This semester I am taking two classes: “Tools for Parish and Nonprofit Administration” and “Community Organizing and Ethical Leadership”. The professors of both classes are Black women. In fact, every class I’ve taken at Meadville Lombard has been taught by a POC. I am deeply grateful for the work they do to help form us as leaders and organizers who can widen the path to liberation for everyone.

I’ve seen a couple parallels in the themes of the readings in both classes so far (it’s only the second week…). In my “Tools” class, we’ve been reading about discernment through periods of liminality (I touched upon liminality and this time that we are currently in last Sunday). But in the book I am reading, Susan Beaumont’s How to Lead When You Don’t Know Where You’re Going, she talks about discernment as the group process of getting to know what God is up to in the world. “Discernment is a quality of attentiveness to God that, over time, develops our sense of God’s heart and purpose in the moment” (p68). If you’ve ever talked theology with me then you may know that I can usually translate traditional terminology pretty fluidly and still gain deep meaning and understanding. However, as I read on in this book, I have to say that I’m struggling with translation. That’s not to say that she doesn’t provide a good analysis of discernment rather than decision-making, church versus business, or a communal visioning over personal agenda. I’m just trying to figure out how to understand it in a UU theology.

In my “Community Organizing” class we’ve started to touch upon prophetic and communal imagining/dreaming. That’s more in-line with my theology and approach to community building! We are pondering the question “what does it mean to dream in a collective with people who are not us?” It means that we break away from our own mirages. When we listen to the dreams of others, we have a better chance at humanizing one another.

This begs the question, how do we begin this process at UUCL? With the board? Within our committees? As a congregation? I love to imagine new worlds. Perhaps we have imagination sessions?

I do believe this is the beginning of shaping real change.

Won’t you dream a big dream with me?