Faith and Reason: Race, Justice, and American Political Life

Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Greater Canton will host a viewing of a video of the Ware Lecture “Faith and Reason: Race, Justice, and American Political Life,” presented at last month's church General Assembly, at 7 p.m. July 27. A discussion will follow.
This year's Ware lecturer, Melissa Harris-Lacewell, who is associate professor of politics and African-American studies at Princeton University, will challenge us to pause in the moment of American racial transformation and ask about how faith and reason can guide our politics toward more just ends.
We Americans do use religious and rational justifications for democratic processes, policy directions and political goals. In fact, in many ways the American state is the God figure in our nation's civic religion. But the realities of black life in America have historically served to challenge the American project in both moral and secular realms.
The presenter is an expert commentator, often on National Public Radio, on U.S. elections, racial issues, religious questions and gender issues. She also has been a Unitarian Universalist her whole life.
While living in Barack Obama's Hyde Park neighborhood in Chicago, she was a UU on Sunday mornings at First Unitarian, and then went to Jeremiah Wright’s Trinity church on Sunday evenings.
A quote from the lecture: "It’s easy to write off faith talk as inherently divisive — but if we do that, we cede faith, and lose the use of it as a tool for the struggle for self, community, and justice."
The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Greater Canton is at 2585 Easton St. NE in Plain Township.
For more information:
http://www.uua.org/events/generalassembly/programming/14600.shtml
For a "live" blog describing the lecture:
http://blogs.uua.org/ga2009/2009/06/27/liveblogging-the-ware-lecture/#mo...