The Methodist Federation for Social Action (MFSA) will be holding a Justice-Seeking Movement Wide Webinar to share the results of a three-year organizational racial audit that the organization has conducted to find the places where it has been complicit with white-supremacy and make recommendations for improvement. The webinar will begin the process of working with those recommendations to live into these anti-racist commitments.

The audit includes research and study of the organization's history and connections to other organizations, recognizes past patterns and themes, and ultimately offers a set of recommendations. As the audit report states, ”MFSA seeks to understand more clearly the patterns of white dominance and seeks to begin transforming our organizational structure and culture to be anti-racist.”

While the audit is focused on MFSA, others in the United Methodist Connection are invited to participate in the learnings and possibly use it as a springboard for evaluating white dominance and historic racism in other church related organizations.

This webinar will be held on Monday, February 27, 2023 at 7:00 p.m. ET, 6:00 pm CT, 5:00 p.m. MT and 4:00 p.m. PT. It will be an introductory overview session of the report from the audit team, including the themes and recommendations of the report.

Following the February 27th release of the audit report, an implementation team will be formed to shepherd the process of implementing the recommendations adopted by the MFSA Board and Program Council.

MFSA invites you — individuals, churches, and other organizations — to participate in this work. That may mean studying the report and considering how such a study could help you and your organization be more anti-racist, or it could mean joining with MFSA in their intersectional justice focus.

Click here to read the MFSA Organizational Racial Audit Executive Summary.

****EVENT IS POSTPONED. The rescheduled date will be released soon.***

Register for part three in Stealing the Earth webinar series: "Pervasive & Self-Perpetuating: The Continuous Falsifying of Narratives" December 8, 2021 at 1PM ET. We will discuss how dehumanization and violence are used to perpetuate the Doctrine of Discovery and how that continues today.

Speakers:
LaRenda Morgan is an enrolled member of the Cheyenne Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma and is also part of the Otoe Missouria Tribe. She attended Carter Seminary Indian boarding school and is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma with a B.A. in Social Sciences and a Masters in Human Relations. Since then she has held a wide variety of offices within her tribe and Oklahoma state government, and is currently the Governmental Affairs Officer for the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes. She’s also been involved in electoral politics on the local and national level, was Tribal Liaison for the Oklahoma Democratic Party, and a 2016 Democratic Candidate for Oklahoma House District 93. She was also Oklahoma Campaign Co- Chair for Bernie Sanders in 2020. She regularly speaks on the topics of Intergenerational Trauma, Historical Trauma, Cultural Competency, Foster Care Recruitment, Indian Child Welfare Act Compliance, Barriers to Native Voting, Native Political Engagement, Native Voters, Tribal State Relations, Women in Gaming Empowerment Tools, Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Epidemic and Domestic Violence in Indian Country. La Renda Morgan is a United Methodist who also participates in traditional Cheyenne ceremonies. She’s been married for 27 years, has two children and a dog, and is a proud Cheyenne descendent of “Shell Woman,” a survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864.

Leon (Kaulahao) Siu is of Hawaiian and Chinese ancestry and hails from the island of Hawaii. While he is well known as a recording artist with the group “Leon & Malia,” he also plays a vital role in the movement to restore the Hawaiian Kingdom as a sovereign nation. To that end he is currently serving as its Minister of Foreign Affairs with the goal of restoring diplomatic relations with other nations. He also serves as a director of the Koani Foundation. In 2016 Mr. Siu was awarded the Knights Grand Cross of the Royal Order of Kamehameha, was nominated for the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize and in June 2017 he received the Decree of Consecration Diploma and Gold Medal “UN Peacemaker Sergio Vieira de Mello Award” from the International Parliament. He is co-author of the book, Modus Vivendi Situation of West Papua and the editor of two seminal works: Perpetuated in Righteousness and Hawaii the Fake State – A Nation in Captivity. Leon Siu is striving to promote understanding, cooperation, creativity and good will. As a follower of Jesus, he is committed to glorifying God in all he does. He is one of the founders of Aloha Ke Akua Ministries, which encourages native peoples to seek God through the gifts God has deposited in their own cultures. He also served on the steering committees of many indigenous religious organizations and is an elder in an indigenous church called Ka Ohana O Ke Aloha.

The second webinar will explore the ways that the Doctrine of Discovery is implicated and implemented in the seizure of indigenous lands from North America to Palestine.

Our Speakers:

Tink Tinker, a citizen of the Osage Nation (wazhazhe), is Emeritus Professor of American Indian Studies at Iliff School of Theology and author. During his 33 years at Iliff, Dr. Tinker brought a distinctly Indian perspective to a predominantly White, euro-christian school and continues to do so in lectures across the continent. As an Indian academic Tinker is committed to a scholarly endeavor that takes seriously both the liberation of Indian peoples from their historic oppression as colonized communities and the liberation of White Americans, the historic colonizers and oppressors of Indian peoples, whose own history has been largely suppressed. For nearly three decades he volunteered both administratively and as a traditional spiritual leader at Four Winds American Indian Council in Denver and worked closely with the American Indian Movement of Colorado. His publications include: American Indian Liberation: A Theology of Sovereignty (Orbis, 2008); Spirit and Resistance: American Indian Liberation and Political Theology (Fortress, 2004); Missionary Conquest: The Gospel and Native American Genocide (Fortress Press, 1993); and co-editor of Native Voices: American Indian Sovereignty and Identity (University of Kansas, 2003). He has published nearly a hundred journal articles and chapters for edited volumes.

Jonathan Brenneman is a Palestinian-American Christian who grew up in the Great Lakes watershed, St. Marys, Ohio (traditional Shawnee land). Jonathan was a frontline activist of Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) Palestine project in Hebron/Al-Khalil from 2012 to 2014. After his time with CPT he completed a Masters at the University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. That program included a six-month internship in Cape Town, South Africa fighting for more just land policies. Jonathan was the Israel/Palestine Partners in Peacemaking Coordinator for Mennonite Church USA, where he facilitated the writing, passing, and implementation of the Seeking Peace in Israel and Palestine Resolution. Jonathan continues to work for Palestinian liberation through connecting the Palestinian decolonial struggle with those of other indigenous peoples, and challenging theologies of domination.