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This spring, right after the terrible school shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, an interfaith group of religious leaders and young people gathered at Augusta Lutheran Church in Portland. They decided it was time to do something. It is from this meeting that Measure 43, a ballot measure to limit the sale and ownership of assault weapons, was born.
The coalition, Lift Every Voice, proposes two steps to make Oregon a safer place for all residents. The first step is to ensure that semiautomatic weapons and large capacity magazines are registered by responsible gun owners. The second step is to prohibit the future sale of these weapons and magazines in Oregon . This campaign was started out of a passionate conviction, and the timeline for getting signatures gathered to make it on the ballot is tight. Everything is ALMOST ready to begin gathering signatures. The push for the 88,184 signatures needed will not begin until court challenges to the Ballot Title have been cleared. After that there will only be a few days or weeks to gather signatures before the July 6th deadline. Lift Every Voice is asking that people who want to gather signatures get trained before the ballot title is cleared. That way signature gathers can be ready to start gathering signatures ASAP! Action of the Week - Mark your calendars to attend a short training on petition gathering for Measure 43. Lift Every Voice says "These trainings will be less than one hour in length and are open to all who want to support this effort by learning how to effectively gather signatures to put this measure on the November 6, 2018 ballot." Monday, June 11 in Portland (emphasis on youth involvement) at 7pm at Augustana Lutheran Church, 2710 NE 14th Ave. Wednesday, June 13 in Salem at 7pm at St. Mark's Lutheran Church, 790 Marion St N.E. Thursday, June 14 in Eugene at 7pm at First Christian Church, 1166 Oak St. Tuesday, June 19 in Portland at 7pm at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, 147 NW 19th Ave. Wednesday, June 20 in Bend at 7pm at Trinity Episcopal Church, 469 NW Wall St. You can check out Lift Every Voice's website and sign up as a volunteer here if you want to know more. In Love and Faith, Rev. Katie Larsell Calendar June 5th, Truthful Tuesday live-stream, National Poor People’s Campaign,The Right to a Healthy Planet, from 4:30 – 7:00 pm, First Unitarian Church, 1011 SW 12th Ave, Portland. June 12th Truthful Tuesday live-stream, National Poor People’s Campaign, Everybody's Got the Right to Live, from 4:30 – 7:00 pm, First Unitarian Church, 1011 SW 12th Ave, Portland. June 19th Truthful Tuesday live-stream, National Poor People’s Campaign, A New and Unsettling Force, from 4:30 – 7:00 pm, First Unitarian Church, 1011 SW 12th Ave, Portland. Sept 15 -- Oregon Unitarian Universalist Voices for Justice Annual Social Justice Conference. Mark your Calendar
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The Oregon Poor People’s Campaign will be livestreaming Truthful Tuesday Teach-Ins presented by the national Poor People’s Campaign, from 4:30 – 7:00 pm each Tuesday during the 40 days of Action.
The livestream will be from 4:30 – 6:00 pm, followed by local discussion and Q&A about the campaign and its goals. The goal of the teach-ins is to create an opportunity for deeper education on the issues at the heart of this campaign and to build power among our community, bringing us together through deeper discussion and reflection. Action of the Week: Join with the campaign for Truthful Tuesday Teach-Ins on May 29, June 5, 12, 19 from 4:30 – 7:00 pm in Eliot Chapel, First Unitarian Church, 1011 SW 12th Avenue, Portland. Each week, in the Truthful Tuesday Teach-Ins we will learn more about the intersectionality of the four evils addressed by the campaign: system racism, systemic poverty, militarism and ecological devastation, and the reframing and correction of the current moral narrative.
Here is a link for a flyer to use at your congregation.Contact: Rev. Connie Yost, cyost@uuma.org, 503-385-2135 In Love and Faith, Rev. Katie Larsell Calendar Sept 15 -- Oregon Unitarian Universalist Voices for Justice Annual Social Justice Conference. Mark your Calendar The Oregon Poor People's Campaign will be joining with Portland Democratic Socialists of America in a rally and action in Salem on Monday, May 21. Governor Kate Brown is calling a special session to cut taxes for business owners. Join us to protest this tax cut for already wealthy individuals. As reported in The Oregonian, this tax plan will mostly benefit high-income individuals making well over $200,000 a year. It would take away critical revenue needed to fund schools, affordable housing, and other vital services. Giving a tax break to wealthy business owners is moving us in the wrong direction. Our country and our state needs a fair, tax system that can provide the services we need. Our schools, our elders and the mentally ill have a hard time lobbying for services. We need to do it for them. There are two possible Actions of the Week. Action 1: Join the Oregon Poor People's campaign and the Portland Democratic Socialists of America at their rally on the Capitol steps to protest this special session for the wealthy. The rally is in Salem on Monday May 21 from12-1pm. Tell our state officials that we want our tax system to reflect our values! Immediately following the rally, the Oregon Poor People's Campaign will lead people in an action that may result in civil disobedience; other participants may be witnesses. Watch for the email from the Oregon Poor People's Campaign that will have the RSVP link. Sign up here to receive the email. Action 2: If you can't make it to Salem (or even if you can), let your Oregon legislators know that you do not want to see them pass this tax cut. You can do that here. Your email will give the legislators and Governor Brown some suggestions. They could make the tax cut revenue neutral, meaning it will not affect the Oregon State Budget. They can put a sunset date on the tax cut so it runs out a few years from now. In Love and Faith, Rev. Katie Larsell Calendar May 18-20th Rural Organizing Project, 2018 Rural Caucus and Strategy in the Dalles. More Info Sept 15 -- Oregon Unitarian Universalist Voices for Justice Annual Social Justice Conference. Mark your Calendar! My legislator, Senator Michael Dembrow, is a wonderful liberal legislator. When I go to a Salem lobby day, I often find he wrote the legislation I was going to lobby him about. Or if he didn't write it, at least he sponsored it! I end up congratulating him for doing the right thing!
I’ve heard this story of liberal people lobbying like minded legislators many times. Urban legislature tend to be liberal, rural legislature tend to be conservative. Senator Dembrow has said to me something like, 'do you have friends and family in rural Oregon? If so, talk to them, because it’s those rural legislators that need to know more about this bill.' Outside of contacting our rural cousins and friends, or moving to a beautiful rural setting, what can we do about the rural-urban divide? I try to remember we aren’t all urbanites. We do have small UU congregations all over Oregon in rural areas. And we have rural members of our urban congregations. This action of the week is especially for our congregations in Grants Pass, Roseburg, Astoria, McMinnville, Klamath Falls, Hood River, Newport, Florence, Bend, and Coos Bay. It's also for UU’s who live in the country but attend a congregation in Ashland, Eugene, Corvallis, Salem or Oregon City. That is quite a few people! The Action of the Week: attend the Rural Organizing Project’s2018 Rural Caucus & Strategy Session in the Dalles over the Friday through Sunday May 18-20th week-end. Sign up here,and mark your calendars. Here is an agenda of what is happening at the gathering:
You can support rural UUs by attending the Friday events and participate in the NORCOR Rally and dinner. Here is a little bit about The Rural Organizing Project (ROP). It’s a statewide organization of locally-based groups that work to create communities accountable to a standard of human dignity: the belief in the equal worth of all people, the need for equal access to justice, and the right to self-determination. Their three guiding principles are a lot like our seven principles:
ROP was started in 1992 in response to the Oregon Citizens Alliance’s terrible Abnormal Behaviors Initiative, which targeted gay and lesbian Oregonians for legalized second-class citizenship. Oregonians in small towns across the state mobilized, many for the first time. ROP stepped into this organizing opportunity to fill a niche the radical right was trying to claim. You can read more on their great website . Create a more just Oregon and support the Rural Organizing Project. In Love and Faith, Rev. Katie Larsell Calendar May 12, Saturday -- Lummi Totem Pole Journey, Ecotruct blg, Portland, More Details Here May 15, Monday -- Poor People's Campaign, First Action Day, Salem SIgn Up Here Sept 15, Saturday -- Oregon Unitarian Universalist Voices for Justice Annual Social Justice Conference. Mark your Calendar |
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