Spirituality and Racial Equity: Exploring Power and Privilege

Broadly Spiritual Programming Series

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Do you want to talk about racial privilege but you don’t know where to begin?

This eight-session program awakens participants to the economic systems, public policies, cultural norms, and hidden biases that empower some and oppress others.

Program Overview

Using mindfulness and meditation practices to ground the program, Spirituality and Racial Equity introduces a framework for understanding and recognizing racial disparities and takes a deeper dive into specific issues related to power and privilege.

Spirituality and Racial Equity invites participants to formulate their own spiritually-rooted responses to racism in their families, workplaces, and communities. By fostering active listening, dialogue, and meditation and mindfulness, this program forms a group that is rooted in trust and compassion. Through new learning from articles, videos, and resource books (White Fragility, I’m Still Here and The Inner Work of Racial Justice), it lends new insights to participants’ awareness of privilege and racism. By encouraging mindfulness practices and informed action, it cultivates an expanding community of people who work to dismantle racism in their respective contexts.

Spirituality and Racial Equity is not based on any one specific religion or denomination. It is designed for a more broadly spiritual audience. Those who are unaffiliated with a church or religious tradition or who identify as “spiritual but not religious” will find the program content relevant and meaningful. This version of the program may also resonate with an interfaith audience. Meditative practices at the beginning and end of each session provide a spiritual foundation for the program. These practices draw from Hindu and Buddhist practices of mindfulness but do not arise from any one particular religious tradition. (A specifically Christian version of “Faith and Racial Equity” is also available).

Spirituality and Racial Equity is not for the faint of heart! The program is designed for participants who are willing to wrestle with hard questions and take an honest look at their own attitudes, assumptions, and choices. However, through spiritual grounding and community-building, participants find support and belonging throughout their journey to personal transformation and social action.

Program Goals

Goals for Spirituality and Racial Equity: Exploring Power and Privilege include:

To help participants better address racism in their communities and workplaces.

To communicate welcome and embrace toward all people.

To answer difficult questions about race and privilege in the United States.

Sessions

Spirituality & Racial Equity: Exploring Power and Privilege consists of eight 2-hour sessions, an opening retreat, and an immersion experience into the local community.

Recommended group size is 8-14.

Program Framework & Session Topics

  • Opening Retreat: Community-Building & Self-Reflection

  • Session 1: Breaking the Silence

  • Session 2: The Invention of Race

  • Session 3: Socialization

  • Session 4: What is Whiteness?

  • Session 5 (guest speaker): Privilege and Education

  • Session 6: Privilege and the Media

  • Immersion Experience (to be determined by the group)

  • Session 7: The Accused

  • Session 8: Opting In

Sessions include:

Meditation and mindfulness practices
Dialogue
Active listening
Relationship building
Videos/guest speaker

Want to know more?

An overview, sample session, and program booklet are available for free download.

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Program Promotion

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Cost

We believe strongly in making our programs inclusive and available to everyone

Cost should never be a barrier to participation, and we are committed to working with individuals and organizations to ensure meaningful access through flexible pricing options. Why do we use a sliding fee scale?

There are Two Registration Options:

Option 1: Individual Participant Registration

Participants register and pay individually using a sliding-scale fee of $45, $60, or $75 per person, based on ability to pay. If $45 is still inaccessible, participants can choose the Pay-What-You-Can option to choose a price that is right for them.

  • There is no charge for up to two facilitators.
  • A minimum of 8 participants is strongly recommended.

Option 2: Organization-Sponsored Registration

A church or organization may choose to cover registration for all participants using a sliding fee scale of $45, $60, or $75 per person, based on ability to pay.

  • The organization will be billed a flat rate of the amount chosen below, which covers up to 8 participants.
  • For groups larger than 8, the organization will be invoiced an additional $45, $60, or $75 per participant when the group begins, price depending on the chosen amount below.
  • If the lowest fee is inaccessible to your organization or ministry, choose the Pay-What-You-Can Rate to learn about shared-cost or reduced-fee options.

What the Registration Fee Includes

  • Comprehensive materials for each session (instant download upon purchase)
  • Facilitation scripts, guidance, and training resources
  • Retreat and immersion planning assistance
  • Adaptations for virtual groups
  • Direct access to program staff for ongoing support
  • Books are an additional cost and may be purchased separately through the bookstore.

To ensure our programs remain accessible while remaining sustainable, we utilize a sliding fee scale of $45 to $75 for our registrations. We invite you to choose the registration tier that best reflects you or your faith community's current financial reality. Paying on the higher end allows us to keep the program affordable for all.

We also offer a Pay-What-You-Can Rate. If the lowest rate does not seem accessible to you or your church at this time, don’t let this be a barrier to participation. Contact our staff here to learn about shared-cost or reduced fee options.

 

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What our program participants are saying

As a Unitarian Universalist residing in the Bible Belt, I've become used to interfaith-based conversations that revolve around all the flavors of Christianity, so this course on Spiritual and Racial Equity surprised me as being true to its promise of welcoming and speaking to people of all faith traditions. My favorite part could be the guided meditations which were effective even over Zoom. I recommend this course for people who recognize that systemic racism in American makes individual relationships messy, complicated and nuanced - yet the participant is prepared to dig in anyway, willing to experience discomfort at times because, ultimately, the pavers on the pathway to justice we are laying down are comprised of joy, prophetic wisdom, empowerment, and good will, all of them being spiritually-centered attributes and pursuits that we may overlook. Engaging in the 'struggle' and the 'work' of anti-racism may be necessary labor but this program prepares participants' hearts and minds to be open to the beauty and transformation that are always within our reach along the way, no matter how distant we may be from the justice we seek.

Jim H.

One of the most important things I learned in this series is how much I didn’t know! I am far from alone: Our educational systems in the U.S. have white-washed our base of knowledge about our racial history. The readings, assignments and discussions in this series were constructive, even when difficult. We felt safe sharing our opinions, personal history and beliefs, and left empowered to take a stand against injustice. I cannot recommend this series more highly.

Susan H.