On Sunday, September 15, UUFR had technical difficulties with its livestream so we are posting Rev. James’s message from that morning below…
We have such a hard time imagining our lives different as different than they are now. Our present reality looms so large. Our present reality looms so large in our field of vision it is like an 18-wheeler we’re stuck behind on a two-lane highway. We have such a hard time seeing passed it into a future that could be different from our present.
We have a hard time imagining our children growing up even when they seem to be growing up before our eyes. We have a hard time imagining ourselves growing old, and when we do, as some of you have shared with me, we look in the mirror and say, “How the hell did that happen?”
We also have a hard time imagining how we might intentionally change our lives for the better. We falsely believe that the way things are now are the way they always have to be.
I want to suggest for your consideration this morning that the biggest obstacle for any of us in creating change in our individual lives or our collective lives is not lack of time, lack of money, lack of know how, lack of a real desire for change, lack of individual willpower or lack of collective political power, but lack of imagination.
The Black feminist poet and education Lucille Clifton once said, “We cannot create what we cannot imagine,” and I believe that’s true.
Em Puertolas is one of our staff members here at UUFR. She is one of our youth group advisors and also helps with many administrative tasks around UUFR.
Em started running again in January of 2022, running only a mile or so at once. At the time they started running, they couldn’t imagine themselves running any more than a few miles, but a year and a half later, last fall, they ran their first half marathon. Before the race, even a half-marathon seemed like a nearly impossible distance to run, but after successfully finishing a half marathon, Em began to be able to imagine themselves running and finishing a full marathon.
Later this fall, they are planning to run their first full marathon in Philadelphia. But, Em said, if they couldn’t first imagine it in their head, they couldn’t have even begun to train for it.
Em has already successfully completed a 20-mile run, and most long-distance runners say that if you can run 20 miles, you are physically ready to run 26.2 miles. But as Em shared at a recent staff meeting, their biggest challenge isn’t a physical one, but continues to be a mental one, picturing themselves crossing the finish line. They know now that will be the key to doing well in November.
I find Em’s story inspiring, and I hope all of us will wish them well in Philadelphia this fall.
I think Em’s story inspires all of us to ask ourselves, “What is it that I might want to be different in my life? Can I really imagine it happening?” If we can’t, that might be the place to start. To repeat Clifton’s words, “We cannot create what we cannot imagine.”
I think a lack of imagination is not only what holds us back in our individual lives, but also in our collective lives.
I think it’s more important than ever for all of us to imagine the possibility of a world in which all people are treated with compassion and dignity, where women have autonomy over their own bodies again, where we are taking practical steps to reduce climate change.
Because if we can’t imagine it, we cannot create it because we will certainly give in to despair and inaction.
I want to commend all of you here at UUFR who are participating in this congregation’s “UU the Vote Effort” to send 6000 postcards to infrequent voters before the November election. Research shows that efforts like this increase voter turnout between 1 and 3 percent, which may be enough to determine one or more outcomes in the November election. As you sit down and write your postcards, I hope you will imagine one of the people receiving these postcards, who otherwise wouldn’t have voted, going to vote. I hope you will imagine that vote making a difference in the future of our country and you being a part of that difference.
How many of you here this morning are writing postcards? Can you imagine that making a difference?…If we can imagine it, we can make it happen.
I know many of us are very much focused on the presidential election. I am too. My family and I watched the debate together. My pets haven’t been so traumatized since the Fourth of July. I also happened to find myself in Greensboro on Thursday evening, and it was an exciting place to be.
However, as always, we have the most power to make the biggest difference closer to home, so also want all of us to imagine how life could be different not only in our country but right here in Raleigh and the rest of Wake County.
We know the biggest issue in Wake County is affordable housing.
I’ve talked with you many times before.
I’ve told you before how Wake County’s homeless population has doubled from 2019 until 2023, with adults and children sleeping outside or in their cars or in abandoned buildings.
I’ve told you before how many families have to choose every month between buying food, paying for necessary prescriptions, or paying rent.
I’ve told you before how historically Black communities in Southeast Raleigh are being decimated by gentrification and skyrocketing property taxes. There is an exodus by Black families who have lived in these neighborhoods for generations to other parts of Wake County and other parts of the state.
More recently, I’ve heard about children streaming off school buses that stop at the cheap motels along Capitol Boulevard because so many families with children now call those places home.
I’ve told you before about hundreds of mostly Hispanic families at a mobile home park in Cary, which provides some of the last low-cost housing in Cary, being in danger of losing their homes and displaced, because the land underneath the mobile homes they own is now up for sale.
I’ve told you how teachers and nurses and firefighters can’t afford to live in Cary and how some of my son’s high school teachers commuted more than an hour each way between home and work. I told you two weeks ago about how my family recently moved from Cary to Apex, in part because my rent has gone up by one third in five years. More recently, I’ve heard about Wake Med hospital employees sleeping in their cars between shifts because they had no permanent home to which to return or one that was too far away to which to easily return between shifts.
I’ve told you how more and more people moving to Wake County are living further and further out to find affordable housing, including many of the newcomers to this congregation, and how commute times in Wake County are expected to double by 2035, which will mean many more tons of greenhouses gases spewing into our atmosphere. If you think your commute is too long already now, I’d encourage you to get an audiobook subscription and develop a taste in Russian literature.
It doesn’t have to be like this. It’s not like this in other parts of the world. It’s not even like this in other parts of this country.
I invite you to join me this morning imagining something else is possible. I invite you to join me in imagining living in a county in which no adult or child ever had to sleep outside, in their car, or an abandoned building, or even in a cheap motel on Capitol Boulevard.
I invite you to join me in imagining living in a place where not only teachers, nurses, firefighters can live in the communities where they work, but so can the people who cut our hair, stock our grocery shelves, mow and landscape our yards and parks, and repair our roads.
The current wealth gap between white families and Black families is more than $200,000, so I invite you to join me in imagining living in a place where more Black and brown families can buy their own homes and build generational wealth that they can pass on to their children and grandchildren.
Can you imagine that?… If we can imagine it, we can make it happen.
Most importantly, I want you to join me in imagining that all of us together can play a part in making this a reality.
Can you imagine that?…If we can imagine it, we can make it happen.
But how?
As most of you know, UUFR belongs to ONE Wake, a community organizing coalition of nearly 50 religious organizations and civic institutions. It is a multiracial, multicultural, and multifaith coalition that was founded in the fall of 2020.
Just in the last year, ONE Wake successfully advocated for funding to help those Cary mobile home park residents who will likely be displaced from their homes. Just this last year, ONE Wake successfully advocated for funding for a new, permanent drop-in shelter for homeless individuals. More than a dozen of you attended a county budget hearing last May where I spoke about this, in August the county approved funds, and two weeks ago an article appeared in The News-Observer about a building that had been purchased in North Raleigh.
But now ONE Wake is imagining even bigger.
In the 1980s, a group of congregations in East Brooklyn New York formed an organization similar to ONE Wake, convinced the city of New York to sell them unused land very cheaply, and eventually built more than 4500 affordable homes for mostly first-time Black and Latino homebuyers that has now generated more than $1.5 billion in generational wealth. Some of you may remember I talked about this last Easter.
ONE Wake wants to do something similar here in Wake County and build 1000 affordable homes and 1000 affordable rental units on unused land currently owned by municipalities, the county, and the state.
How does ONE Wake plan to do this?
On Thursday, October 10, ONE Wake is going to host a candidates’ assembly at Watts Chapel Missionary Baptist Church in Raleigh. Twenty six of the 27 mayoral and city council candidates are already confirmed to be there.
At this meeting, ONE Wake plans to present them with a petition with 10,000 signatures in support of this plan. ONE Wake plans to have at least 1,000 people there, and in front of those 1,000 people ask each candidate individually if they will support ONE Wake’s plan.
Will they say less? In the last Raleigh municipal elections, the mayor’s race was decided by less than 10,000 votes, so if we present them with 10,000 signatures and 1,000 of us show up in person, I imagine they will.
Then on Sunday, October 20, in Durham, ONE Wake and its sister organizations across North Carolina will hold another assembly for candidates running for statewide offices, including candidates for governor, attorney general, and state superintendent of public instruction. ONE Wake and its sister organizations will be asking them for their support on affordable housing, food access, mental health care.
ONE Wake is inviting these candidates because no matter which party controls the state legislature, elected leaders in these offices have the ability to take action on their own.
To date, only Mo Green, a candidate for State Superintendent of Public Instruction, is confirmed to attend, but I have hopes other candidates will confirm as the date draws nearer.
Then in the fall election, not only will all of you have a chance to vote for candidates who support this plan, but Cary voters will also have the opportunity to vote for a $30 million affordable housing bond for the first time. By the way, I doubt this bond would be appearing on the ballot if not for the candidate assembly ONE Wake held last fall in Cary, the largest in Cary’s history, in which 600 people showed up to show support for more funding for affordable housing in Cary.
So what can all of you do?
More than anything else, I invite you to believe that this is possible and that you can make a difference in making it possible.
Can you imagine that? If we can imagine it, we can make it happen.
Then, if you live anywhere in Wake County, sign the petition in support of ONE Wake’s housing plan. More than 300 of you already have. If you are really motivated, you can also pick up a clip board with the copy of the petition, gather signatures from friends and neighbors, and bring them back to UUFR before October 10.
By the way, St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Cary is another ONE Wake congregation. Father Javier Almendarez-Bautista is a pastor there. Father Javier and I good colleagues, but we are also a little competitive, so we agreed that if UUFR can get more signatures than St. Paul’s by October 10, St. Paul’s will provide us with baked goods for one of our social hours, but if St. Paul’s collects more signatures than UUFR, then we have to do the same for them.
What do you say? Are we going to let a bunch of Episcopalians collect more signatures than us? I’m in the mood for some Episcopalian eclairs, how about you?
Then, if you live in Raleigh, sign up to attend the October 10 assembly. I would like UUFR to send at least 100 people. To make it easier for people from UUFR to attend, we plan to rent a chartered bus from UUFR to Watts Chapel and back, and even arrange carpools for people uncomfortable driving to or from UUFR at night.
Let me make something clear. The affordable housing crisis affects each and every one of us, but it is affecting Wake County’s Black residents more than others, and it is the leaders of predominantly Black churches who are taking the lead on ONE Wake’s plan. They are explicitly and specifically asking UUFR for our help. Last spring, we unanimously voted to put up a Black Lives Matters Flag in front of our building. If we truly believe Black Lives Matters, we need to show up on October 10.
Then, if you live in Cary, I encourage you to vote for the affordable housing bond on your ballot, but before then, attend one of the information sessions on the housing bond being held this month and next month so you can better talk about it with friends, coworkers, and neighbors.
Then, if, you live anywhere else in North Carolina, I encourage you to attend the October 20 gathering in Durham.
To do any of these things – – sign the petition, gather signatures for the petition from others, sign up for the October 10 assembly, sign up for the October 20 assembly, or attend an information section about the housing bond, scan one of the QR codes in the handout you received today or stop by a table downstairs after the service today or after any service before October 10, or visit uufr.org and search for “ONE Wake.” (Here is the link!)
Why should we be doing any of these things?
We should be doing these things because we care about the most vulnerable, least fortunate people in our larger community.
We should be doing these things because our neighbors are explicitly and specifically asking us to help.
We should be doing these things for our own souls. It is not good for our own souls to live in a world that we can’t imagine being better than the one we live in today. It is not good for our own souls to live in a world where we don’t believe we can make a difference. It is not good for our souls to be mired in hopelessness and despair.
These are easy ways we can make a real difference just by showing up. In my opening words this morning I talked about not being able to do everything, but not refusing to do the something we can do.
I know all of our lives are busy. But I hope each and every one of you can at least sign a petition. I hope each and every one of you can take a few hours out of your life – – one evening or one afternoon – – to make a difference in this community we share.
My friends, let us imagine a more compassionate, more just, more sustainable, more peaceful world for us, our children, our grandchildren and others, let us imagine that we each can make a difference, and then let us do everything we can to make it so.
So may it be. Amen.
