Advocates for Collective Liberation?

If “nobody’s free until everybody’s free,” shouldn’t we be…

In our recent 2024 Annual Report, you may have noticed mention of Collective Liberation, a term I’ve been using with, and introducing to, UUSJ supporters for several years.

However, while related to that mention, this post comes in happy response to the UU@UNO Intergenerational Seminar on September 21st & 22nd, 2024, where participants can “build a tomorrow where we are all free together,” and they use the tagline “Reimagining Tomorrow: Global Solidarity Beyond Empire.”

I read that as collective liberation, and I am pleased. Here is why:

Collective liberation is the idea that multiple oppressions are intertwined and that people must work together to end them. I think most of us agree. If I believed otherwise, I would not continue in our tradition.

My interest in collective liberation, as it pertains to Unitarian Universalist activism, became serious over a decade ago when I took Jubilee training with Paula Cole Jones as a Church Council Steering Committee member and a consistent social justice volunteer.

Later, with UUSJ, my interest increased when our organization started to work on how to widen our circle of concern, what it means to become a national organization, what it implies to have Moral Owners, and whether we should voluntarily adopt the 8th Principle. This receptivity accelerated further as I discussed with our volunteers how best to express what UUSJ genuinely wants in our work toward mission fulfillment.

Collective liberation is a framework grounded in anti-racism organizing by Black Feminists. As such, it pulls from the liberatory traditions of the Black Church, builds upon lessons from the Civil Rights era, and translates a Feminist analytical frame for the Black Community.

It is explicitly linked to the 1977 Combahee River Collective Statement and is generally associated with the 1996 pro-indigenous Jemez Principles for Democratic Organizing. (We can add anti-colonial here as well.) Over time it has been appreciated and further translated and transposed by other communities of color.

Famously, author Chris Crass successfully connects such ideas in his 2013 book Towards Collective Liberation: Anti-Racist Organizing, Feminist Praxis, and Movement Building Strategy.

Collective liberation has a rich history of thought and organizing prowess behind it. It involves:

Acknowledging oppression
Working together
Centering marginalized voices
Building community
Learning

These are all things we, as Unitarian Universalists, hold dear.

Nevertheless, some members have found the concept large, amorphous, or unclear. Others shy away from the abolitionist underpinnings. A few members worry about ties to its slightly older cousin, liberation theology, in the Latin American context and a reliance on Marxist analysis. For many, even if they agree with the impulse, the emphasis on communitarianism, mutual responsibility, and mutual accountability can be jarring–even scary–to the individualism present-day Americans are encouraged to revere.

Oddly, even though Jim Crow liberation theology informed Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King‘s teachings, we Unitarian Universalists are somewhat hesitant to fully embrace collective liberation. Even as we hold King in high esteem, despite his example, this hesitancy remains present. Even though King pointed the way when he said, “I came to see for the first time that the Christian doctrine of love operating through the Gandhian method of nonviolence was one of the most potent weapons available to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom.” (Pilgrimage to Nonviolence, 1960.)

Key words: Love. Method. Oppressed. People. Struggle. Freedom.

We can and should move beyond our reservations by simply putting them aside. Here is why:

We can follow King’s prophetic and farseeing guidance on how to link faith to action. We should trust that collective liberation can be a method for our times and our social context that facilitates the universal doctrine of love. It can help us be more effective and impactful in the struggle for freedom among and with the oppressed. It can facilitate meaningful fellowship with the people we care for and about. That is how we build Beloved Community grounded in our faith tradition which, by necessity, brings Collective Liberation grounded in our secular lived experience.

Collective liberation, in many ways, is simply a robust expression of the intersectional values we cherish as Unitarian Universalists. It provides a secular organizing context that aligns well with our faith-based grounding, reinforcing the natural fit of these concepts for our faith.

For example, as Unitarian Universalists:

We have pledged to widen the circle of concern.
We value learning about Root Causes and Root Harms.
We strive for fellowship and to be good allies.
We cherish covenantal behavior.
We look to place ourselves “eye-to-eye” and “shoulder-to-shoulder” with impacted and vulnerable communities.
When marginalized communities take up the LGBTQia refrain, “Nothing about us, without us,” we agree with the sentiment.
In our spirit, we know with certainty that “the people [truly] united shall never be defeated.” How could it be otherwise when we also believe that the moral arc of the universe bends toward justice?
We hold sacred the idea that Beloved Community can set our society free.
We know that when pro-democracy forces have defied authoritarianism, faith actors have been a catalytic part of that moral response—at least in our Western Hellenistic traditions.

As of General Assembly 2024, Unitarian Universalists have agreed to “adopt new language on core religious values.” We have decided that love is the power that holds us together and is central to our shared values. The values we share include all the following, which we hold as inseparable and deeply interconnected: Interdependence, Pluralism, Justice, Transformation, Generosity, and Equity. (Read more on the Article II revision process.)

These values, expressed within our faith tradition, are highly compatible with an emphasis on collective liberation. I am still learning and discerning, but a recent sermon by Rev. Anastassia Zinke: A Covenantal Faith makes me wonder if collective liberation is the covenantal force of love at work for social change and justice. At least, that is how her words landed for me.

It’s beautiful to see that our Unitarian Universalist organizations are already teaching related faith-based concepts, providing a wealth of educational opportunities for our community to learn and engage with the concept of collective liberation. For example:

The UU Climate Justice Revival, which will take place on September 28th and 29th, 2024, promises that congregations will “Understand their role in the interdependent ecosystem of creating climate justice and collective liberation.”
DRUUMM cries out: “We work towards collective liberation and healing.”
Recognize the reference to “flourishing for all” in the UU Ministry for Earth’s organizational Vision.
Celebrate the UU Women’s Federation covenant “for the purpose of mutually supporting, uplifting, and inspiring action in the movement for collective liberation.”
Notice Side With Love “seeks to harness love’s power to stop oppression” and says, “the work that we do together to build a world in which all of us are free and thriving is interrelated.”
Catch that UURISE declares, “We foster an organizational culture that celebrates equity and diversity, striving for collective liberation.”
Don’t forget that UUSC’s mission includes “partnering with those who confront unjust power structures and mobilizing to challenge oppressive policies.”
Review a blog post by Rev. Claudia Jiménez, Minister of Faith Formation, UU Congregation of Asheville, NC, Introducing the Liberation Collective.

When Unitarian Universalists get serious about our faith-based work for social justice, we often get serious about freedom, thriving, and flourishing—as collective liberation.

While the forces of hate frequently deride collective liberation as “just” woke, hippy, kumbaya, critical race theory, mumbo-jumbo—or communist propaganda, instead, it might just be the secular organizing basis for what Unitarian Universalists are about in spirit, as a matter of our evolving faith.

Collective liberation terrifies the forces of hate, anti-pluralism, and the beneficiaries of oppression. That is why they have mobilized the tools of authoritarianism and fascism in recent months and years to oppose a multi-cultural, multi-racial, inclusive, and pluralistic American democracy. The roots of that opposition go deep in our history and politics. See the comments by authors David Pepper and Steve Philip for UUSJ.

At bottom, fear of a United States open to collective liberation for its citizens and residents is one reason we have such a consequential, vitriol-filled election in 2024.

UUSJ is foremost a faith-based domestic-policy advocacy organization, so I aspire that we can be “Advocates for Collective Liberation.” I urge you to collaborate with us on this endeavor. Your participation is crucial.

Please explore how Unitarian Universalist organizations ask you to side with freedom, thriving, flourishing, interdependence and more. Let us live into our adopted values, with love at the center, and champion Collective Liberation, building toward Beloved Community.

Our democracy needs us now. Our posterity needs us to do this sacred, transformational justice work.

Remember what Fannie Lou Hamer, the cherished Civil Rights icon, taught when she said, “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.”

In optimism for our collective liberation,

Pablo DeJesús

Executive Director, UUSJ