Peacemaking Overview Committee Members Peacemaking Links
Pizi means bravery to the Native American Sioux tribe.
Bravery in peacemaking is essential to resolve all conflicts, including those involving immigration. When you see Pizi, know our Peacemaking Committee is in action!
"...Emerson has a theme of Peacemaking and in particular, peaceful respectful dialogue around the issue of immigration..."
Reverend Jeff Jones
Our Peacemaking Committee
We are called to discover ways to bring peace to our lives and to facilitate others in their search for peace. Together we strive to learn how to apply peacemaking to immigration issues.
We want these activities to help us promote peaceful dialogue within our Emerson UU Congregation and our local community. Our meetings are open to anyone who wants to join our committee or to learn about events and activities we are planning.
Meetings
We meet the third Thursday of each month at Emerson UU Congregation from 7:30 - 9:00 PM.
Please come join us!
Activities
- Planning programs for the congregation
- Facilitating presentations and workshops
- Supporting the Peacemaking webpage
- Communicating with others about events and activities
Check our Peacemaking Links to connect to online peacemaking resources!
Events
Our Exploration of Non-Violent Communication
As our Peacemaking journey proceeds, we are exploring Marshall Rosenberg’s Non-Violent Communication (NVC) method, a process for peaceful interactions between people. Rosenberg's approach provides a key tool for discussing difficult topics, but it requires education and mastery through practice.
This fall, our Peacemaking Committee is offering two more film/discussion sessions that explain NVC and enable us to learn its principles and practices. Topics include anger, depression, focus of attention, punishment, mediation, trust of process, connection of feelings to needs, and more.
Click the book image on the right to display our Emerson home page, where you can order the book through the Amazon search box in the lower left of the page.
Please plan to attend the fourth session and the repeat of the third session if you did not attend it earlier. Join us, even if you have not participated in the first sessions, so we can learn together how to use NVC skills in our discussions about immigration.
Schedule of Sessions
►Non-Violent Communication: A language of the heart (Part 3), film/discussion session
repeated on Friday, October 14 at 11:30 AM - 12:30 PM in our Rainbow House Chapel
►Non-Violent Communication: A language of the heart (Part 4), film/discussion session
Friday, December 9 at 7:30 - 9:00 PM in our Rainbow House Chapel
Immigration Workshop Series
This fall and winter, we are offering six Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) learning workshop sessions about immigration.
Come and join us as we learn together about its causes and history, how economic pressure affects it, issues of security and enforcement and human rights, consequences of the current system, and discussion of solutions.
Use this link to sign up for the series or sign up on Sunday at Emerson.
Before each session, we will be asked to read a brief UUA informational presentation to prepare us to discuss the scheduled topic.
Sessions
Session 1) Understanding the Causes of Immigration
Friday, September 9 at 7:30 - 9:00 PM, in our sanctuary
Session 1 pre-reading
Goals:
-Introduce participants to each other and get a sense of what they bring with them to
the discussion and what they hope to gain
-Engage participants with the personal reasons why people immigrate
-Begin to think about how our national policy should treat different types of
immigrants
Session 2) History of Migration in the U.S.
Friday, September 23 at 7:30 - 9:00 PM, in our sanctuary
Session 2 pre-reading
Goals:
-Encourage participants to see the immigration issue from perspectives other than
from the legacy of colonialism
-Think about what is means to be considered "American"
Session 3) Economic Pressures Around (im)migration
Friday, October 28 at 7:30 - 9:00 PM, in our sanctuary
Session 3 pre-reading
Goals:
-"Experience" the standard of living disparities between the U.S. and Mexico (and by
extension, other parts of the world)
-See the working conditions under which migrant workers toll
Session 4) Security, Enforcement, and Human Rights
Friday, November 11 at 7:30 to 9:00 PM, in our sanctuary
Session 4 pre-reading
Goals:
-Get a glimpse of the enormity of human suffering caused by the U.S. enforcement-
only immigration policy
-Consider how human rights are protected (or not)
Session 5) Who Benefits from a Broken System?
Date to be determined, in our sanctuary
Session 5 pre-reading
Goals:
-Tying together what has been learned from the previous weeks
-Reframing the debate from one of citizenship to one of globalization and corporate
power
Session 6) Seeking Solutions
Session 6 pre-reading
Date to be determined, in our sanctuary
-Visualize what a just immigration policy would look like from a Unitarian Universalist
(UU) perspective
-Plan next steps of participation in the social witness process