St. Stephen’s is beginning to undertake, diligently and collectively, the work of anti-racism as a congregation. You’ll find below the chronology of our efforts. If you want to join in the work, be in touch with Steve or Ethan
Anti-Racism Curriculum
Six weeks – Oct 11th through Nov 16th
On Sunday and Monday evenings for six weeks, we will be undertaking an anti-racism curriculum together based on the work of the folks out of the Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing in the Diocese of Atlanta. We will be running two sections of the curriculum — one for adults and one for high schoolers, both on Zoom. The high school section will run on Sundays from 5:00-6:00pm. The adult section will run on Mondays from 7:00-8:00pm. Dates for these sections are as follows:
Adults; Mondays from 7:00-8:00pm; Oct 12, Oct 19, Oct 26, Nov 2, Nov 9, Nov 16.
Authors of Color reading group
On the second Tuesday of the month, join in for a one hour discussion of a different fiction book, on Zoom. The goal is, simply, to engage deeply with the self-articulated lived-experiences of people of different racial/cultural/ethnic backgrounds and to see what we understand better about their culture and our own underlying assumptions. Be in touch with Ethan for the Zoom link.
| Oct 13th: Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya |
| Nov 10th: The Vanishing Half by Britt Bennett |
| Dec 8: TBD |
I’m Still Here by Austin Channing Brown – book groups
The leadership at St. Stephen’s is organizing a series of book clubs to read and discuss together the memoir by Austin Channing Brown. Each of the book club sections will meet twice, two weeks apart, on the same day and time.
The options are as follows: Sundays at 11am, Mondays at 7pm, Tuesdays at 7pm, and Thursdays at 9:30am. The meetings are 90 minutes long and will meet on Zoom. The discussions begin on July 26th and wrap up by August 13th. If you are interested in participating, sign up below and/or be in touch with Ethan or Steve.
Movie Discussion of 13th
On Thursday, July 2nd, members of St. Stephen’s gathered on Zoom to discuss the movie 13th, directed by Ava DuVernay. The movie is available on Netflix, YouTube, Amazon, and pretty much anywhere movies are available.
Catherine Meeks and the Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing
At our inaugural meetings on June 19th and June 22nd, among the things we discussed was this sermon by Dr. Catherine Meeks on the 400th anniversary of the slave trade, given at St. Philip’s Cathedral in Atlanta.
Beginning sermons
A series of sermons launched this effort, specifically following the killing of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police department on May 25th.