Interconnected Roots of Oppression: Deepening Understanding, Broadening Solutions

LauraSue Schlatter, Beloved Community Communications Team

Over six weeks this winter, Unity’s Executive Team and Beloved Community Staff Team, with assistance from the Racial Justice Team, hosted a series of evenings during which the congregation was invited to learn more about the meanings of Foundations of Racial Capitalism; Land, Ownership, and Housing Justice; Borders, Policing, and the Politics of Belonging; Finance, Debt, and the Cost of Inequality; Universal Care and the Struggle for Collective Well Being; and Fossil Capitalism and Imagining New Futures. All of this was set in the context of racial capitalism, illustrated with real-life stories presented by members of our extended community. Attendees were asked to reflect on their own experiences or their observations of these relationships in the community, to more clearly understand how oppression is interconnected and deeply rooted in our society. The series was very well and consistently attended. People saw the necessity for action beyond discussion. The context of the winter ICE surge more dramatically highlighted the urgency.

Meanwhile, the Indigenous Justice Community Outreach Team, along with the Act for the Earth and Racial Justice Community Outreach Teams, were moving along a different, but interconnected path, exploring the possibility of bringing Indigenous scholar and speaker Mark Charles to present for a day at Unity Church. Writing in his blog on Memorial Day 2019, Charles named Memorial Day as the most difficult National Holiday for him as a Native person. According to the U.S. Army Center of Military History website, he pointed out, “[o]ver 12% of the total 3,515 Medals of Honor awarded were given to soldiers who fought against the indigenous peoples of this land!”

Charles continues, “George Erasmus, a wise leader from the Dene Nation, in a press release titled ‘From Truth to Reconciliation Transforming the Legacy of Residential Schools’ wrote ‘Where common memory is lacking, where people do not share in the same past, there can be no real community. Where community is to be formed, common memory must be created.’”

Mark Charles concludes that, because white people and people of color, including but not limited to Indigenous people and African Americans, do not share a common memory, this country has a very limited sense of community. That is why it is so urgent that we learn, we understand, where our Indigenous neighbors come from, so we can begin to have a glimpse of their common memories. The memories of our African American neighbors, the descendants of people who were enslaved, are different from those who are Indigenous and whose forbears were here before white people arrived. 
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The Indigenous Justice Team has walked a different path to bring teachings to us because they have different, but equally important lessons for us. The image I see is the trails leading to the convergence of the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers, the B’dote, the sacred place from which all life springs, according to many of the Indigenous people who made this place their home long before colonization. The strands of stories come together at that point, and the interconnection of histories, of oppressions, of memories, helps to build a larger, Beloved Community. We hope to see you at the Mark Charles event on June 27.

Mark R. Charles at Unity Church
Saturday, June 27 | 9:30 a.m.-4:00 p.m. | Parish Hall and Zoom 
Please register by June 20.