Climate Justice
Mission: To care for Mother Earth and all who call her home by centering our four essentials around love.
- Congregational Transformation: Working together to improve the ways we organize and collaborate.
- Community Resilience: Cultivating communities of care to prepare for and respond to climate disruption.
- Justice: Partnering with those most harmed by climate change to build thriving communities.
- Mitigation: Reducing emissions from energy usage, transportation, food systems, waste, & consumption.
Vision: UUCM Climate Justice Ministry believes that together we can move past systems and cultures of extraction to usher in a new era with love and justice at the center of our climate actions. We strive to honor our covenant to protect Earth and all beings from exploitation. Through community care we will create and nurture sustainable relationships of care and respect, mutuality and justice. To repair harm and damaged relationships, we will work to move beyond carbon tunnel vision and towards viewing climate justice as intersectional. We work to cultivate a thriving community that advances a just and equitable transition to a sustainable future. Through spiritual grounding & nourishment, political education, skill building, leadership development, and mobilization, we facilitate shared learning, mutual support, and collective action. Working with external partners like the MNIPL, Green Sanctuary 2030, and MUUSJA, we support UUs to take spiritually grounded, optimistic climate action.
Impact: We focus on practical, systemic, and spiritual impact. Practical impacts include organics and Ridwell collection at church, solar panels on the church roof, removing invasive plants and planting native plants on church grounds, following a plant-forward and ethical diet, etc. Systemic impacts include attending lobby days for climate organizations, advocating for plant-based school meal options, advocating for the closure of the HERC trash incinerator. Spiritual impacts include embracing our shared UU values, while centering love, in our climate actions, building community and supporting one another in spiritual growth and wellbeing.
Get Involved: Our Ministry, Chaired by Genevieve Vavreck, holds monthly hybrid meetings on the fourth Thursday of each month from 6:30–8:00 p.m in person and on Zoom; as well as various special events. To join, sign up through our google form HERE.
Housing Justice
The Housing and Homelessness group is working toward a time when all people have a place to call home. We recognize the impact of racism in the growing housing crisis. We frequently work with other community organizations including Beacon Interfaith Collaborative and Interfaith Outreach and Community Partners (IOCP).
UUCM is dedicated to working to end homelessness and housing insecurity. Our volunteers meet with local lawmakers often and advocate for legislation to support more affordable housing in Minnesota.
The Housing Justice group meets virtually on the fourth Tuesday of each month from 6:30–8:00 p.m. Sue Fust serves as the chair of the Housing Justice Committee. Please reach out to her at drlanasue@yahoo.com for more information on getting involved.
Racial Justice
The Racial Justice group at UUCM works to raise awareness about racism and combat in its many forms. As Unitarian Universalists, we believe in the inherent worth and dignity of every person and justice, equity and compassion in human relations. Our congregation also voted to approve the 8th Principal to covenant to affirm and promote: journeying toward spiritual wholeness by working to build a diverse multicultural Beloved Community by our actions that accountably dismantle racism and other oppressions in ourselves and our institutions.
At UUCM, we work to end racial discrimination and injustice, starting within ourselves and moving out into the world around us. We're dedicated to working with our community partners, including BLUU, the Legal Rights Center, the Minnetonka Coalition for Equitable Education and the Mapping Prejudice Project.
We frequently host educational events and programming. Check out the recording of one of our recent events on Indigenous Perspectives on Palestine. It examines parallels between the colonial experience of Indigenous people in North America and in Palestine/Israel. The presentation also shares words from statements made by tribal governments and Indigenous-led organizations, compare them with the Unitarian Universalist Association's statements, and explore what this means to us as UUs.
The Racial Justice group meets virtually on the second Thursday of each month from 4:30–5:00 p.m. Tyler Grosshuesch and Karen Zais serve as the co-chairs of the Racial Justice Committee. Please reach out to Tyler for more information on getting involved.