What We Believe About White Supremacy and Reparations 

As the faith community that gathers and worships, learns and labors together as Land of the Sky United Church of Christ, we believe white supremacy exists and that its toxic presence undermines beloved community. We know it is killing us all.

Racism and white supremacy are power structures borne out of a destructive legacy of the genocide of indigenous people, colonialism, slavery, and Jim Crow that divide, devastate, and traumatize generations of Black and Indigenous lives.

We honor the grief of those most directly harmed by systemic oppression and the beauty, resilience, and strength of those who have been harmed.

We know that colonialism, racism, and white supremacy have caused harm to our planet, this nation, our community, and our families. And we know that as a community of faith we are complicit in it.

While white supremacy permeates our existence, we believe another world is possible.

We believe when harm has been done, we must work to repair that harm. Reparations are necessary to achieve reconciliation and healing. The work of reparations will not be completed in any of our lifespans, and this is urgent work. We stand in the possibility that our children and our children’s children can live into beloved community.

Reparations is an intentional practice. It requires deep self-reflection and concrete action.

We choose to stay in this difficult work even when it is hard and hurts. In this work, we center Black and Indigenous people and those people most directly harmed by white supremacy.

Land of the Sky UCC, a predominantly white congregation, commits to humility, deep listening, repentance, ongoing learning, and continued evolution towards our better selves as we seek collective liberation.

We stand for naming, acknowledging, and dismantling white supremacy. We stand for a redistribution of power and resources that have been claimed by some and denied to many.

Repair is possible, and reparations will take Holy Imagination.

This statement of beliefs was co-created by the Racial Justice Team of Land of the Sky United March 26, 2019 in order to ground our work and reparations practice.