097 --> 00:03:52,880 My wife, Donna, just says it's awful. 61 00:03:52,880 --> 00:03:55,275 [LAUGHTER] 62 00:03:55,275 --> 00:03:56,233 It is. 63 00:03:56,233 --> 00:03:57,191 It doesn't matter. 64 00:03:57,191 --> 00:03:58,300 It doesn't matter. 65 00:03:58,300 --> 00:04:03,633 Sophia Lyon Fahs said it came to her in a moment of inspiration. 66 00:04:03,633 --> 00:04:06,627 What she was trying to do was capture 67 00:04:06,627 --> 00:04:10,120 the children's imaginations. 68 00:04:10,120 --> 00:04:15,609 It was autumn, harvest-time, yet in the middle of New York, 69 00:04:15,609 --> 00:04:18,603 the city children had at least seen squirrels 70 00:04:18,603 --> 00:04:22,120 storing nuts for the winter. 71 00:04:22,120 --> 00:04:24,860 What else is hidden from them? 72 00:04:24,860 --> 00:04:28,255 The wonders within the little peanut. 73 00:04:28,255 --> 00:04:30,680 Wonders discovered by who? 74 00:04:30,680 --> 00:04:34,075 George Washington Carver. 75 00:04:34,075 --> 00:04:37,955 The night before, as she thought about Carver, the botanist, 76 00:04:37,955 --> 00:04:40,942 scientist, educator, African-American 77 00:04:40,942 --> 00:04:44,386 who discovered hundreds of uses for the peanut, 78 00:04:44,386 --> 00:04:49,798 she'd written "To A Little Dry Peanut." 79 00:04:49,798 --> 00:04:52,258 During the service, she asked the children 80 00:04:52,258 --> 00:04:56,686 if, when they felt deeply, they had ever 81 00:04:56,686 --> 00:05:03,574 tried to express it in a poem. 82 00:05:03,574 --> 00:05:08,700 November, 1936, at age 60, Fahs was 83 00:05:08,700 --> 00:05:10,403 teaching at Union Theological School 84 00:05:10,403 --> 00:05:14,822 and serving as the supervisor of the junior department 85 00:05:14,822 --> 00:05:17,277 of the Sunday school program at the Riverside 86 00:05:17,277 --> 00:05:19,241 Church in New York City. 87 00:05:19,241 --> 00:05:24,180 The congregation, located a mile and a half west of Harlem, 88 00:05:24,180 --> 00:05:27,798 was led by the preeminent liberal minister 89 00:05:27,798 --> 00:05:33,030 of that era, Harry Emerson Fosdick. 90 00:05:33,030 --> 00:05:36,954 Early in the new year, the worship service, in '37, 91 00:05:36,954 --> 00:05:38,451 focused on China. 92 00:05:38,451 --> 00:05:41,445 It ended with readings from Lao-tze. 93 00:05:41,445 --> 00:05:43,940 Japan was mentioned in another service. 94 00:05:43,940 --> 00:05:46,435 The teacher, leading the discussion, 95 00:05:46,435 --> 00:05:49,429 told of how the children in the junior department 96 00:05:49,429 --> 00:05:52,173 had wished the church to be a place where 97 00:05:52,173 --> 00:05:55,417 people of different races would feel at home. 98 00:05:55,417 --> 00:06:00,906 The next week, Mr. Balawi Magusa, from Uganda, 99 00:06:00,906 --> 00:06:03,401 came and talked about his native land. 100 00:06:03,401 --> 00:06:09,920 And the discussion was led by Mrs. Kat Lee, another African. 101 00:06:09,920 --> 00:06:12,760 Later that year, Ernest Kuebler, the director 102 00:06:12,760 --> 00:06:14,800 of the Religious Education Department 103 00:06:14,800 --> 00:06:18,311 of the AUA, the American Unitarian Association, 104 00:06:18,311 --> 00:06:21,790 brought Fahs on board as the children's editor 105 00:06:21,790 --> 00:06:26,760 of what then came known as the New Beacon Series. 106 00:06:26,760 --> 00:06:31,730 Consistent with the program she had developed at Riverside, 107 00:06:31,730 --> 00:06:35,706 the first book of the series, Beginnings of Earth and Sky, 108 00:06:35,706 --> 00:06:38,688 represents stories and myths from many cultures. 109 00:06:38,688 --> 00:06:42,727 The book's introduction included a poem. 110 00:06:42,727 --> 00:06:48,194 "To All Thoughtful Persons and Patient Scholars." 111 00:06:48,194 --> 00:06:52,170 "To all thoughtful persons, black or white, 112 00:06:52,170 --> 00:06:56,643 who have stopped to wonder, who ask the great questions, 113 00:06:56,643 --> 00:07:03,104 who search for true answers, who try to imagine." 114 00:07:03,104 --> 00:07:08,610 In 1937, her approach, this approach was revolutionary. 115 00:07:08,610 --> 00:07:10,910 Fahs goes on to describe the Bushmen 116 00:07:10,910 --> 00:07:13,730 before offering their myth of creation. 117 00:07:13,730 --> 00:07:15,821 Well, it's followed then by stories 118 00:07:15,821 --> 00:07:20,820 of Australian Aborigines, Native Americans, 119 00:07:20,820 --> 00:07:23,814 Chinese, Japanese cultures. 120 00:07:23,814 --> 00:07:28,305 A truly multicultural, if subtlety culturally 121 00:07:28,305 --> 00:07:33,794 chauvinistic, collection meant to allow the pupil 122 00:07:33,794 --> 00:07:37,690 to enter into the wanderings of life of today 123 00:07:37,690 --> 00:07:43,708 as well as of other races. 124 00:07:43,708 --> 00:07:45,590 Not the same one. 125 00:07:45,590 --> 00:07:48,630 When the next book in this series, Martin and Judy, 126 00:07:48,630 --> 00:07:50,613 came out in 1939, nothing explicitly 127 00:07:50,613 --> 00:07:53,260 was said about race or culture. 128 00:07:53,260 --> 00:07:56,620 Martin and Judy in Their Two Little Houses, 129 00:07:56,620 --> 00:07:58,917 I know some people here grew up with this. 130 00:07:58,917 --> 00:07:59,500 Audience: Yes. 131 00:07:59,500 --> 00:07:59,980 Mark Morrison-reed: Yes? 132 00:07:59,980 --> 00:08:00,460 Yes? 133 00:08:00,460 --> 00:08:00,960 [LAUGHTER] 134 00:08:00,960 --> 00:08:03,170 OK, there we go. 135 00:08:03,170 --> 00:08:06,420 Well it's the first of a three book offering of Unitarian 136 00:08:06,420 --> 00:08:10,860 Universalist-- it was our Dick and Jane, right? 137 00:08:10,860 --> 00:08:12,690 It was our Dick and Jane. 138 00:08:12,690 --> 00:08:17,160 Fahs said in book the stories were meant to encourage, 139 00:08:17,160 --> 00:08:22,150 in small children, a sensitivity to the intangible values that 140 00:08:22,150 --> 00:08:25,386 are basic to all real living, which deserves 141 00:08:25,386 --> 00:08:32,030 to be characterized as spiritual in quality. 142 00:08:32,030 --> 00:08:34,190 This was a UU catechism. 143 00:08:34,190 --> 00:08:37,178 But instead of responding to a fixed set of questions 144 00:08:37,178 --> 00:08:41,162 by regurgitating the answers, questions 145 00:08:41,162 --> 00:08:43,652 arose from the stories and experience. 146 00:08:43,652 --> 00:08:47,282 And the answers were then searched for. 147 00:08:47,282 --> 00:08:52,738 The emphasis was placed on the child's social and spiritual 148 00:08:52,738 --> 00:08:54,722 experience. 149 00:08:54,722 --> 00:09:04,146 It was religiously non-doctrinal but not culturally neutral. 150 00:09:04,146 --> 00:09:08,114 The kids, the particulars of Martin and Judy's lives 151 00:09:08,114 --> 00:09:12,082 were those of middle-class, Euro Americans living in a suburb, 152 00:09:12,082 --> 00:09:15,330 with father as the breadwinner. 153 00:09:15,330 --> 00:09:17,910 You know, father knows best. 154 00:09:17,910 --> 00:09:22,484 This was the hidden or the null curriculum. 155 00:09:22,484 --> 00:09:25,862 There was also a missing curriculum. 156 00:09:25,862 --> 00:09:28,750 In the original and in its revision in 1944, 157 00:09:28,750 --> 00:09:32,960 everyone was depicted as white, Euro American. 158 00:09:32,960 --> 00:09:37,895 In the 1959 extensive revision, there 159 00:09:37,895 --> 00:09:41,130 is still no black character in the stories. 160 00:09:41,130 --> 00:09:47,915 However, each of the new volumes includes a single boy 161 00:09:47,915 --> 00:09:51,330 with Negro features among the illustrations. 162 00:09:51,330 --> 00:09:56,920 Dick and Jane, in contrast, included Pam and Penny, 163 00:09:56,920 --> 00:10:02,990 African-American twins but not until 1965. 164 00:10:02,990 --> 00:10:06,830 Race, as an issue, was not entirely missing 165 00:10:06,830 --> 00:10:08,400 in the New Beacons Series. 166 00:10:08,400 --> 00:10:14,152 In 1942, in Growing Bigger, Elizabeth Manwell and Fahs 167 00:10:14,152 --> 00:10:15,065 did this. 168 00:10:15,065 --> 00:10:20,335 It was a story entitled "The Engine Dance." 169 00:10:20,335 --> 00:10:25,430 So Roger, the little boy, is accompanying his mother 170 00:10:25,430 --> 00:10:29,442 to nursing school, where she volunteers. 171 00:10:29,442 --> 00:10:33,210 Beforehand, she tells him that many children there 172 00:10:33,210 --> 00:10:36,460 will have dark, brown skin. 173 00:10:36,460 --> 00:10:39,020 Negroes, she calls them. 174 00:10:39,020 --> 00:10:43,090 It stirs Roger's imagination and his curiosity. 175 00:10:43,090 --> 00:10:46,640 That day, the class is take a special trip. 176 00:10:46,640 --> 00:10:49,955 It's to a train station, where one of the children's fathers 177 00:10:49,955 --> 00:10:54,680 is a porter on a Pullman car. 178 00:10:54,680 --> 00:10:56,664 He shows them around. 179 00:10:56,664 --> 00:10:58,155 Roger likes him. 180 00:10:58,155 --> 00:11:02,370 He thinks that perhaps someday he'll be a porter. 181 00:11:02,370 --> 00:11:04,540 In the end, Roger feels that he likes 182 00:11:04,540 --> 00:11:08,524 the boys and girls with the brown skin. 183 00:11:08,524 --> 00:11:11,182 The story is structured so that Roger 184 00:11:11,182 --> 00:11:13,612 learned from the children, who were 185 00:11:13,612 --> 00:11:15,556 both younger than him and Negro. 186 00:11:15,556 --> 00:11:21,420 His message is that you can learn and like anyone. 187 00:11:21,420 --> 00:11:25,510 The "Engine Dance" is an anomaly. 188 00:11:25,510 --> 00:11:29,490 More typical is the drawing of a single black child, 189 00:11:29,490 --> 00:11:33,410 without reference to race or culture. 190 00:11:33,410 --> 00:11:36,350 That's what one finds The Family Finds Out, 191 00:11:36,350 --> 00:11:38,690 a book geared to five and seven-year-olds, 192 00:11:38,690 --> 00:11:40,430 published in 1951. 193 00:11:40,430 --> 00:11:45,591 It was written by Edith Hunter in the style of, 194 00:11:45,591 --> 00:11:48,297 in the spirit of Martin and Judy. 195 00:11:48,297 --> 00:11:52,500 An African-American looking boy appears twice. 196 00:11:52,500 --> 00:11:55,686 His name is either David or Philip. 197 00:11:55,686 --> 00:11:57,530 And he speaks. 198 00:11:57,530 --> 00:12:01,540 However, both times, he's paired with the same little white boy. 199 00:12:01,540 --> 00:12:07,818 And the reader can't tell which boy is which. 200 00:12:07,818 --> 00:12:12,598 In 1954, the AUA Commission on Intergroup Relations, 201 00:12:12,598 --> 00:12:15,040 having evaluated the Association's 202 00:12:15,040 --> 00:12:18,490 educational program vis a vis race relations, 203 00:12:18,490 --> 00:12:22,590 said the open-minded experiential and reasonable 204 00:12:22,590 --> 00:12:28,710 approach to all human relations that we advocate 205 00:12:28,710 --> 00:12:33,005 tend to make for flexible thinking and feeling 206 00:12:33,005 --> 00:12:37,984 and discourage the formation of stereotyped opinions. 207 00:12:37,984 --> 00:12:44,258 Then nine years later, in The Free Church in a Changing 208 00:12:44,258 --> 00:12:47,670 World, the Commission on Education of Liberal Religion 209 00:12:47,670 --> 00:12:50,190 saw it very differently. 210 00:12:50,190 --> 00:12:54,980 One might ask how typical are Martin and Judy or, more 211 00:12:54,980 --> 00:12:56,730 important, how meaningful are they, 212 00:12:56,730 --> 00:12:59,712 in their neat, white house in the suburbs, 213 00:12:59,712 --> 00:13:03,688 to children whose world includes all the blood and thunder as 214 00:13:03,688 --> 00:13:08,658 well as the sophisticated reporting of television. 215 00:13:08,658 --> 00:13:13,520 During that decade, a lot had changed. 216 00:13:13,520 --> 00:13:19,836 So what else was the hidden and missing curriculum? 217 00:13:19,836 --> 00:13:25,237 Well the curricula bias went way beyond Martin and Judy. 218 00:13:25,237 --> 00:13:27,710 It was actually endemic. 219 00:13:27,710 --> 00:13:30,007 Since race is not mentioned in Child 220 00:13:30,007 --> 00:13:34,483 of the Son, Pharoah of Egypt in 1939, Joseph 221 00:13:34,483 --> 00:13:39,870 and the Story of the 12 Brothers published in 1941, Moses, 222 00:13:39,870 --> 00:13:45,380 the Egyptian Prince, Nomad Sheikh, Lawmaker in '42, 223 00:13:45,380 --> 00:13:49,380 or Jesus the Carpenter's Son in '45, 224 00:13:49,380 --> 00:13:54,558 it left the impression that Middle Easterners were white. 225 00:13:54,558 --> 00:14:00,366 Something the illustrations did little to dispel. 226 00:14:00,366 --> 00:14:03,280 Now Africans, however, are not completely absent. 227 00:14:03,280 --> 00:14:05,930 The book From Long Ago And Many Lands 228 00:14:05,930 --> 00:14:08,334 includes three stories from Uganda. 229 00:14:08,334 --> 00:14:13,530 But what about African-Americans? 230 00:14:13,530 --> 00:14:20,690 What about George Washington Carver? 231 00:14:20,690 --> 00:14:24,708 Books written for the older ages likewise 232 00:14:24,708 --> 00:14:28,570 ignore African-American culture. 233 00:14:28,570 --> 00:14:31,540 The Church Across the Street was written 234 00:14:31,540 --> 00:14:36,342 by Reginald Manwell and Sophia Lyon Fahs and came out in 1947. 235 00:14:36,342 --> 00:14:41,062 It was revised, came out again in 1962. 236 00:14:41,062 --> 00:14:44,470 It's a wonderful book designed to familiarize our youth 237 00:14:44,470 --> 00:14:46,704 with other American faith traditions. 238 00:14:46,704 --> 00:14:49,910 It includes the Catholic Church, the Latter Day Saints, 239 00:14:49,910 --> 00:14:53,758 the Baptists, the Society of Friends, and the Methodists. 240 00:14:53,758 --> 00:14:56,580 The chapter on Methodism tells of John Wesley, 241 00:14:56,580 --> 00:14:59,120 spends a lot of time with John Wesley, at length, 242 00:14:59,120 --> 00:15:05,050 before ending with a six-line paragraph about the existence 243 00:15:05,050 --> 00:15:08,254 of the Negro Methodist denominations. 244 00:15:08,254 --> 00:15:11,242 Then they revised it in 1962. 245 00:15:11,242 --> 00:15:18,061 And there is single 12-line paragraph about the African 246 00:15:18,061 --> 00:15:20,959 Methodist Episcopal Church, the African Methodist Episcopal 247 00:15:20,959 --> 00:15:23,870 Zion Church, the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church. 248 00:15:23,870 --> 00:15:29,430 But it fails to tell of Richard Allen. 249 00:15:29,430 --> 00:15:33,795 In 1794, Richard Allen, with the support of Universalist 250 00:15:33,795 --> 00:15:36,705 Benjamin Rush, founded one of the first, independent, 251 00:15:36,705 --> 00:15:38,645 African-American churches, congregations 252 00:15:38,645 --> 00:15:40,650 in the United States. 253 00:15:40,650 --> 00:15:43,770 And in 1816, Allen was elected first bishop 254 00:15:43,770 --> 00:15:48,470 of the AME Church, the first black denomination. 255 00:15:48,470 --> 00:15:52,060 Neither does the curriculum mention the Nation of Islam. 256 00:15:52,060 --> 00:15:53,984 It was founded in, what, 1930. 257 00:15:53,984 --> 00:15:56,912 It was widely known by '62. 258 00:15:56,912 --> 00:15:58,864 When the revised edition appeared-- 259 00:15:58,864 --> 00:16:01,625 and this is quite odd-- indeed, the year before, 260 00:16:01,625 --> 00:16:06,770 1961, Beacon Press had published the first substantial study 261 00:16:06,770 --> 00:16:12,674 of the black Muslims a year before the revision. 262 00:16:12,674 --> 00:16:15,134 But there's no sign of that in here. 263 00:16:15,134 --> 00:16:22,056 In 1962, the UUA also published Unitarianism and Universalism, 264 00:16:22,056 --> 00:16:25,270 an Illustrated History, written for teenagers 265 00:16:25,270 --> 00:16:27,330 by Henry Cheetham. 266 00:16:27,330 --> 00:16:30,274 He was the Director of the AUA Department of Education. 267 00:16:30,274 --> 00:16:34,002 The book does not mention any African-American Unitarians 268 00:16:34,002 --> 00:16:35,910 or Universalists. 269 00:16:35,910 --> 00:16:39,240 The same is true of Those Live Tomorrow, 270 00:16:39,240 --> 00:16:42,084 20 Unitarian Universalist's Biographies. 271 00:16:42,084 --> 00:16:44,928 Moreover, while it includes biographies 272 00:16:44,928 --> 00:16:50,152 of Benjamin Rush, Jenkin Lloyd Jones, John Murray Attwood, 273 00:16:50,152 --> 00:16:52,550 and Clarence Skinner, nowhere does 274 00:16:52,550 --> 00:16:54,980 it mention how outspoken and truly, 275 00:16:54,980 --> 00:17:03,328 truly radical all these men were on racial justice. 276 00:17:03,328 --> 00:17:06,744 Another book for teens, Tensions Our Children Live 277 00:17:06,744 --> 00:17:11,631 With, an anthology of stories raising ethical issues, '59, 278 00:17:11,631 --> 00:17:17,240 does include two stories about racial segregation. 279 00:17:17,240 --> 00:17:19,520 The last book, the very last book 280 00:17:19,520 --> 00:17:21,710 that Fahs wrote for the New Beacon Series 281 00:17:21,710 --> 00:17:26,850 was entitled Worshiping Together with Question Minds. 282 00:17:26,850 --> 00:17:31,740 In it, she devoted four chapters to the life 283 00:17:31,740 --> 00:17:36,160 of George Washington Carver. 284 00:17:36,160 --> 00:17:41,358 Why did it take almost 30 years to begin 285 00:17:41,358 --> 00:17:45,831 to bring racial awareness to Unitarian Universalist 286 00:17:45,831 --> 00:17:47,830 religious education? 287 00:17:47,830 --> 00:17:52,820 Why the inattention to the issue of race throughout the New 288 00:17:52,820 --> 00:17:56,720 Beacon Series? 289 00:17:56,720 --> 00:18:01,975 When, in 1964, the UUA Commission on Religion 290 00:18:01,975 --> 00:18:05,810 and Race-- at first, the UUA Department of Education, 291 00:18:05,810 --> 00:18:08,080 Cheetham, its director, who was then 292 00:18:08,080 --> 00:18:10,260 the author of the illustrated history, 293 00:18:10,260 --> 00:18:13,672 told them that for financial reasons-- probably 294 00:18:13,672 --> 00:18:17,608 you've heard this recently, "for financial reasons--" 295 00:18:17,608 --> 00:18:21,544 the department could not scrap the present stock of books 296 00:18:21,544 --> 00:18:23,940 despite the fact that the text and the illustrations 297 00:18:23,940 --> 00:18:26,550 were-- in his words-- pure white. 298 00:18:26,550 --> 00:18:30,987 But that the new materials will reflect the intercultural, 299 00:18:30,987 --> 00:18:33,945 interracial situations and the issues 300 00:18:33,945 --> 00:18:36,903 of city life, multi-ethnic groups, and poverty 301 00:18:36,903 --> 00:18:43,330 would be featured in contemporary, new materials. 302 00:18:43,330 --> 00:18:46,494 So I think Cheetham was ready with an excuse, 303 00:18:46,494 --> 00:18:48,800 because the challenge had been issued 304 00:18:48,800 --> 00:18:52,740 the year earlier in The Free Church in a Changing World. 305 00:18:52,740 --> 00:18:55,880 It had been observed, in that report, 306 00:18:55,880 --> 00:18:57,802 that our religious education materials tend 307 00:18:57,802 --> 00:19:02,080 to reflect the habits and mores of the urban, suburban 308 00:19:02,080 --> 00:19:05,440 middle-class. 309 00:19:05,440 --> 00:19:09,057 So why hadn't these conversations happened sooner? 310 00:19:09,057 --> 00:19:10,981 I mean why didn't these conversations 311 00:19:10,981 --> 00:19:11,943 happen before then? 312 00:19:11,943 --> 00:19:15,960 I mean looking back from here, in 2014, what is hidden 313 00:19:15,960 --> 00:19:17,445 and what is missing? 314 00:19:17,445 --> 00:19:20,415 Well it's kind of obvious for us. 315 00:19:20,415 --> 00:19:26,585 Not so in 1939, not so in 1954, clearly not even so in 1961. 316 00:19:26,585 --> 00:19:28,624 It was not. 317 00:19:28,624 --> 00:19:33,940 Was this a reflection of liberal religion's cultural myopia? 318 00:19:33,940 --> 00:19:36,750 Was it ignorance of African-American culture? 319 00:19:36,750 --> 00:19:38,545 Or was it indifference? 320 00:19:38,545 --> 00:19:42,460 Or was it disdain? 321 00:19:42,460 --> 00:19:45,620 We can only speculate. 322 00:19:45,620 --> 00:19:51,792 What we can examine is the New Beacon Series itself. 323 00:19:51,792 --> 00:19:54,112 And I've given you but a cursory sense 324 00:19:54,112 --> 00:19:55,880 of what is there and, more importantly, 325 00:19:55,880 --> 00:20:01,324 what was not there. 326 00:20:01,324 --> 00:20:05,810 There is another fact. 327 00:20:05,810 --> 00:20:11,510 There's only a handful of African-Americans 328 00:20:11,510 --> 00:20:14,472 who were professionally engaged in religious education 329 00:20:14,472 --> 00:20:18,850 between 1937 and 1960. 330 00:20:18,850 --> 00:20:21,690 In 1948, the Community Church of New York 331 00:20:21,690 --> 00:20:26,606 hired Maurice Dawkins, a theological student 332 00:20:26,606 --> 00:20:29,965 at Union Theological School, as minister of education. 333 00:20:29,965 --> 00:20:34,010 In 1954, the year Dawkins left for Los Angeles 334 00:20:34,010 --> 00:20:36,980 to become the minister of one of the oldest community 335 00:20:36,980 --> 00:20:40,802 churches in America, William Y. Bell, 336 00:20:40,802 --> 00:20:44,620 Jr. began serving as director of religious education 337 00:20:44,620 --> 00:20:49,230 and social relations with the Council of Liberal Churches. 338 00:20:49,230 --> 00:20:52,800 The CLC was a transitional organization 339 00:20:52,800 --> 00:20:55,825 formed as the Universal Church of America 340 00:20:55,825 --> 00:20:59,246 and the AUA moved toward merger. 341 00:20:59,246 --> 00:21:01,666 His tenure was quite brief. 342 00:21:01,666 --> 00:21:03,118 I think about a year. 343 00:21:03,118 --> 00:21:05,810 Then, in quick succession, Pauline Warfield Lewis 344 00:21:05,810 --> 00:21:09,272 became the DRE in the Unitarian Church in Cincinnati. 345 00:21:09,272 --> 00:21:13,705 In 1956, Bernice Bell Just-- actually 346 00:21:13,705 --> 00:21:17,810 William Bell's daughter-- was hired as the DRE of All Souls, 347 00:21:17,810 --> 00:21:20,280 in DC, in '57. 348 00:21:20,280 --> 00:21:23,860 The Rev. William Jones, the assistant minster DRE, 349 00:21:23,860 --> 00:21:26,380 right here, in First Unitarian Church, in Providence-- 350 00:21:26,380 --> 00:21:27,582 Audience: Yay. [APPLAUSE] 351 00:21:27,582 --> 00:21:30,610 Mark Morrison-reed: --in '58 to '60. 352 00:21:30,610 --> 00:21:34,569 And then Rev. Lewis McGee serves as interim minister 353 00:21:34,569 --> 00:21:38,088 of religious education in Throop Memorial Church, in Pasadena, 354 00:21:38,088 --> 00:21:42,000 during the '63-'64 church year. 355 00:21:42,000 --> 00:21:47,570 Two women, four men, that's it. 356 00:21:47,570 --> 00:21:50,275 Outside this group, the only black professional 357 00:21:50,275 --> 00:21:53,540 to serve the UU Church, the actual denomination, 358 00:21:53,540 --> 00:21:57,560 was the Rev. Eugene Sparrow. 359 00:21:57,560 --> 00:21:59,105 It would be interesting to know. 360 00:21:59,105 --> 00:22:01,910 But I'd love to know what they thought about the New Beacon 361 00:22:01,910 --> 00:22:06,480 Series, which at that point was winding down and coming 362 00:22:06,480 --> 00:22:07,250 to an end. 363 00:22:07,250 --> 00:22:09,356 But given the nature of the positions 364 00:22:09,356 --> 00:22:13,825 and the brevity of some, their input, I doubt, was sought. 365 00:22:13,825 --> 00:22:16,980 I doubt that we'll ever know what they thought. 366 00:22:16,980 --> 00:22:18,480 I mean there's interesting stories-- 367 00:22:18,480 --> 00:22:22,790 we'll talk about them-- attached to most of these settlements. 368 00:22:22,790 --> 00:22:25,525 It is not a surprise the Community Church of New York 369 00:22:25,525 --> 00:22:28,780 was first, white Unitarian or Universal congregation 370 00:22:28,780 --> 00:22:31,140 to hire a black minister. 371 00:22:31,140 --> 00:22:34,400 When Dawkins began to work in the Community Church 1948, 372 00:22:34,400 --> 00:22:37,838 it was a continuation of an effort at integration 373 00:22:37,838 --> 00:22:41,640 that began in 1910. 374 00:22:41,640 --> 00:22:47,240 Pauline Lewis was the DRE when Bill Sinkford began 375 00:22:47,240 --> 00:22:52,490 attending Cincinnati, the congregation, at age 14. 376 00:22:52,490 --> 00:22:59,098 Bill writes, it seemed that as soon as mother and I crossed 377 00:22:59,098 --> 00:23:01,026 the threshold, we were introduced 378 00:23:01,026 --> 00:23:04,896 to the director of religious education, Pauline Warfield 379 00:23:04,896 --> 00:23:10,150 Lewis, an African-American woman of about my mother's age. 380 00:23:10,150 --> 00:23:13,102 When I read the history of the Liberal Religious Educators 381 00:23:13,102 --> 00:23:16,054 Association a few years ago, I was 382 00:23:16,054 --> 00:23:19,006 surprised and pleased to see a picture of Mrs. Lewis 383 00:23:19,006 --> 00:23:22,942 at one of the first LREDA conferences. 384 00:23:22,942 --> 00:23:30,360 What Bill says next is important for us to remember. 385 00:23:30,360 --> 00:23:32,820 I went to the youth group that first Sunday 386 00:23:32,820 --> 00:23:37,408 evening and found that, of the 10 or so young people 387 00:23:37,408 --> 00:23:42,230 in the group, four were African-American. 388 00:23:42,230 --> 00:23:44,569 This church was clearly a place where 389 00:23:44,569 --> 00:23:50,098 it was acceptable to be black in the company of whites. 390 00:23:50,098 --> 00:23:53,374 When I say I found my religious home that day, 391 00:23:53,374 --> 00:23:58,488 the presence of that easy, unforced, natural-seeming 392 00:23:58,488 --> 00:24:01,932 diversity was a huge element. 393 00:24:01,932 --> 00:24:06,360 For persons of color to check out a Unitarian Universalist 394 00:24:06,360 --> 00:24:10,296 church where there are no dark faces or varied 395 00:24:10,296 --> 00:24:16,350 hue, the decision to come again, let alone the decision to stay, 396 00:24:16,350 --> 00:24:22,128 must be far more difficult, let alone the [INAUDIBLE]. 397 00:24:22,128 --> 00:24:26,874 But how can you be at home when everyone else in the room 398 00:24:26,874 --> 00:24:27,846 is white? 399 00:24:27,846 --> 00:24:31,734 Are you willing to sign up to be a token? 400 00:24:31,734 --> 00:24:34,407 To have one of the religious professionals at the church 401 00:24:34,407 --> 00:24:40,010 be a person of color said volumes. 402 00:24:40,010 --> 00:24:45,480 Bernice Just was also at an early LREDA conference, 403 00:24:45,480 --> 00:24:46,910 that same one. 404 00:24:46,910 --> 00:24:50,030 Notably, she came from All Souls Church, 405 00:24:50,030 --> 00:24:53,774 in DC, where the minister, A. Powell Davies, was outspoken, 406 00:24:53,774 --> 00:24:57,500 and an outspoken radical in his faith, 407 00:24:57,500 --> 00:25:01,960 fighting the racial segregation in Washington DC. 408 00:25:01,960 --> 00:25:05,862 And then in 1958, we had Bill Jones. 409 00:25:05,862 --> 00:25:10,160 His settlement in Providence fits the pattern. 410 00:25:10,160 --> 00:25:12,861 That is how black, male ministers were first 411 00:25:12,861 --> 00:25:15,350 placed in white congregations. 412 00:25:15,350 --> 00:25:19,512 Maurice Dawkins in '48, then a failed attempt 413 00:25:19,512 --> 00:25:22,440 in 1950, when Eugene Sparrow, who candidated 414 00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:26,242 as the assistant minister in Detroit, where he would 415 00:25:26,242 --> 00:25:28,200 have been responsible for what? 416 00:25:28,200 --> 00:25:32,314 Youth work and campus ministry. 417 00:25:32,314 --> 00:25:35,248 Take note, the first African-American religious 418 00:25:35,248 --> 00:25:38,810 professionals hired by white churches and the denomination, 419 00:25:38,810 --> 00:25:43,290 Dawkins, Bell, Lewis, Just, Jones, all, 420 00:25:43,290 --> 00:25:46,176 everyone of them carried which portfolio? 421 00:25:46,176 --> 00:25:50,500 The religious education portfolio. 422 00:25:50,500 --> 00:25:54,140 What does this suggest? 423 00:25:54,140 --> 00:25:58,962 Is it that religious education is seen as ancillary and thus 424 00:25:58,962 --> 00:26:07,818 is an acceptable arena for black leadership? 425 00:26:07,818 --> 00:26:13,240 Behind this story of paucity is one of resistance. 426 00:26:13,240 --> 00:26:16,172 When, in 1947, Pauline McCoo, when 427 00:26:16,172 --> 00:26:18,662 she was at teacher's college in Chicago, 428 00:26:18,662 --> 00:26:21,152 was teaching Sunday school in First Unitarian 429 00:26:21,152 --> 00:26:25,550 Society of Chicago and wished to join the congregation, 430 00:26:25,550 --> 00:26:28,710 this young, black woman precipitated a showdown 431 00:26:28,710 --> 00:26:32,133 in the board about open membership. 432 00:26:32,133 --> 00:26:34,488 In 1950, in Detroit, the congregation 433 00:26:34,488 --> 00:26:38,734 voted against calling Eugene Sparrow. 434 00:26:38,734 --> 00:26:43,126 In a sermon delivered in Framingham, in 1970, 435 00:26:43,126 --> 00:26:46,542 Charles Ames tells of an incident a few years earlier 436 00:26:46,542 --> 00:26:49,640 in which an applicant to teach in the First Parish's 437 00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:52,890 nursery-kindergarten school was turned away. 438 00:26:52,890 --> 00:26:56,285 The individual was, quote, more eminently qualified 439 00:26:56,285 --> 00:26:58,230 than the white teacher who was hired. 440 00:26:58,230 --> 00:27:00,010 But the person responsible, who was not 441 00:27:00,010 --> 00:27:01,638 a member of the congregation yet, 442 00:27:01,638 --> 00:27:04,078 claimed that the black teacher would not 443 00:27:04,078 --> 00:27:09,450 fit in with the other staff. 444 00:27:09,450 --> 00:27:13,915 Too late, it was brought to his attention. 445 00:27:13,915 --> 00:27:18,060 Such stories are actually quite hard to come by, gang. 446 00:27:18,060 --> 00:27:22,820 People would rather forget than retell them. 447 00:27:22,820 --> 00:27:26,180 Not fit in was the excuse in Framingham. 448 00:27:26,180 --> 00:27:32,910 Not ready, they said that in Detroit and many other places. 449 00:27:32,910 --> 00:27:35,980 These very blatant examples. 450 00:27:35,980 --> 00:27:38,930 What happened in regard to the New Beacon Series, 451 00:27:38,930 --> 00:27:42,920 though, where we started, was more subtle. 452 00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:46,794 Hymn books used in the UU religious education program 453 00:27:46,794 --> 00:27:48,780 are a good example. 454 00:27:48,780 --> 00:27:52,120 So there was a Martin and Judy Songs. 455 00:27:52,120 --> 00:27:54,910 It was published in 1948. 456 00:27:54,910 --> 00:27:58,210 Fahs writes in the introduction, many religious songs 457 00:27:58,210 --> 00:28:01,810 taught to young children are out of harmony 458 00:28:01,810 --> 00:28:06,860 with a modern, intelligent approach to life. 459 00:28:06,860 --> 00:28:10,900 The songs it contains are largely European or English 460 00:28:10,900 --> 00:28:15,230 but there are also two songs, each, from Japan, [INAUDIBLE], 461 00:28:15,230 --> 00:28:17,124 one from Brazil. 462 00:28:17,124 --> 00:28:19,564 There are also 20 drawings. 463 00:28:19,564 --> 00:28:23,470 One of them is of a little Japanese girl. 464 00:28:23,470 --> 00:28:27,498 This song book is in line with the other works in the New 465 00:28:27,498 --> 00:28:28,474 Beacon Series. 466 00:28:28,474 --> 00:28:33,120 That is it's culturally diverse in a kind of anthropologic kind 467 00:28:33,120 --> 00:28:36,830 of way but offers no songs-- it's stunning, actually, 468 00:28:36,830 --> 00:28:43,841 when you think about it-- from the musical heritage ot 469 00:28:43,841 --> 00:28:47,110 African-Americans. 470 00:28:47,110 --> 00:28:52,941 In 1955, Vincent Silliman compiled We Sing the Life. 471 00:28:52,941 --> 00:28:55,316 You've got some of these lying around your congregations, 472 00:28:55,316 --> 00:28:56,670 I'm sure. 473 00:28:56,670 --> 00:28:59,140 Published by the Ethical Cultural Society, 474 00:28:59,140 --> 00:29:02,110 it was widely used in our children's program. 475 00:29:02,110 --> 00:29:05,610 And it did include two African-American spirituals, 476 00:29:05,610 --> 00:29:09,480 "Go Down Moses" and "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child." 477 00:29:09,480 --> 00:29:12,275 And I have talked long enough, so you guys 478 00:29:12,275 --> 00:29:13,766 are going to get to sing now. 479 00:29:13,766 --> 00:29:15,992 "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child." 480 00:29:15,992 --> 00:29:16,824 Can you read that? 481 00:29:16,824 --> 00:29:17,288 Audience: Yeah. 482 00:29:17,288 --> 00:29:19,788 Mark Morrison-reed: "Sometimes I feel like have no friends," 483 00:29:19,788 --> 00:29:21,470 and all well start, OK? 484 00:29:21,470 --> 00:31:26,530 [SINGING "SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE A MOTHERLESS CHILD"] 485 00:31:26,530 --> 00:31:31,076 Mark Morrison-reed: In 1957, a joint hymn book commission, 486 00:31:31,076 --> 00:31:36,775 composed of Unitarians and Universalists, was formed. 487 00:31:36,775 --> 00:31:39,680 Vincent Silliman, remember. 488 00:31:39,680 --> 00:31:43,951 When Hymns for the Celebration of Life came out in 1964 489 00:31:43,951 --> 00:31:52,825 it included not one spiritual, not one gospel, not 490 00:31:52,825 --> 00:32:00,713 even a reading by an African-American, nothing. 491 00:32:00,713 --> 00:32:04,164 1964, how? 492 00:32:04,164 --> 00:32:05,150 How? 493 00:32:05,150 --> 00:32:08,640 How is this possible? 494 00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:13,633 Well, Vincent Silliman was raised in Minnesota. 495 00:32:13,633 --> 00:32:17,750 He spent much, not all, but much of his ministry in Maine. 496 00:32:17,750 --> 00:32:20,238 While his exposure to African-American culture 497 00:32:20,238 --> 00:32:25,158 was limited, it was not entirely unfamiliar with 498 00:32:25,158 --> 00:32:28,410 or unsympathetic with the cause. 499 00:32:28,410 --> 00:32:31,375 Silliman knew Egbert Ethelred Brown, 500 00:32:31,375 --> 00:32:34,177 who ministered in Harlem from 1920 to 1956. 501 00:32:34,177 --> 00:32:38,130 He actually had him preach in Hollis. 502 00:32:38,130 --> 00:32:39,120 And this is incredible. 503 00:32:39,120 --> 00:32:40,605 Before I read that. 504 00:32:40,605 --> 00:32:44,070 He's got an autographed copy of Langston Hughes book 505 00:32:44,070 --> 00:32:48,030 of poetry, Freedom's Plow, inscribed to, for who? 506 00:32:48,030 --> 00:32:50,505 For Vincent Silliman. 507 00:32:50,505 --> 00:32:54,415 He can compile We Sing of Life, and he 508 00:32:54,415 --> 00:32:59,788 had AME hymnals in his library. 509 00:32:59,788 --> 00:33:01,764 Other commission members had connections 510 00:33:01,764 --> 00:33:03,740 to the black community, too. 511 00:33:03,740 --> 00:33:06,704 The chair of the commission, Arthur Foote, 512 00:33:06,704 --> 00:33:10,162 had worked alongside the Rev. Howard Thurman 513 00:33:10,162 --> 00:33:14,030 on the AUA Commission on Intergroup Relations. 514 00:33:14,030 --> 00:33:18,850 Thurman was Martin Luther King Jr.'s mentor. 515 00:33:18,850 --> 00:33:23,210 He was also a prolific writer, a longstanding relationship 516 00:33:23,210 --> 00:33:25,640 to Unitarian Universalism. 517 00:33:25,640 --> 00:33:26,960 Well, you will Tagore. 518 00:33:26,960 --> 00:33:28,840 You'll find Lao-tze. 519 00:33:28,840 --> 00:33:31,190 You'll find Gibran. 520 00:33:31,190 --> 00:33:34,782 You'll find Gandhi. 521 00:33:34,782 --> 00:33:39,264 You will not come across Thurman in Hymns 522 00:33:39,264 --> 00:33:40,758 for the Celebration of Life. 523 00:33:40,758 --> 00:33:46,236 It is a stunning omission, a truly stunning omission. 524 00:33:46,236 --> 00:33:53,210 His daughter was working for the UUA-- a stunning omission. 525 00:33:53,210 --> 00:33:56,725 White privilege. 526 00:33:56,725 --> 00:33:58,756 White privilege. 527 00:33:58,756 --> 00:33:59,672 You know what it does? 528 00:33:59,672 --> 00:34:03,818 It actually narrows Caucasians' world view is what it does. 529 00:34:03,818 --> 00:34:08,300 Those who compile the hymn book, I mean, these were good people. 530 00:34:08,300 --> 00:34:10,781 Chris Moore, my choir director, who 531 00:34:10,781 --> 00:34:13,280 started the original Chicago Children's Choir, was a member. 532 00:34:13,280 --> 00:34:15,272 These were good people, committed 533 00:34:15,272 --> 00:34:19,754 to living their values and in favor of racial justice. 534 00:34:19,754 --> 00:34:22,244 There's no question about that, about any of them. 535 00:34:22,244 --> 00:34:26,726 But they lived inside a Euro-American cultural 536 00:34:26,726 --> 00:34:27,722 hegemony. 537 00:34:27,722 --> 00:34:32,684 I mean privilege, it engenders blindness. 538 00:34:32,684 --> 00:34:35,760 From inside this cultural bubble, 539 00:34:35,760 --> 00:34:38,423 they couldn't imagine African-Americans, 540 00:34:38,423 --> 00:34:42,609 who were coming in increasing numbers into our congregation, 541 00:34:42,609 --> 00:34:45,554 because usually we were such visible allies in the areas 542 00:34:45,554 --> 00:34:48,344 of fair housing, equal access. 543 00:34:48,344 --> 00:34:49,971 They couldn't figure out that they 544 00:34:49,971 --> 00:34:54,356 might like to have their culture reflected in UU worship. 545 00:34:54,356 --> 00:34:57,210 Nor did it occur to them that Euro-Americans 546 00:34:57,210 --> 00:34:59,540 would profit as much from hearing 547 00:34:59,540 --> 00:35:03,070 Howard Thurman, Langston Hughes, who did one 548 00:35:03,070 --> 00:35:06,737 his first public readings at the Community Church of New 549 00:35:06,737 --> 00:35:12,588 York, as from Vera Parker, [INAUDIBLE]. 550 00:35:12,588 --> 00:35:17,025 Examine Hymns for the Spirit, published in 1934. 551 00:35:17,025 --> 00:35:18,504 Hymns for the Celebration of Life 552 00:35:18,504 --> 00:35:21,792 was '64, Singing the Living Tradition, 553 00:35:21,792 --> 00:35:24,600 '93, Singing the Journey. 554 00:35:24,600 --> 00:35:27,020 And you can see, there's an evolution. 555 00:35:27,020 --> 00:35:28,472 Well, you can see the evolution. 556 00:35:28,472 --> 00:35:31,860 As hymn meanings changed with each generation, 557 00:35:31,860 --> 00:35:35,900 each commission had to wrestle with what to keep 558 00:35:35,900 --> 00:35:39,866 and what to introduce. 559 00:35:39,866 --> 00:35:42,860 How much Bible? 560 00:35:42,860 --> 00:35:45,390 What about humanism? 561 00:35:45,390 --> 00:35:52,550 Keep the amens or not? 562 00:35:52,550 --> 00:35:56,136 They could not go too far. 563 00:35:56,136 --> 00:35:59,094 They could not get far from the collective comfort 564 00:35:59,094 --> 00:36:03,038 level of our congregations if they expected the hymn book 565 00:36:03,038 --> 00:36:06,920 to be adopted and the hymns to be sung. 566 00:36:06,920 --> 00:36:10,090 And even though it was published a decade ago, 567 00:36:10,090 --> 00:36:12,510 it's routine for me in my speaking. 568 00:36:12,510 --> 00:36:14,930 There are congregations that have 569 00:36:14,930 --> 00:36:17,990 chosen not to buy Singing the Journey 570 00:36:17,990 --> 00:36:20,480 and insist that I choose readings 571 00:36:20,480 --> 00:36:24,132 from Singing the Living Tradition. 572 00:36:24,132 --> 00:36:28,524 The dynamic, I think, in the UU religious education 573 00:36:28,524 --> 00:36:30,964 world-- that's what I'm telling you-- 574 00:36:30,964 --> 00:36:34,380 it must have been similar, must have been parallel. 575 00:36:34,380 --> 00:36:36,332 Fahs' commitment to multiculturalism 576 00:36:36,332 --> 00:36:40,620 and child-centered religious education was progressive. 577 00:36:40,620 --> 00:36:49,990 Despite that, the pace of change in regard to race was glacial. 578 00:36:49,990 --> 00:36:53,490 A few illustrations and no histories 579 00:36:53,490 --> 00:36:56,490 that mention anyone of color. 580 00:36:56,490 --> 00:36:58,490 I mean, actually this is not surprising. 581 00:36:58,490 --> 00:37:02,700 There was no scholarship, none. 582 00:37:02,700 --> 00:37:04,800 It did not exist. 583 00:37:04,800 --> 00:37:07,056 So there's no resource for anyone to turn to. 584 00:37:07,056 --> 00:37:10,550 If given the concern was civil rights, 585 00:37:10,550 --> 00:37:13,300 there was mounting-- I mean, what explains this? 586 00:37:13,300 --> 00:37:15,750 Was it indifference? 587 00:37:15,750 --> 00:37:18,200 Or was it inertia? 588 00:37:18,200 --> 00:37:22,452 Or was it ignorance? 589 00:37:22,452 --> 00:37:25,700 I mean ignorance, however, doesn't explain 590 00:37:25,700 --> 00:37:29,830 why it took nearly 30 years, till the end of the series, 591 00:37:29,830 --> 00:37:32,553 till the end of her career for Fahs 592 00:37:32,553 --> 00:37:36,550 to produce something about George Washington Carver, when 593 00:37:36,550 --> 00:37:41,863 she had written the program in 1936. 594 00:37:41,863 --> 00:37:46,036 It's a stunning thing to know that she had written program 595 00:37:46,036 --> 00:37:51,192 and that poem in '36 and it did not appear until, I think, '66. 596 00:37:51,192 --> 00:37:53,647 How is that possible? 597 00:37:53,647 --> 00:37:56,102 It's just one of these mysteries. 598 00:37:56,102 --> 00:37:59,201 I mean were the authors afraid that Euro-Americans would not 599 00:37:59,201 --> 00:38:03,298 be interested in African-American culture, would 600 00:38:03,298 --> 00:38:09,570 find it irrelevant, or perhaps even offensive? 601 00:38:09,570 --> 00:38:12,960 As UU engagement in the civil rights movement grew, 602 00:38:12,960 --> 00:38:18,381 how was race and racial justice to be introduced? 603 00:38:18,381 --> 00:38:21,832 There were a thousand, thousand little decisions 604 00:38:21,832 --> 00:38:27,255 made by well-meaning individuals that left what had, 605 00:38:27,255 --> 00:38:32,185 at its onset, been a revolutionary approach mired 606 00:38:32,185 --> 00:38:36,129 in the habits and mores of white, urban, suburban 607 00:38:36,129 --> 00:38:40,580 middle-class. 608 00:38:40,580 --> 00:38:44,080 There was an exception. 609 00:38:44,080 --> 00:38:49,380 The program had nothing to do with the New Beacon Series. 610 00:38:49,380 --> 00:38:53,253 For decades, the American Friendship Program 611 00:38:53,253 --> 00:38:58,520 was disseminated by the General Sunday School Association 612 00:38:58,520 --> 00:39:01,002 of the Universalist Sunday schools, the Sunday 613 00:39:01,002 --> 00:39:02,970 Universalist Sunday schools. 614 00:39:02,970 --> 00:39:07,682 The program, from January 26 to February 16, 1947, 615 00:39:07,682 --> 00:39:09,223 said-- I want you to listen carefully 616 00:39:09,223 --> 00:39:13,167 to what the Universalists were saying-- 617 00:39:13,167 --> 00:39:17,604 our purpose for the American Friendship Program is 618 00:39:17,604 --> 00:39:20,069 to recognize the worth of individuals 619 00:39:20,069 --> 00:39:25,730 as persons, to appreciate Negro people and their contributions 620 00:39:25,730 --> 00:39:29,132 to our country's life, to become acquainted 621 00:39:29,132 --> 00:39:32,534 with the work of our Church among the Negros, 622 00:39:32,534 --> 00:39:37,420 to do something to foster better race relations. 623 00:39:37,420 --> 00:39:42,076 So it then focuses on the work of Universal Church of America 624 00:39:42,076 --> 00:39:46,710 had been doing in Virginia since 1889. 625 00:39:46,710 --> 00:39:53,920 The publicity. 626 00:39:53,920 --> 00:39:56,838 The publicity given the Suffolk School, 627 00:39:56,838 --> 00:40:00,662 through the Sunday schools of this Universalist church 628 00:40:00,662 --> 00:40:04,040 prompted lots of hands-on kinds of engagement. 629 00:40:04,040 --> 00:40:07,620 Children saved their pennies, their nickels. 630 00:40:07,620 --> 00:40:09,066 They sent them books. 631 00:40:09,066 --> 00:40:10,512 They sent writing materials. 632 00:40:10,512 --> 00:40:13,420 Some of them went to visit. 633 00:40:13,420 --> 00:40:18,630 You will find nothing like it in the Unitarians, nothing, 634 00:40:18,630 --> 00:40:20,830 no equivalent in the Unitarians. 635 00:40:20,830 --> 00:40:24,660 After the merger, it was shunted aside. 636 00:40:24,660 --> 00:40:28,660 And they let the relationship die. 637 00:40:28,660 --> 00:40:34,086 Another, in this case, not so little decision. 638 00:40:34,086 --> 00:40:36,526 So this raises a question. 639 00:40:36,526 --> 00:40:39,454 Whether it raises it or not, I'm going to pursue one. 640 00:40:39,454 --> 00:40:42,835 Given the dearth of anything about African-American culture 641 00:40:42,835 --> 00:40:46,500 in the New Beacon Series and the scant educational resources 642 00:40:46,500 --> 00:40:50,010 addressing the issues of race and racial justice, how 643 00:40:50,010 --> 00:40:55,580 then do we explain why so many UU youth raised in the '50s 644 00:40:55,580 --> 00:41:02,596 participated in the 1964 Mississippi Summer Program? 645 00:41:02,596 --> 00:41:05,400 I mean, you know, over 1,000 young people 646 00:41:05,400 --> 00:41:08,510 went South to do voter registration. 647 00:41:08,510 --> 00:41:12,460 Among them-- and you know, right-- Andrew Goodman, 648 00:41:12,460 --> 00:41:16,110 who, with the core organizer Michael Schwerner and James 649 00:41:16,110 --> 00:41:17,426 Chaney, were murdered. 650 00:41:17,426 --> 00:41:20,950 Well among them were five Unitarian ministers 651 00:41:20,950 --> 00:41:28,070 and at least 35 UU youths. 652 00:41:28,070 --> 00:41:33,460 First, UU youth, this is the list of who we know that went. 653 00:41:33,460 --> 00:41:36,610 UU youth were following the cultural currents 654 00:41:36,610 --> 00:41:38,450 of that moment. 655 00:41:38,450 --> 00:41:42,415 Cathy Cade-- Cathy's name is up there-- wrote, 656 00:41:42,415 --> 00:41:47,662 I attended the Memphis Unitarian Church and youth group. 657 00:41:47,662 --> 00:41:49,525 The church happened to be across the street 658 00:41:49,525 --> 00:41:52,450 from my segregated high school. 659 00:41:52,450 --> 00:41:54,480 At the Unitarian church, I found support 660 00:41:54,480 --> 00:41:57,090 for my integrationist ideas. 661 00:41:57,090 --> 00:42:00,640 The world was changing and they were changing with it. 662 00:42:00,640 --> 00:42:05,750 But where did those ideas come from? 663 00:42:05,750 --> 00:42:10,190 Second, such engagement actually was not new. 664 00:42:10,190 --> 00:42:14,915 In 1947, 55 members of the American Unitarian Youth Mohawk 665 00:42:14,915 --> 00:42:21,330 Valley Federation participated at a work camp near Syracuse 666 00:42:21,330 --> 00:42:25,008 with a group of Negro young people. 667 00:42:25,008 --> 00:42:29,060 In that same year and in 1951, the Unitarian Service Committee 668 00:42:29,060 --> 00:42:32,286 run a summer project in Harlem for college students. 669 00:42:32,286 --> 00:42:36,158 In 1952, they did the same thing for high school students 670 00:42:36,158 --> 00:42:37,126 in Harlem. 671 00:42:37,126 --> 00:42:40,998 They also ran a work camp in the Interracial Highlander Folk 672 00:42:40,998 --> 00:42:43,920 School in Tennessee. 673 00:42:43,920 --> 00:42:46,970 During the 1950s, the Universal Service Committee 674 00:42:46,970 --> 00:42:52,350 ran a Wold Citizenship Camp for junior high school 675 00:42:52,350 --> 00:42:55,110 youth in Upstate New York. 676 00:42:55,110 --> 00:42:57,645 And 3 of the 15 campers were African-American, 677 00:42:57,645 --> 00:43:04,146 while others came from South America and Japan. 678 00:43:04,146 --> 00:43:07,520 Third and most importantly, if they were actually 679 00:43:07,520 --> 00:43:09,448 following their parents and their ministers 680 00:43:09,448 --> 00:43:13,170 and then taking it a step further? 681 00:43:13,170 --> 00:43:16,530 Preaching in 1951, Chuck Gaines said, 682 00:43:16,530 --> 00:43:19,510 we were active in organizing fair housing, 683 00:43:19,510 --> 00:43:25,312 in the fair housing community in Framingham over 10 years ago. 684 00:43:25,312 --> 00:43:27,520 I can't tell you how many congregations 685 00:43:27,520 --> 00:43:32,850 were doing that sort of thing, Barnstable, Maine, Marshfield, 686 00:43:32,850 --> 00:43:37,630 Mass., Main Line, Pennsylvania, Ridgewood, New Jersey, 687 00:43:37,630 --> 00:43:44,027 Deerfield, Illinois, Kansas City, Kansas, Denver, Colorado, 688 00:43:44,027 --> 00:43:44,860 Hayward, California. 689 00:43:44,860 --> 00:43:48,452 The list goes on and on, many, many, many. 690 00:43:48,452 --> 00:43:51,674 They were taking leads in organizing for open housing. 691 00:43:51,674 --> 00:43:58,506 However, Unitarian Universalists understood civil rights, 692 00:43:58,506 --> 00:44:03,466 quite naturally, through the optics of privilege. 693 00:44:03,466 --> 00:44:08,211 As middle-class Euro-American suburbanites, 694 00:44:08,211 --> 00:44:09,985 they expected to what? 695 00:44:09,985 --> 00:44:14,100 To be able to live where they wanted, to go to school 696 00:44:14,100 --> 00:44:17,685 where they wanted, to eat where it suited them, to vote, 697 00:44:17,685 --> 00:44:19,794 and to be employed in an occupation 698 00:44:19,794 --> 00:44:24,240 commensurate with their education. 699 00:44:24,240 --> 00:44:27,674 It was clearly an injustice that African-Americans could not 700 00:44:27,674 --> 00:44:30,820 do likewise. 701 00:44:30,820 --> 00:44:38,560 But was it more a matter of fairness and compassion, 702 00:44:38,560 --> 00:44:46,072 more about the law rather than being in relationship, 703 00:44:46,072 --> 00:44:52,190 about doing for rather than doing with? 704 00:44:52,190 --> 00:44:55,416 Is this what the UU youth noticed? 705 00:44:55,416 --> 00:44:58,320 Did they also notice the hypocrisy 706 00:44:58,320 --> 00:45:01,597 of living in white suburbs in order 707 00:45:01,597 --> 00:45:06,096 to send their children to white schools, 708 00:45:06,096 --> 00:45:12,984 to partake of privilege while decrying the system as unjust? 709 00:45:12,984 --> 00:45:20,856 And seeing how hypocrisy worked, how could they not go south? 710 00:45:20,856 --> 00:45:26,268 As an educational venue, church school is auxiliary. 711 00:45:26,268 --> 00:45:30,210 It supports the members [INAUDIBLE] and parents. 712 00:45:30,210 --> 00:45:33,170 Perhaps the way to frame the question is, 713 00:45:33,170 --> 00:45:36,808 how was the New Beacon Series reinforcing what 714 00:45:36,808 --> 00:45:43,410 was being learned at home and seen in society? 715 00:45:43,410 --> 00:45:48,810 Without casting blame, the reality is Fahs 716 00:45:48,810 --> 00:45:53,458 and her colleagues were on the cutting edge of developing 717 00:45:53,458 --> 00:46:00,070 religious education programs, but not in regard to race. 718 00:46:00,070 --> 00:46:02,884 The series is a testament to how difficult 719 00:46:02,884 --> 00:46:08,810 it is when one lives inside a particular cultural milieu, 720 00:46:08,810 --> 00:46:14,165 to see one's self freed of one's bubble. 721 00:46:14,165 --> 00:46:17,997 As Susan Lawrence said, recognizing or even welcoming 722 00:46:17,997 --> 00:46:21,560 a changing world does not necessarily equip or qualify 723 00:46:21,560 --> 00:46:26,842 someone to shepherd that change, even if they deeply 724 00:46:26,842 --> 00:46:29,668 want to do so. 725 00:46:29,668 --> 00:46:32,494 So how do children raised in these programs, 726 00:46:32,494 --> 00:46:35,673 in the '40s and '50s, become the change 727 00:46:35,673 --> 00:46:39,770 agents of the '60s and the '70s? 728 00:46:39,770 --> 00:46:42,006 What did they experience there that 729 00:46:42,006 --> 00:46:49,250 might later inform their activism? 730 00:46:49,250 --> 00:46:55,780 1960, Vincent Silliman delivered a paper to the Prairie Group. 731 00:46:55,780 --> 00:46:57,590 It's a ministers' study group. 732 00:46:57,590 --> 00:47:01,750 The topic, which was assigned to Silliman, was this. 733 00:47:01,750 --> 00:47:04,520 Love as taught by the liberal churches 734 00:47:04,520 --> 00:47:10,360 in the Beacon Press publications religious education. 735 00:47:10,360 --> 00:47:16,120 So he begins his paper by turning to the Prophet Hosea, 736 00:47:16,120 --> 00:47:21,260 then to Jesus, then, later, to Hosea Ballou, the Universalist, 737 00:47:21,260 --> 00:47:24,730 and then most particularly to the words of William Ellery 738 00:47:24,730 --> 00:47:28,118 Channing, his discourse pronounced before the Sunday 739 00:47:28,118 --> 00:47:34,666 School Society, "The Great End in Religious Instruction." 740 00:47:34,666 --> 00:47:36,040 [INAUDIBLE]. 741 00:47:36,040 --> 00:47:39,350 In these, he grounds his thesis that the genius 742 00:47:39,350 --> 00:47:42,895 of the liberal church is love. 743 00:47:42,895 --> 00:47:47,080 Silliman then turns to Fahs' experiential approach 744 00:47:47,080 --> 00:47:50,560 to religious education before reviewing the New Beacon 745 00:47:50,560 --> 00:47:55,420 Series beginning Long Ago And Many Lands, Martin 746 00:47:55,420 --> 00:47:58,210 and Judy, Church Across the Street. 747 00:47:58,210 --> 00:48:02,552 He says the beginnings was meant to stimulate respect 748 00:48:02,552 --> 00:48:06,284 for the different the people who created the stories. 749 00:48:06,284 --> 00:48:10,076 And this kind of respect is one ingredient 750 00:48:10,076 --> 00:48:13,252 in every kind of love through which 751 00:48:13,252 --> 00:48:16,626 our outlook and the concerns of religious liberals 752 00:48:16,626 --> 00:48:18,554 are expressed. 753 00:48:18,554 --> 00:48:23,374 The stories of diverse peoples in Long Ago And Many Lands 754 00:48:23,374 --> 00:48:27,670 have to do with loves and their meanings. 755 00:48:27,670 --> 00:48:29,230 And The Church Across the Street, 756 00:48:29,230 --> 00:48:33,220 he writes the motive is understanding, 757 00:48:33,220 --> 00:48:36,570 an ingredient of mature love of any sort. 758 00:48:36,570 --> 00:48:39,200 In each, he saw a different aspect, 759 00:48:39,200 --> 00:48:43,565 a different manifestation of love. 760 00:48:43,565 --> 00:48:49,870 Now Mr. Silliman's analysis helps us. 761 00:48:49,870 --> 00:48:53,415 His essay, like the curricula, speaks 762 00:48:53,415 --> 00:48:56,130 neither of African-Americans nor or race 763 00:48:56,130 --> 00:48:58,436 nor of racial injustice. 764 00:48:58,436 --> 00:49:05,550 This suggests it was not the content but the process, 765 00:49:05,550 --> 00:49:08,860 the layer undergirded the young UU youths 766 00:49:08,860 --> 00:49:12,142 who engaged in civil rights struggle. 767 00:49:12,142 --> 00:49:15,670 Marshall Mcluhan's adage comes to mind. 768 00:49:15,670 --> 00:49:16,620 What is it? 769 00:49:16,620 --> 00:49:19,944 It's the medium is the message. 770 00:49:19,944 --> 00:49:25,110 This is to say the New Beacon Series educational model was 771 00:49:25,110 --> 00:49:31,530 even less about its content than its creators imagined. 772 00:49:31,530 --> 00:49:34,842 Whether Biblical or multicultural or commonplace, 773 00:49:34,842 --> 00:49:37,340 it did not matter. 774 00:49:37,340 --> 00:49:41,035 The overt messages were drawn from everyday life 775 00:49:41,035 --> 00:49:43,080 and from faraway cultures. 776 00:49:43,080 --> 00:49:46,320 The hidden messages, reinforced notions 777 00:49:46,320 --> 00:49:49,810 about the domestic role of women and the understanding 778 00:49:49,810 --> 00:49:54,760 that the normal life is lived in white, middle-class suburbs. 779 00:49:54,760 --> 00:49:59,170 The missing was anything about African-Americans 780 00:49:59,170 --> 00:50:03,642 not to mention Hispanics. 781 00:50:03,642 --> 00:50:08,217 But behind the overt, hidden, and missing messages 782 00:50:08,217 --> 00:50:15,390 was a process, a child-centered, open, multicultural, engaging, 783 00:50:15,390 --> 00:50:20,774 probing, respectful process the Commission on Intergroup 784 00:50:20,774 --> 00:50:25,694 Relations had described as an open-minded, experiential, and 785 00:50:25,694 --> 00:50:29,630 reasonable approach to all human relations that 786 00:50:29,630 --> 00:50:34,415 tends to make for flexibility in thinking and feeling 787 00:50:34,415 --> 00:50:42,870 and to discourage the formation of stereotyped opinions. 788 00:50:42,870 --> 00:50:46,215 Silliman's assignment was to speak 789 00:50:46,215 --> 00:50:50,590 about love in religious education. 790 00:50:50,590 --> 00:50:56,975 Calling love the golden strand running through Unitarianism 791 00:50:56,975 --> 00:51:01,340 and Universalism he said, this golden strand again 792 00:51:01,340 --> 00:51:04,770 bright in modern theories, which declare that education 793 00:51:04,770 --> 00:51:07,420 is primarily concerned with the child 794 00:51:07,420 --> 00:51:13,990 and only secondarily, only secondarily, only secondarily 795 00:51:13,990 --> 00:51:17,195 with the body of material which the child is 796 00:51:17,195 --> 00:51:19,912 expected to receive and master. 797 00:51:19,912 --> 00:51:24,360 It is in this concern with the child 798 00:51:24,360 --> 00:51:28,738 that the golden strand is seen. 799 00:51:28,738 --> 00:51:34,380 This process, in emphasizing relationship over content, 800 00:51:34,380 --> 00:51:36,650 nurtured children whose inquisitive minds 801 00:51:36,650 --> 00:51:39,870 were encouraged to question. 802 00:51:39,870 --> 00:51:44,380 Affirmed through questioning, they questioned the status quo. 803 00:51:44,380 --> 00:51:46,740 These were children who developed empathy 804 00:51:46,740 --> 00:51:51,400 in reading about other peoples and other cultures. 805 00:51:51,400 --> 00:51:54,630 Were they bothered by the incongruity 806 00:51:54,630 --> 00:51:59,170 of reciting words about the supreme worth of every person 807 00:51:59,170 --> 00:52:03,570 and then observing their elders do so little about it? 808 00:52:03,570 --> 00:52:12,150 Emmet Till, the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Little Rock, 809 00:52:12,150 --> 00:52:14,511 all making headlines. 810 00:52:14,511 --> 00:52:19,630 Seeing what their elders did not, the hypocrisy of affirming 811 00:52:19,630 --> 00:52:23,180 racial justice while ensconced in suburbia, 812 00:52:23,180 --> 00:52:26,264 they became impatient with the status quo emanating 813 00:52:26,264 --> 00:52:30,661 from the congregations in which they were reared. 814 00:52:30,661 --> 00:52:35,510 That is the conclusion that Orloff Miller, the director 815 00:52:35,510 --> 00:52:38,854 of the UUA College Centers came back. 816 00:52:38,854 --> 00:52:42,230 Returning from Selma, after having been beaten with James 817 00:52:42,230 --> 00:52:48,000 Reed, Miller wrote, now I know personally the tremendous sense 818 00:52:48,000 --> 00:52:51,120 of frustration felt by those students who 819 00:52:51,120 --> 00:52:53,932 have been on the civil rights projects in the South. 820 00:52:53,932 --> 00:52:57,290 I know why they believe their academic worth is 821 00:52:57,290 --> 00:53:01,006 utterly irrelevant. 822 00:53:01,006 --> 00:53:03,752 For a long time, we, at UUA headquarters, 823 00:53:03,752 --> 00:53:06,222 have been part of the liberal establishment 824 00:53:06,222 --> 00:53:12,890 in the eyes of our own students. 825 00:53:12,890 --> 00:53:15,276 Understood pedagogy. 826 00:53:15,276 --> 00:53:19,102 This is to say, those students felt 827 00:53:19,102 --> 00:53:23,890 their academic work was irrelevant. 828 00:53:23,890 --> 00:53:31,923 It actually places relationship and engagement and behavior 829 00:53:31,923 --> 00:53:34,701 before content. 830 00:53:34,701 --> 00:53:39,060 That is why UU camp experience is so powerful. 831 00:53:39,060 --> 00:53:42,770 That's why the Universalist American Friendship 832 00:53:42,770 --> 00:53:46,685 Program and the old strand of what Silliman spoke 833 00:53:46,685 --> 00:53:51,018 of within the New Beacon Series resonate. 834 00:53:51,018 --> 00:53:55,728 By the mid-'70s, the content in the UU curriculum, you know, 835 00:53:55,728 --> 00:53:57,676 it was bound to change. 836 00:53:57,676 --> 00:54:02,546 Africa's Past Impact on Our Present was published in 1976. 837 00:54:02,546 --> 00:54:06,898 The Inventions of Gospel, with its multiple sections 838 00:54:06,898 --> 00:54:12,608 on Sacajawea and on Harriet Tubman, came out in '78. 839 00:54:12,608 --> 00:54:18,507 I mean after '65, this change was all inevitable. 840 00:54:18,507 --> 00:54:21,860 More important was what Bill Sinkford found years ago 841 00:54:21,860 --> 00:54:25,250 when he walked in the First Unitarian Church of Cincinnati 842 00:54:25,250 --> 00:54:28,930 at age 14. 843 00:54:28,930 --> 00:54:32,988 When I say, I found my religious home 844 00:54:32,988 --> 00:54:37,968 that day, the presence of that easy, unforced, natural-seeming 845 00:54:37,968 --> 00:54:43,960 diversity was a huge element. 846 00:54:43,960 --> 00:54:45,460 The presence of African-Americans 847 00:54:45,460 --> 00:54:50,984 as a DRE for the youth group eased him into, 848 00:54:50,984 --> 00:54:56,400 eased him into being engaged and being what? 849 00:54:56,400 --> 00:54:59,250 In relationship. 850 00:54:59,250 --> 00:55:02,580 In relationship. 851 00:55:02,580 --> 00:55:08,170 So the lesson for me is this, every curriculum we use 852 00:55:08,170 --> 00:55:12,750 contains the explicit and the hidden. 853 00:55:12,750 --> 00:55:16,520 Something is inevitably missing. 854 00:55:16,520 --> 00:55:20,950 The process and the environment we create for our children, 855 00:55:20,950 --> 00:55:26,220 the relationships that are built, the love that we show, 856 00:55:26,220 --> 00:55:29,876 and the values that we model with our lives 857 00:55:29,876 --> 00:55:39,770 are and will remain the mainstay of religious education. 858 00:55:39,770 --> 00:55:41,770 So be it. 859 00:55:41,770 --> 00:56:13,750 [APPLAUSE] 860 00:56:13,750 --> 00:56:19,724 Speaker 1: I certainly share our deep gratitude 861 00:56:19,724 --> 00:56:22,712 for your wisdom and your willingness 862 00:56:22,712 --> 00:56:25,700 to continue to teach us. 863 00:56:25,700 --> 00:56:28,688 Thank you so much, everyone. 864 00:56:28,688 --> 00:56:31,676 I just want to tell you that this lecture series is 865 00:56:31,676 --> 00:56:36,656 made possible with funding from the LREDA Endowment Fund. 866 00:56:36,656 --> 00:56:40,136 And of course, we'd love you all to join that fund. 867 00:56:40,136 --> 00:56:41,636 And there's information in the back. 868 00:56:41,636 --> 00:56:45,620 But again, thank you. 869 00:56:45,620 --> 00:56:50,600 [APPLAUSE] 870 00:56:50,600 --> 00:56:54,540 Mark Morrison-reed: So some of that and more 871 00:56:54,540 --> 00:56:57,368 is in the Selma Awakening. 872 00:56:57,368 --> 00:57:00,296 Actually, so I go through religious education, 873 00:57:00,296 --> 00:57:03,224 I go through worship, I go through our governance. 874 00:57:03,224 --> 00:57:05,176 But I do the same kind of analysis. 875 00:57:05,176 --> 00:57:07,128 Not just [INAUDIBLE], but for each thing, 876 00:57:07,128 --> 00:57:08,836 when you look at the analysis, it 877 00:57:08,836 --> 00:57:11,002 gets real clear why we are the way we are. 878 00:57:11,002 --> 00:57:12,252 It's not about bad intentions. 879 00:57:12,252 --> 00:57:13,960 It's about the cultural milieu. 880 00:57:13,960 --> 00:57:16,543 The other thing I'm going to-- called the-- and I think you 881 00:57:16,543 --> 00:57:19,460 have this in the bookstore-- The Larger Liberty, 882 00:57:19,460 --> 00:57:22,960 The Biography of Rev. Dr. Vincent Silliman. 883 00:57:22,960 --> 00:57:25,360 So Richard Speck wrote this. 884 00:57:25,360 --> 00:57:27,760 And this is available, too, if you're interested. 885 00:57:27,760 --> 00:57:29,311 If Vincent Silliman caught your fancy 886 00:57:29,311 --> 00:57:31,060 and you want to know a bit more about him, 887 00:57:31,060 --> 00:57:33,160 that should be available, too. 888 00:57:33,160 --> 00:57:33,760 Thank you. 889 00:57:33,760 --> 00:57:36,210 [APPLAUSE] 890 00:57:36,210 --> 00:58:13,534