Exclusion and Embrace: Talk at UUC in Seattle

Three generations connecting in a holiday moment.

The earlier Reflection on this website, “Exclusion and Embrace,” was developed into a talk and service at the University Unitarian Church in Seattle, Washington on Sunday, July 12, 2020. Parts of the Reflection essay were changed or developed for the spoken service, and other readings and meditations were added.

To access this talk, click the play button below:

 

Bruce’s Dad, shortly before his death.

Good families, good people. And yet a tradition of exclusion may be passed down, generation to generation, sometimes overtly, more often covertly, by accepting an exclusive and excluding system implicitly.

One of the most important spiritual practices we can do is to halt a harmful intergenerational pattern. That means changing how previous generations operated. It is courageous and important work to stand up for justice—to learn and grow and find a way toward authentic embrace across lines of cultural difference.