How to Develop Spiritual Practices that Engage Antiracist Multicultural Work

By Rebecca Gonzalez-Campoy and Rev. KP Hong, Beloved Community Communications Team
 
In his book, Faith Without Certainty: Liberal Theology in the 21st Century, UU theologian Paul Rasor lays out plainly how liberal religion is fraught with challenges to examining spirituality and putting it to work to address racism. He writes:

All of our analysis, no matter how sophisticated, and all of our programs, no matter how well-designed, will never be sufficient to make us anti-racist. We must also be willing to do the difficult work necessary for spiritual transformation…. As much as we say we want more spirituality in our lives, we are often reluctant to go too deep to find it. Sustained spiritual practice can take us deep inside, exposing aspects of ourselves we may rather not see. But racism cannot be overcome without this work.

Unity recently concluded a three-part workshop, “Spiritual Practice: Discovery and Transformation,” that brought participants together in conversation and exploration of how to do what Rasor describes: develop spiritual practices that engage in antiracism work. To be effective, one cannot exist without the other, says Rev. KP Hong, Minister of Faith Formation and one of the workshop leaders. Anything less continues to support white supremacy.

This was precisely the question Martin Luther King, Jr., brought into prophetic focus, wondering how spiritual practice on Sunday morning could be emblematic of “one of the most segregated hours” in America, a racialized spiritual practice in collusion with white supremacy. And equally significant, King relentlessly interrogated what racial justice requires and, with other members of the civil-rights generation, formulated nonviolence as the “only weapon that could cut and heal at the same time,” an antiracist practice necessarily grounded in disciplined spiritual practice.

Unity provides many opportunities to engage in antiracist multicultural action. This workshop sought to look at the faith formation side of things, and raised many questions as participants considered how to create or enhance their own practices. One example: “How do I know I’m not living out my value of perfection?” Workshop leaders offered this advice: Is your practice me-centered or other-centered? Does it make you just feel good or do you push yourself to go beyond your comfort zone, to push boundaries? To disrupt? Perfectionism is me-centered. When one pursues excellence, it can be we-centered if benefiting others is your goal.

Spiritual practice can take many forms. Body awareness work, zazen meditation, prayer, writing, art, walking or working in the natural world, chalice circles, worship, Lectio Divina, and music are among many possibilities. The key here is the word “practice.” Whatever you choose, commit to doing it each day, with intention and discipline.

The first session established an understanding of spiritual practice as our way of being with the (w)holy, with what is greater than me and the countless boundaries that we erect to establish, fortify, and protect our preferred sense of self. At its core, then, spiritual practice summons us to the borders of our being, knowing, and ways of moving through the world – whether the borders of my personal identity or my tribe or the checkpoints along the Rio Grande. What happens at the border with the Other and the Not-Me? As King reflected on the Parable of the Good Samaritan, “the first question that the Levite asked was, ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’ But then the Good Samaritan came by, and he reversed the question: ‘If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?’”

The second session explored what those practices might look like, stepping beyond the border of theory into practice, beyond the border of understanding into experiencing. The third and final gathering brought together spiritual practice and antiracist practice as an inescapable mutuality, a “double helix” in which the parallel helices of spiritual practice and antiracist practice co-create, authenticate, and prophetically keep each other from being co-opted and appropriated by white supremacy encoded throughout our history, culture, and structures.

Participants will be invited to a follow-up session in February to review their progress. However, you may attend in February even if you did not take part in the fall series.

To find out even more about spiritual practice, check out the Spiritual Practice page on the Unity Website to get some ideas. Of particular interest are the Spiritual Practice Packets organized around our monthly themes. You do not need to be in a chalice circle to use the packet. Find copies in the kiosk in the main lobby and on the Spiritual Practice bulletin board just outside the kitchen. The packet this month centers on the worship theme for October, “confessing.”

To find out even more about spiritual practice, check out the Spiritual Practice page on the Unity Website to get some ideas. Of particular interest are the Spiritual Practice Packets organized around our monthly themes. You do not need to be in a chalice circle to use the packet. Find copies in the kiosk in the main lobby and on the Spiritual Practice bulletin board just outside the kitchen. The packet this month centers on the worship theme for October, “confessing.”