Seven-part “Intersections” workshop series begins this month
Intersections brings people from all walks of life into dialogue with the 2021 resource, Challenging Racist “British Columbia,” and with each other. Our hope for this series is that together we encounter our collective past, locate ourselves as participants in the ongoing story of this place, and explore how to respond faithfully to the truths we find together, so that we can participate with God in restoring creation and affirming the dignity of all people.
Each of the seven two-hour sessions responds to a particular part of the CRBC text. Each session is moderated by a trained team of people from across the diocese. The sessions will cover the following topics:
Session 1: Introduction
Session 2: Land, language and treaties
Session 3: Residential “School” system
Session 4: Restrictive immigration
Session 5: Japanese internment
Session 6: Black experiences
Session 7: Conclusion—where do we go from here?
Sessions are interactive and woven through with prayers, music and videos. The intention is that participants would commit to attending all seven sessions and build meaningful relationships with one another, strengthening our common bonds as we continue our journey of truth telling, decolonization, repair and reconciliation.
We will be offering two concurrent series through Lent via Zoom: one on Tuesday (11:30 a.m.–1:30 p.m.) and the other on Wednesday evenings (7:00 p.m.–9:00 p.m.). The first sessions will run on Feb. 22 and 23. Please register through the diocesan website. We have limited each of these sessions to 30 participants, but will be offering the series again later this year. If you would like to sign up but it is full, please email [email protected] with the subject line “Intersections” to have your name placed on the contact list for subsequent offerings.
I want to thank the working group who, with the help of Joan Beck from the Kaleidoscope Institute, shaped these sessions and the group of moderators trained to offer these workshops. Please pray for the moderators and participants of this first offering of this series.
We know that this initiative will not solve the ways white supremacy has been imbued in our social fabric but we are confident that with God’s help we will deepen our understanding of what has taken place, so that we might see with new eyes what a renewed people with renewed hearts and renewed spirits might look like.
