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Message from new UUSJ Board Chair:

A New Chapter Begins At UUSJ

Greetings, UUSJ supporters!  What an honor it is for me to serve as Chair of the new UUSJ board this year.  As many of you have read, UUSJ has completely transformed its Board of Trustees to make it more national, and more diverse in terms of geography, age, race, ethnicity and other ways. The eleven new members were recruited by a national nominating committee, and only three of us had served on the last board (each for two years or less). I thank the nominating committee for that deeply important service.

I also want to honor the hard work and sacrifice of the past Board, which spent two years on discerning strategically and planning just such a transformation as part of the move to being more national, and more accountable. Then the whole board – whose members in the past were largely named by the Washington, DC area congregations – committed to stepping back and off the Board voluntarily to allow this new approach to take place. In many cases, outgoing members will still serve as “volunteer liaisons” to help implement UUSJ activities under guidance from Executive Director Pablo DeJesús. 

This intentional transformation comes from a commitment to become a more justice-centered UU-related organization. As part of that process, the previous Board identified four groups of moral owners we are striving to be in right relationship with and better serve. They are: UU individuals, UU congregations, impacted communities, and organizations led by or representing impacted communities. 

UUSJ has also concluded it must widen its circle of concern to strive for better, more equitable engagement and service to our moral owners.

My aim as Chair was first to quickly restructure our officers and committees. This task is now completed thanks to the willingness of new trustees to join several special sessions.  We now will turn to reassessing our priorities for education, engagement and advocacy. A recent survey of 200+ UUs along with the past board’s work on anti-racism has highlighted the need for us to be more intentional about racial justice goals.  

At the same time, voter suppression, immigrant and refugee needs, climate change and persistent economic inequalities (our current four priority areas) beg for continued attention. This challenging goal will, I am confident, be achieved through the experience, creativity and dedication of our amazing new Board and volunteers.  We will be doing so as we also strive for much more interaction with partners who represent impacted people.

I am excited for this new chapter in UUSJ’s future and I encourage you to remain involved with UUSJ and find new ways to support the social justice actions as we move forward.  You keep our community vibrant and financially buoyant.  

With thanks and respect, 
Charlotte Jones Carroll, Board Chair

Advocacy News and Events

Don’t Wait – Nomination Deadline September 10th

You know who those Social Justice stars are. Make your nomination now!  The awards criteria and link to the nomination form can be found on UUSJ’s Website. 

The form is straight forward and we are looking for simple TikTok style videos to help present in an online format.

Preparations for the Fall Virtual Gala are in the works and the date will be announced. In the meantime, mark your memory to join us to hear about inspiring UU Social Justice work around the US and learn this year’s Social Justice Award recipients and their stories.

If you think your congregation will be submitting a nomination, or if you have any questions, email us at awards@uusj.org.

Write Here! Write Now!

UUSJ’s September Write Here! Write Now! letter-writing campaign will focus on the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. See the WHWN Handout. Our online WHWN platform is available HERE and allows you to send your letters directly. The Democracy Action Team will hold an issue briefing on September 15th at 7pmET / 4pmPT, RSVP here.

For information on how to set up a congregational letter-writing campaign, register at Write Here! Write Now! 

We will be arranging meetings with a number of Senate offices to discuss the importance of these bills.  If you’d like to participate in a virtual Senate visit, please register at Virtual Meeting or contact fredvandeu@gmail.com.

2021 Social Justice Activist Roundtable
Saturday, November 6, 2021
1pm ET | 12 noon CT | 11am MT | 10am PT

Network with other social justice activists, share successful programs, discuss challenges, and be inspired to continue doing justice work. After our virtual roundtable discussion, activists will walk away inspired and with actionable strategies. Watch for more details. Save the date.

UUSJ News and Events

New UUSJ Board Selects Officers

The new Board of Trustees elected in June 2021 is smaller (11 vs. 22) and more diverse geographically, age-wise, in race/ethnicity, and many other ways. A number of the board members have divinity degrees. The new board elected four new officers at its initial special July board meeting.

Unitarian Universalist News

Side With Love Welcomes New Congregational Justice Organizer

The centrality of relationship, community, and learning is important to Unitarian Universalists and organizing. This is why Side with Love is happy to announce that Rev. Ranwa Hammamy will be joining the UUA’s Organizing Strategy Team as the new Congregational Justice Organizer. Rev. Ranwa’s skill, commitment to racial justice-rooted organizing, and invitational leadership are markers of their powerful justice ministry that have supported organizations like UU Justice Ministry of California and Diverse Revolutionary Unitarian Universalist Ministries.

UUA Launches Side with Love Action Center 
Sept. 12 at 2pm ET | 1pm CT | 12pm MT | 11am PT

Our faith calls us to act in solidarity, understanding that interdependence means “None of us are free until all of us are free.” Our lives and future are bound together, and together is how we move forward toward living out our faith in a just and loving world. This is why we need YOU to help us launch the Side With Love Action Center: a place for folks to come together across differences, issues, and geography to end oppression and build democratic, sustainable, and thriving communities focused on Side with Love’s four key issues: Climate Justice, Decriminalization, Democracy & Voting Rights LGBTQ+, and Gender Justice. Find more information at the  Side with Love Action Center 

UUA President: Updated COVID Guidance for the Delta Variant (click for details)

Defending Our Democracy

Fred Van Deusen, Democracy Action Team Convener (fredvandeu@gmail.com)

Voting Rights Legislation

The Democracy Action Team continues to strongly urge Congress to pass the For the People Act and now includes the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.  

Last month, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer tried to bring S.1, the For the People Act, to the floor for a vote but the effort was promptly blocked by Sen.Ted Cruz, R-Texas.To date, no Republicans have supported the bill and the change in filibuster rules needed for it to pass. Senator Schumer promised to bring it up again when the Senate returns the week of September 13. 

Senate Democrats will have to decide — which is more important: saving our democracy or preserving the filibuster. You can help them make the right decision by writing to your senators using this UUSJ Action Alert.

The John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act was introduced in the House on August 17 and it passed on August 24. It would restore the protections of the 1965 Voting Rights Act against discriminatory voting laws. It is important to understand that we need passage of both the For the People Act and the John Lewis Act. The For the People Act sets the expectations that states must meet, the John Lewis Act protects our rights and provides a remedy when required. It now moves to the Senate and will very likely require changes to the filibuster rules to pass, perhaps in tandem with the For the People Act.  You can write your Senators on this as part of UUSJ’s WHWN program, see below or above.

Voting Rights Action of Immediate Witness

Members of the Democracy Action Team authored an Action Of Immediate Witness (AIW) to Stop Voter Suppression and Partner for Voting Rights and a Multiracial Democracy at this year’s UUA General Assembly.  The team partnered with Nicole Pressley of UU the Vote to organize an event focused on this AIW, and developed a list of actions to support it.

Save the Date - October 6th, 7-9pmET / 4-6pmPT when UUSJ will be joining the UUA Commission on Social Witness for its Fall Social Witness Convening on the 2021 AIWs.

Take action to support UUSJ's AIW with this message to Congress.

Environmental and Climate Justice

IPCC Climate Report

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a body of the United Nations mandated to provide objective scientific information relevant to understanding human-induced climate change, its natural, political, and economic impacts and risks, and possible response options. Read the recent UN report Here.

Book Recommendation: The Politics of Rights of Nature
Craig M. Kauffman & Pamela L. Martin

With the window of opportunity to take meaningful action on climate change and mass extinction closing, a growing number of communities, organizations, and governments around the world are calling for Rights of Nature (RoN) to be legally recognized. Advocates are creating new laws that recognize natural ecosystems as subjects with inherent rights, and appealing to courts to protect those rights. (Review by Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Link)

“Given the urgency of the present climate and biodiversity crises and the need to transform our ways of living, we offer a hopeful account of one way to craft new international relations capable of allowing all living beings on the planet to flourish and regenerate now and into the future.” (Author’s introduction)

Environmental Action Team Action Alert

The urgency of the climate crisis has again been brought home by horrific record heat waves, historic drought,  wildfires, and hurricanes of increasing strength. While the need for action has never been clearer, there is only a narrow path for getting adequate legislation enacted that will provide a realistic chance of stabilizing global warming in time to avert catastrophic changes. This is a critical time, and UUs need to urge their Representatives and Senators to stand up for real and just action on climate. Take Bold Action for Climate Jobs and Justice.

Immigration Justice

Steve Eckstrand & Terry Grogan, Immigration Action Team Convenors (terrymgrogan@gmail.com)

Advocating for Pathways to Citizenship for DACA, TPS and other Immigrants

This summer, Immigration Action Team members met virtually with Senate staff, to advocate for pathways to citizenship for undocumented immigrants covered under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and Temporary Protected Status (TPS), as well as farm workers, and essential workers. During June and July, the team met virtually with 17 Senate offices. 

Most of the team’s meetings were with staff of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is considering several immigration-related bills. The team visited Senate offices from California, Georgia, Hawaii, Iowa, Illinois, North Carolina, New Hampshire,Texas, Utah, and Virginia.  UUs and others from those states also joined the meetings.   

Immigration Action Alert

UUSJ joined #WeAreHome, Faith in Action and Side with Love in calling on Congress to include pathways to citizenship for immigrants covered by DACA and TPS as well as those who are farmworkers, and essential workers.    

UUSJ’s Action Alert urges the House and the Senate to use the reconciliation process to pass a budget that includes such pathways. To date, over 155 individuals have responded by contacting their members of Congress.

There is still an urgent need for advocacy. The recently-passed Senate resolution includes more than $100 billion to put Dreamers, those eligible for Temporary Protected Status (TPS), and essential workers—including farmworkers—on a pathway to citizenship. The House of Representatives also passed its budget resolution. This means that Democrats can use the budget reconciliation process to pass a bill by a simple majority. However, since Democrats need every member’s vote, they may need to change the bill before it is brought to a vote. You can urge them to keep the funding for the path to citizenship in the bill by using this Action Alert.

UUSJ Opposes Using Health Authority to Expel Families; Deporting Haitian Immigrants  

The Immigration Action Team last month prepared and UUSJ sent a letter to Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas to stop using the public health authority of Title 42 to expel families, adults, and children seeking refuge at the southern border. There is no public health rationale for the use of Title 42 at this time.

UUSJ also joined other national immigration advocacy and faith groups calling on Administration officials to stop deportation flights to Haiti and to provide other relief, addressing Department of Homeland Security appropriation levels and advocating cutting detention funding. UUSJ and other groups sent letters to Senators, urging them not to adopt amendments to the budget resolution weakening immigrant protections.

Economic Justice

Tell the House, Pass H.R. 40: UUs Endorse A Fact-Based Understanding of American Slavery

True national unity can only emerge with acknowledgment of harm. It's one of the first steps in pursuing restorative justice. For that reason, UUSJ supports H.R. 40, which would establish a commission to study and develop reparation proposals for African-Americans. The very least we can do is to "study and recommend." As Unitarian Universalists and Americans, many of us want to understand the harms of slavery and its impacts on our society. We believe that the deep work of dismantling systemic racism must include acknowledging the harm of American slavery and its continued impact on racial and ethnic communities such as disparities in health, education, employment, housing, environmental outcomes, and policing, among other things.

During this session, Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) hit an important legislative mark with her championship of H.R. 40. This is the first time a House committee has considered the bill for recommendation to the House floor since it was first introduced in 1989 by then-Rep. John Conyers (D-MI). Human Rights Watch is working to educate the public on the reparative justice dimension and “The Right to Remedy and Reparation Under International Human Rights Law” adding to the leadership of the National African-American Reparations Commission (NAARC) and National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America (N’COBRA) on this issue.

Write the House

Tell Your Senator To Support The Broad Principle of Relief for Students

Millions of Americans find themselves drowning in student debt. Federal student loans impose a substantial burden on students across generations. From recent graduates to working professionals, 43 million Americans owe nearly $1.7 trillion in student loan debt. Yet, college is known to be an important step in achieving a higher income and financial freedom. American students and young professionals shouldn’t be subject to an almost predatory lending environment in order to have a solid chance in the economy. 

President Biden has provided some relief, but he can truly make an impact by canceling up to $50,000 of debt for all individual borrowers with federal educational debt. With the stroke of a pen, he can bring life-changing relief to millions of Americans struggling with student loan debt. ​Legislation could be developed with his support. There are multiple bills referring to this issue. Some target specific groups: such as H.R. 2418, forgiving loans of healthcare workers, or H.R. 4293, focusing on young entrepreneurs. Yet there are broader measures relating to the issue and better reflecting the principle, H.Res. 100 by Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley, and S.Res. 46 by Majority Leader Schumer.

Write to President Biden  -  Write to Congress