Confronting Racism Workshop Series for Congregations: Workshop #1 “Never Again”: A Reading & Conversation

Confronting Racism: Tacoma Stories of Lament & Hope

A Winter/Spring 2023 Workshop Series for Congregations

“Racism is a powerful system that creates false hierarchies of human value.” That’s how Abraham X. Kendi describes it. Racism’s warped logic has impacted all of us. Churches everywhere have come to understand how deeply “America’s original sin” (Jim Wallis) has shaped us. This series of workshops continues a conversation that has been going on for years between a collection of Tacoma congregations, and will listen to stories of historic injustice (Native American genocide/colonialism, the WW2 Japanese American internment, and Tacoma’s own story of institutional racism), and then invites the stories of how some local Tacoma congregations are confronting racism in their congregations and communities.

Workshop #1 (March 16, 6:30-8p)

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR WORKSHOP #1

“Never Again”: A Reading & Conversation
(download flyer here)

“Never Again” is a 45 minute play written by local playwright Aya Hashiguchi Clark. “Never Again” weaves together first-hand, personal testimonies of Japanese Americans living in Tacoma who were incarcerated in WWII internment camps to tell the story of this tragic event in US history. The reading will be followed by a facilitated conversation.

Workshop #2 (April 20, 6:30-8pm)

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR WORKSHOP #2

“How We Got Here”: The History of Institutional Racism in Tacoma

“How We Got Here” tells the story of institutional racism here in Tacoma, and was produced in 2018 by the City of Tacoma’s Office of Equity & Human Rights. We will watch this 53 minute documentary together, followed by a facilitated conversation.

Workshop #3 (May 18, 6:30-8p)

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR WORKSHOP #3

Stories from Local Congregations Learning to Address Racial Injustice

Two different Tacoma Congregations share stories of what action they are taking both to more deeply educate themselves on racial injustice, and to organize themselves to confront it, and what motivates them.