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A discussion about parenting and liberal religion, with Michelle Richards, author of Tending the Flame: The Art of Unitarian Universalist Parenting. | Welcome | Subscribe
By Michelle Richards, on March 26th, 2012  ©2011 oneclearvision/iStockphoto When Henry went to an overnight camp designed for boys to learn about law enforcement (a subject he was really into), he of course took a bunch of books along with him. He was an avid reader and just couldn’t imagine going to an overnight without some books.
However, many if not most of the other boys didn’t bring books along with them, and they didn’t quite understand Henry’s interest in reading. As they teased and asked him about the books, it eventually degenerated into his roommates asking him, “What, are you gay?”
Henry, having been raised as a Unitarian Universalist and quite familiar with homosexual couples—a number of whom are good family friends—responded to these taunts with a reasonable statement: “I don’t know yet, I’m only 10.”
In his innocence, he didn’t even realize these boys were using the word “gay” as a derogatory term, and since he is fully aware of what the word actually means, he responded as if he was being asked the question in terms of his sexual identity. And while many children already do have an inkling of where their affectional orientation lies at that age, I love the idea that he believed sexuality was something which evolves as you grow and, despite the fact that he didn’t know yet, he believed that if he turned out to be gay, that was okay.
I wasn’t there, but I imagine the boys laughed at his answer to their taunt, and most likely it was an uneasy sort of laughter. Uneasy because Henry made them think and boys (and girls) who are prone to bullying don’t like to be challenged in their thinking.
This is not unlike the comment issued by my bisexual daughter and preserved in her high school’s magazine when she was recently interviewed for a story. In talking about her own sexuality, she explains, “There’s a rumor going around that I’m a lesbian. Well, that’s only half true.”
So while Henry and other children being raised by Unitarian Universalist parents will say they “don’t know,” often times it turns out that they do in fact know a lot more than other kids around them. And who then is better equipped to educate their classmates about loving compassion and social justice?
By Michelle Richards, on January 16th, 2012  U.S. postage stamp; photo ©2011 Ken Brown/iStockphoto Martin Luther King Jr. Day is not only for celebration, remembrance, and a tribute to an amazing individual, but in recent years has evolved into a national day of service. All across America on this day, people perform community service in hospitals, homeless shelters, prisons, and wherever people need help. It is a day of volunteering to feed the hungry, rehabilitate housing, tutor those who can’t read, mentor at-risk youngsters, console the broken-hearted, and a thousand other projects building the beloved community of Dr. King’s dream.
For Unitarian Universalist parents who lament our lack of meaningful holidays, a national day of service can be a way of living our faith together as a family. Beyond honoring the inherent worth and dignity of all persons, this national day of service promotes actively working to uphold our Second Principle, “justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.” And since many children are home from school to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, this can be an optimal family time for community service.
For instance, Laura Yamashita, who attends the Unitarian Universalist Church of Atlanta, marches in the annual Martin Luther King Jr. parade with her children every year. This has become an annual tradition for her family and has marked the passing of the years just like holidays such as Christmas and Thanksgiving. It also makes a clear statement to her children that their presence is important in honoring the man and his work for non-violent social change.
Other Unitarian Universalist parents have arranged time to serve meals in soup kitchens, work on community restoration projects, or donated time to stock a food pantry’s shelves with food for hungry families. The opportunities for service are limitless; in fact, many local organizations that are in need of assistance will hold special opportunities for volunteers to help out on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. You can find out about ways to make a difference all over the country and in your neighborhood through the National Day of Service website.
Even if your family does not engage in social action projects together on this day, the holiday presents an opportunity for Unitarian Universalist children to learn about the power of nonviolent protest and civil disobedience, two key aspects of our religious heritage. One thing that my kids find really amazing is that even though Dr. King was not a Unitarian Universalist, he was heavily influenced by Gandhi (who was a Hindu) and through him, by Henry David Thoreau (a Transcendentalist Unitarian). (King also drew inspiration from the Unitarian-Universalist utopian minister Adin Ballou, whose idea of “nonresistance” influenced Tolstoy and Gandhi, and from the radical Unitarian minister Theodore Parker, whose language about the “moral arc of the universe” King used in his speeches.)
This National Day of Service presents an opportunity for all of us, no matter our color or creed or political affiliation, to create a better world. For beyond his work on the civil rights movement and non-violent protest, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. presented a challenge to all of us when he said, “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: ‘What are you doing for others?’” To this challenge, I’ll add: “What are you doing to teach your children what we need to be doing for others?”
Learn more about the MLK-Thoreau connection at these links: “The Formative Influences on Martin Luther King,” by Gregg Blakely (Peace Magazine, Apr.-June 2001); “The Life and Words of Martin Luther King Jr.” (Scholastic curriculum guide, grades 6-8).
By Michelle Richards, on January 10th, 2011 For many youth raised as Unitarian Universalists, with adolescence comes the acute realization that many of their peers do not hold the same values they do and that our culture at large promotes very different ideals.
 ©knape/iStockphoto In a thoughtful article for Brain, Child magazine, Catherine Newman wonders why we even bother to teach our children the values of sharing and cooperation when “our national ethos is the hoarding of food and medicine, land and resources, like the good capitalists that we are? Congratulations! We’ll say when they turn twenty-one. Now you can start drinking and stop behaving ethically!”
Recognizing that the systems and myths of our culture help to justify the growing divide between the “haves” and “have-nots” will help parents find ways to help our children understand these inequalities before the realization hits them in their teens that the world is full of hypocrisy.
Parents who regularly engage in social action projects can find ways to bring their children along and actively involve them, but we can also use teachable moments to communicate that although we believe sharing and cooperation are ideal, they are not always a reality in our world. Reading books together such as The Lunch Thief by Anne Bromley or One Grain of Rice by Demi can raise discussions about inequities in the world. For older children or teens, movies such as Hotel Rwanda or Blood Diamond can expose them to some of these same issues. News reports or newspaper articles can also open the doors to questions and discussions about the realities of our world.
Ultimately, however, we parents need to support our adolescents in discovering how they can stand up for themselves and speak assertively without offending others. We can also help them express themselves confidently as they address the wrongs they wish to have righted.
We can encourage them to recognize the inequities of the world and do the right thing even when they feel outnumbered or intimidated by others who disagree with them. In short, they need us to be their allies as they adapt to the larger culture where their perspective may not often be valued or even acknowledged as legitimate.
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