You will find here information about our social justice teams, our community collaborators and how to join with others in this vital work.
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Justice CouncilFast Justice Navigation
Click links below to go directly to the issue team you want. |
Our Justice Council is comprised of our Issue Team leads and several at-large members and is chartered by our Board of Trustees. All our justice team meetings are open to drop-ins! Consider yourself invited!
The Justice Council Charter:
Many of our justice making initiatives can be found on our Meetup Group page, Santa Fe Justice Makers. Join this group and visit regularly! |
Sister Goose and the Foxes
"When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty."—Thomas Jefferson |
SISTER GOOSE AND THE FOXES | RACIAL JUSTICE
Story By Faye Mogensen, from "Ancient Stories for Modern Times" Sister Goose swam in the pond, happy as could be. Now and then, she ducked her head down to nibble a little bit here, and nibble a little bit there. She took no more than her fill of those succulent underwater plants, for she knew that the pond belonged to everyone. Meanwhile, Brother Fox was hiding in the willows at the far end of the pond. He didn’t like to see anyone happy, least of all a goose. Sister Goose swam along, enjoying the clear blue sky and the bright sunshine. She swam along to the willows growing at the far end of the pond. All of a sudden Brother Fox sprang right out of those willows shouting, “Trespasser! You get off my lake!” Sister Goose shrugged up her wings and looked at Brother Fox, mystified. “Trespasser? How so? This lake does not belong to you, it belongs to us all!” Brother Fox didn’t seem to hear her. He carried on, “You’ve been eating some of the plants in this pond. They don’t belong to you! If you don’t get out of this lake, I’m going to take you to court!” Sister Goose was truly perplexed. She knew she hadn’t done anything wrong, but she could see by the ugly gleam in Brother Fox’s eyes that she wouldn’t be able to convince him. Instead she said, “I’m not afraid to go to court over this. At least there, justice will be served.” And so they went to court. But when Sister Goose arrived at the courthouse, she was very surprised. The clerks who sat just inside the doors were both foxes. Inside the courtroom, she saw that the lawyers were foxes. And the judge was a fox. And even the jurors, though some of them had red fur and some of them had brown fur and some of them had silver fur, were all foxes too. Sister Goose was quaking as she entered the defendant's booth. Sure enough, though her arguments were sound, the judge and the jury found her guilty. They convicted her and turned her into stew. That is how it goes. There isn’t much justice for the likes of a goose when the folks in the courthouse are all foxes. |
Justice teamsFor our current justice activities, click here and/or read the UU Santa Fe Weekly eNewsletter. Featuring UU Santa Fe member, Ken Mayers
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.―John F. Kennedy |
UU Santa Fe Justice Teams
All UU Santa Fe justice teams welcome all participants at any time. You don't have to be on a team to participate in UU Santa Fe justice initiatives. Our teams work together, supporting each other, facilitated by our Justice Council. Engage! Our current issue teams:
All UU Santa Fe justice teams welcome participation from anybody at any time. Engage!
Justice Team Meeting Times | Open to All
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UU Santa Fe Justice Teams
Immigrant & RefugeeBorderLinks―Celebrating building bridges, not walls. 
Changing Systems, Changing Ourselves: Anti-Racism Practice for Sanctuary, Accompaniment, and Resistance | American Friends Society & UU Service Committee An excellent webinar series exploring issues that enable us in the non-immigrant community to engage deeply in the issues that effect our friends so intensely and sometimes tragically, click here. “The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.”―Elie Wiesel |
Immigration and Refugee Justice Team Activities Be aware that the initiatives around immigration and refugee support and advocacy can change daily. Oftentimes more quickly than our website can keep up with. So, pay attention to our UU Santa Fe Events and News page, our Facebook page and your email for the latest information. Our Immigrant & Refugee Community Collaborators & Allies
Resources for More Information
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ENVIRONMENTAL
Resources
“I am glad I will not be young in a future without wilderness.” |
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Domestic Violence Awareness
“And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.” |
Domestic Violence Awareness Team - Led by Leona Stucky-Abbott and Cheryl Ancell
Our Team resources and flanks Healing Voices - Personal Stories and Esperanza Shelter. Contact Leona or Cheryl through the UU Santa Fe Office if you are interested joining this team and supporting its efforts. "Domestic violence (also called intimate partner violence (IPV), domestic abuse or relationship abuse) is a pattern of behaviors used by one partner to maintain power and control over another partner in an intimate relationship."
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UU's United Against Gun Violence
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“We lose eight children and teenagers to gun violence every day. If a mysterious virus suddenly started killing eight of our children every day, America would mobilize teams of doctors and public health officials. We would move heaven and earth until we found a way to protect our children. But not with gun violence.”―Elizabeth Warren, A Fighting Chance |
Results Poverty advocacy
To learn more about RESULTS, contact:
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RESULTS―Advocacy for those struggling with chronic poverty
RESULTS is not a UU Santa Fe group; however, we have a deep and cooperative relationship with the RESULTS group who meets on our campus. Have you ever wished you could do something―something effective―to help people struggling with poverty? There is a movement of passionate, committed, “everyday” people, who together use their voices to influence political decisions that will bring an end to poverty. This organization is RESULTS, a non-partisan, non-profit, nationwide group of volunteers whose goal is creating the political will to end poverty, both globally and in the US. RESULTS volunteers receive training, support, and inspiration to become skilled advocates. They learn to effectively advise policy makers, guiding them towards decisions that improve access to education, health, and economic opportunity. Volunteers multiply their impact through the enormous power of advocacy—whether it’s helping change policy to support millions of families putting food on the table or helping raise billions of dollars for the world’s most vulnerable children. RESULTS chapters now exist in every state in the US and in 20 other countries. UU Santa Fe hosts the Santa Fe RESULTS chapter. We meet at UU Santa Fe at 10:15 am on the second Saturday of every month, to plan our advocacy actions. Our primary focus this year is on:
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First Sunday Giving“No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.”―Charles Dickens 
Checklist for Shopping |
First Sunday Giving
The Justice Council and issue teams vets and schedules various, social service nonprofits to receive the abundance of our UU Santa Fe Sunday gathering collection. We bias toward smaller, local organizations with whom our Issue Teams have a working relationship. Here are our recent and proposed recipients. You can look more closely at these organizations by clicking on the links below. If you have local organizations to recommend, do so! Once a month, we highlight an organization during our Sunday service―we collect cash and checks made out directly to the recipient organization (not UU Santa Fe!). In 2018-2019 we collected and dispersed over $10,000 to local nonprofit organizations.
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Potential Future In-Kind Recipients:
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DONATIONS IN-KIND
We are beginning a new in-kind donation process. Three 32 gallon containers are on our portal and accessible most days for you to drop off items that we collect for the underserved in Santa Fe. Bins are be carefully marked. August In-Kind. For our kick-off, we are collecting for Portfolio Resident Services of Santa Fe. Collection bins are on the portal for 1) food, 2) personal care items, and 3) back to school supplies. Click here for the complete list. Please do not donate items that are not on this list. We are collecting donations such as:
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UU Santa Fe Justice
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Justice and Spirit: Unitarian Universalist Online Book Club“The opposite of poverty is not wealth. In too many places, the opposite of poverty is justice.” |
Justice and Spirit: Unitarian Universalist Online Book Club
Skinner House Books and Beacon Press offer an online book each month on the GoodReads website. They describe the book club this way: "Life never stops sending new spiritual challenges our way. How do we, as individuals and communities, search for truth and meaning, strive for justice and action, navigate our spiritual journeys, and live out our values? Justice and Spirit: The UU Book Club is a place where all who are interested in spirituality, religion, and justice, whether UU or not, can discuss books that relate to these crucial questions. We hope to foster deep, meaningful conversations and a welcoming and loving environment. All are welcome." [And our UU Santa Fe Harriet Kidder Memorial Library has many new titles of contemporary thought on justice making.] |
There is always something to do. There are hungry people to feed, naked people to clothe, sick people to comfort and make well. And while I don't expect you to save the world I do think it's not asking too much for you to love those with whom you sleep, share the happiness of those whom you call friend, engage those among you who are visionary, and remove from your life those who offer you depression, despair, and disrespect.―Nikki Giovanni