November 10-13, 2025
Opening Worship
Chaplain will lead our opening Monday evening session as a worshipful introduction to the theme, including rituals of welcome and ingathering.
Session 1 (Tue AM): Theological Engagement with Authoritarianism:
Writer: Krista Taves. Responder: Oscar Sinclair
In the face of authoritarianism, to whom can UU’s look for theological guidance from within our own tradition and beyond? What theological grounding does UUism bring to the resistance of authoritarianism? What are the core characteristics of how religious traditions could be co-opted to support authoritarian governments?
Session 2 (Tue PM): Latin America Witness and US Authorianism,
Writer: Jim Foti. Responder Susan Frederick-Gray
What lessons can we learn from Romero’s witness in the face of authoritarianism? What are insights on how to resist as a religious community (or UUA) that we could apply at institutional level (congregations, community, denominationally) we could draw from the catholic institutional response that was present in Romero’s time? What would a liberationist UU theology today look like?
Session 3 (Wed AM): Worship as a Force that Feeds and Foments Opposition to Authoritarianism,
Writer: Nic Cable. Responder: Jessica Clay
How do we create a multilayer worship experience that comforts and challenges? How do we transform the experience we are having of the current reality into the pulpit? How do we strengthen and equip the community at this time through preaching and/or ritual?
Session 4 (Wed PM): The Care of Souls through Autocracy,
Writer: Jason Lydon. Responder Schuyler Vogel
How do we care for conflict amongst our people? How do we ground people in traumatizing times, when people being reactive is part of the authoritarian’s playbook? What do we learn from communities of resistance about spiritual sustenance across time?
Main Resources
Adams, James Luther, The Evolution of my Social Concern (online article)
1976. On Being Human Religiously, Part I
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. 1995. The Cost of Discipleship. Simon and Schuster. (book)
Gessen, Masha. 2021. Surviving Autocracy (book)
Hodgson, Irene. 2015. Through the Year with Oscar Romero: Daily Meditations (book)
Kujawa-Holbrook, Sheryl; Montagno, Karen. 2023. Injustice and the Care of Souls: Taking Oppression Seriously in Pastoral Care (book)
Nguyen, Elizabeth. Risk, Courage and Discernment: Spiritual Preparation (website)
Romero, Jasmine. Sacred Scandal Nation of Saints, Season 3 (podcast)
The Archbishop Romero Trust (website) http://www.romerotrust.org.uk/homilies-and-writings/homilies
Thomas, Frank. 2020. Surviving a Dangerous Sermon. (book)
Thurman, Howard, “The Fascist Masquerade,” 1946 (online paper)
Supplementary Resources
Protect Democracy: The Authoritarian Playbook
Project Democracy: The Faithful Fight: Practicing noncooperation and civil disobedience
Authoritarianism: How You Know It When You See It
Applebaum, Anne. Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism. First Anchor Books edition. New York: Anchor Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, 2021.
Mullen, Bill V., and Christopher Vials. 2020. The US Antifascism Reader. Verso Books.
Crew: Countering authoritarianism: A blueprint for a more resilient democracy
Rebecca Tapscott, Militarized masculinity and the paradox of restraint: mechanisms of social control under modern authoritarianism, International Affairs, Volume 96, Issue 6, November 2020, Pages 1565–1584, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiaa163
Prairie Group 