Rev. Splaine On "Whiteness"

To the editor: Understandably, there have been many questions raised concerning our decision to take a respectful abstention from hosting the reading of the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights at the UU Meeting House this year. One of those questions has to do with the phrase “understand our own whiteness.”

Why is it that use of the word whiteness – what it means to be white in the context of our history and our present – has created so much consternation, confusion, and choler? As a congregation, in search of the answer to that and many other questions, we are reading, considering, and talking about the book "America U.S.A, How Race Shadows the Nation’s Anniversaries" by renowned Princeton University Prof. Eddie S. Glaude, Jr. Prof. Glaude’s book is a good place for all of us to start.

Peace,
Rev. Erin Splaine (she/her)
Second Congregational Meeting House Society, Unitarian Universalist