ED: Note. For the summer, our Ministerial intern Brigitta Vieyra will be taking over Reverend Christine’s Notes From Your Dance Partner column, and as per her request, the column name has temporarily changed to Field Notes From Your Ministerial Intern.
As a people of possibility, we’ve been exploring the ways in which our faith tradition calls us to ask “what could be” in our search for a more free, more just future for us all. All summer, Mx. Jezz of UUCP Children’s Ministries has been teaching us what an abolitionist imagination looks like through the Abolitionist Classroom. We know we cannot do this work alone.
Divesting from systems of violence requires us to invest in whole new ways of being in community together. Ways of being that build coalitions of care beyond UUCP. Ways that show up in solidarity with our community partners. Black Lives Matter Phoenix Metro, Poder In Action, Trans Queer Pueblo, and White People Against White Supremacy have formed the We Keep Us Safe Collective, which will offer skill building in how to respond to conflict and crisis with compassion and love. Skills like verbal de-escalation and mediation, physical self defense, first aid, mental health crisis response, and more! The We Keep Us Safe Collective is having a family-friendly, public launch celebration, called Night Out For Safety & Liberation on August 1st at 7 pm at the Maryvale YMCA.
If you can attend, please RSVP! I’d love to see you there with me. Imagining another way is possible and creating a more just and loving world is a shared, collective practice and it can also be one that is full of joy. This week, may we trust the part of us that can turn problems into possibilities and remember that creative solutions often come when we form new connections.
-Brigitta Vieyra