The Light Inside the Fire
Arts and Spirituality Mini-Retreat
This Sunday, December 1, during worship time–that is, 10am-12:30pm–and with the help of the Coalition of Artists and Creatives for Compassionate Communities, we’re holding an “Arts, Spirituality and Activism Mini-Retreat!” This will be jointly led by local artists and activists and Urban Sanctuary, giving us all a great opportunity to build relationships and connect with the divine through creativity.
The schedule for the retreat is as follows:
- Gathering Circle – with rhythm and drums (with the legendary PJ Hirabayashi!) we bring our voices together to call in the wisdom of our ancestors and to invite the Creative Spirit to open our imaginations
- Contemplative Guided Meditation
- Creative Workshops – a choice to go to one of the following workshops: Creative Writing, Stone Painting, Making Peace Cranes. All workshops will provide a chance to reflect, create and dialogue about around wisdom we can draw from to address the need to create more just and compassionate communities
- Sharing of Our Experiences after the workshops
- Closing with a Gratitude Circle and making an offering of our creations on a simple altar in the meditation garden
No RSVP needed. Don’t miss this opportunity to join the arts community in spiritual practice!
The Prison Industrial Complex: the Church’s Response
Saturday, September 21, 2019 at 10 AM – 3 PM
In conjunction with the Joint Youth Ministry, Cambrian Park UMC, Los Gatos UMC, Willow Glen UMC, and SURJ at Sacred Heart, Urban Sanctuary will be participating in a workshop led by Rev. Sophia Jackson entitled “Introduction to Racial Injustice, the Prison Industrial Complex & Mass Incarceration and the Church’s Response: More Conversations on Race & Privilege (CRP).” Lunch will be served. Get tickets here.
White Ally Toolkit Training
Sunday, April 7, 2-5 PM
USSJ is partnering with Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) at Sacred Heart, to bring you a very special event! “Encouraging, Empowering, and Equipping Allies: Using the White Ally Toolkit to Help Dismantle Racism, One Conversation at a Time,” with Dr. David Campt, will be held on April 7, from 2-5 PM, at 160 N. 3rd Street, San Jose, CA 95112.
This is USSJ’s next step after our book club around White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, which asked us to think critically about white privilege and, closer to home, why our church itself is mostly white, and how to change the culture so that it’s more welcoming to people of color. Check out the video below to see what to expect.
Street parking is free on Sundays. Register here, and please note that payment is on a sliding scale. We are covering Dr. Campt’s costs; this is not a fundraiser for either SURJ or USSJ.
See you there!
Join us for our book club starting March 24, in the Recovery Cafe, at 11:30a, for a community discussion of this work led by our very own Kevin Haley! You don’t need to be caught up to join in the discussion, and copies of the book are available for $15 in the front office. See you there!
From Amazon.com:
Pictures of a Gone City: Tech and the Dark Side of Prosperity in the San Francisco Bay Area begins by tracing the concentration of IT in Greater Silicon Valley and the resulting growth in start-ups, jobs, and wealth. This is followed by a look at the new working class of color and the millions earning poverty wages. The middle chapters survey the urban scene, including the housing bubble and the newly exploded metropolis, and the final chapters take on the political questions raised by the environmental impact of the boom, the fantastical ideology of TechWorld, and the tech-led transformation of the region.