mission statement
Purposes
To know our past and acknowledge it;
To engage in our present and improve it; and
To imagine an equitable and just future and forge it.
-Dr. Maulana Karenga (creator of Kwanzaa)
To raise awareness and dialogue surrounding racism (past and present), white supremacy, and antiracism
To work against racist laws, policies, and practices in VA and nation-wide
To foster a comfortable environment for people of color in our congregation
Our Antiracism Ministry meets every second Tuesday at 7:30pm on Zoom to work together to fulfill our purposes. We raise awareness and dialogue surrounding racism, white supremacy, and what it means to be antiracist by screening films, offering presentations, holding discussions, book studies, field trips, and presentations from outside speakers. We work against racist policies by partnering with the UCC's Justice and Witness Action Network, and participating in the Network's Faith and Democracy Campaign as appropriate. Finally, we foster a comfortable environment for people of color in our congregation by paying attention to representation in the physical space and in our worship together.
Would you like to join us? Please send an email to antiracism@lrucc.org to receive monthly Zoom meeting links, and keep your eye out for event announcements!
Our Antiracist Founding
Our congregation has an inspiring founding story. Nearly 70 years ago, our church was founded by Congregationalists who were committed to establishing a church in Northern Virginia where Black and White people could worship together during the Jim Crow era. In 1954, old Virginia was still in existence, totally segregated by race in schools, restaurants, drinking fountains, public facilities, and society in general. Although Brown vs. Board of Education had ruled that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional, Virginia was the leader of the “Massive Resistance” of the southern states. In this context, twenty young people decided to establish a new Congregational Church that would 1) teach a faith that is congruent with reason and 2) take action for racial justice.
We began meeting in Annandale Elementary School on Columbia Pike. To our knowledge, we were the first desegregated church in Virginia. The elementary school took notice, requiring the leadership to sign a new application for use of the school, on the condition that they would agree to abide by the Virginia law to segregate the races. The congregation agreed to abide by the law, which they did by designating as seats of honor as many front seats as necessary for people of color, and by sitting in each chair around and behind its Black members and visitors, to welcome and surround them with love.
Our church’s first pastor then gathered a voluntary citizens’ group to explore steps toward public action against discrimination, and church members were also involved in voluntary groups or were involved professionally. One such effort was a Summer Day Camp held on our grounds, called Higher Horizons, which was sponsored by our church, the Unitarian church, and the Fairfax Council. It was first held during the summer just before the first Black students would enter white schools, so that they would get to know each other and have some friends of the other race. Our church was also involved with an interracial Day Care Center in Annandale, and the “March on Washington” in 1963. In 1964, our first pastor also performed the wedding of a white woman and Japanese American man, when it was illegal for a white person to marry anyone with “blood other than Caucasian.”
Renewing antiracism awareness
Since those early days, we know that racism has not gone away. It has simply intertwined and submerged itself into the dominant White culture in the United States today.
What are we doing, as Little River United Church of Christ, to address the subtle racism that has infected us all, the structural racism that is built into our public policies, and the overt racism that rears its ugly head in the murder of and violence against people of color?
In the summer of 2023, many of us read and discussed How to be an Antiracist, by Ibram Kendi, in our Tuesday Discussions. We talked not only about the ideas in that book, but about how antiracism is part of or could be part of our congregational life at Little River. We explored Black theology, reading from James Cone’s work on Black Theology and Black Power. We talked about the difference between being “nice” liberals and being “radical,” by which Cone means taking risks for justice. We analyzed the mural that hangs next to our sanctuary doors, asking what it might mean to present a Christ who identifies with people of color and represents the historical Jesus.
We also explored the worship and organizational culture of Little River and asked whether we are actively resisting racist and assimilationist practices and theologies. We learned to pay attention to how we interpret scripture from Womanist theologian Delores Williams, who explores the similarities between Hagar’s story and African American women’s experience of making a way out of no way.
Finally, we discussed the recent Resolution coming from our own Potomac Association and Central Atlantic Conference, which was approved at the National UCC General Synod this summer, that encourages local congregations to become “White Supremacy Free Zones.” While often associated with the violence perpetrated by the KKK and other extremist groups, we learned that “White Supremacy” also describes a political ideology and systemic oppression that perpetuates and maintains white domination in social, political, and economic institutions. Now we ask ourselves, “How can we work against the maintenance of White dominance here in our local congregation and in Northern Virginia?”
reviving our antiracism ministry
To continue our work toward antiracism, we have officially re-launched our renewed Antiracism Ministry in early 2024 and are looking to expand the Antiracism Ministry team. The team consults regularly in 2024 with Rev. Darryl! Moch, pastor of UCC of Fredericksburg. Rev. Moch is an active leader on antiracism in our Association and Conference and helps us to set priorities, identify resources, and strategize for the work ahead.
Through this work, we are striving with God’s help and the support of one another to be transformed from nonracists, who believe that racism is wrong, to antiracists, who take action to oppose systemic racism and confront White Supremacy.
We all have a part to play. What is yours? Contact the Board of Outreach and Social Justice with thoughts and suggestions.
