Adam Dyer Says

A place for my growing catalogue of original poetry

[adamdyersays]

We're F**ked

We're F**ked @RevIMonroe, @CarltonESmith, @GregMEpstein, @SFrederickGray, @UUA, @RevMitulski

Several years ago, I published a blog, “Rev. Prep” as my personal, public statement affirming that one can be religious and gay and sexual and engaged in promoting safer sex.  Although I use a different medication now (Descovy), I am still on and committed to PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis i.e. anti-HIV medication) as a non-gendered, non-political, non-sexual orientation based strategy to reduce…

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Liberty and Equity

Liberty and Equity...not a choice. @UUA @RevIMonroe @GregMEpstein @SFrederickGray @RevMitulski

“Liberty is not liberty when it functions at the expense of equity.” Liberty is not liberty when it functions at the expense of equity.  This is the basic premise of my research. My field is ethics with a specific focus on how religion and equity interact with individuals and society.  Considering the volatility of our current political climate, it seems clear that I have a great deal of work…

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[adamdyersays]

A Brand New Day

A New Day...important news! @revimonroe @sfrederickgray @gregmepstein @brianmclaren @jimwallis @robertpjones @DeanKBD @iammickyjones @afreshmind @mikemcafee06 @revmitulski @matthewaronson @RevDocJay

“on grounds” “All I ask is no hate.  I’m on the path to be a minister and I’m living a life that is dedicated to love.  Although I draw much of my own personal theology from Christian teaching, I recognize that my way is not the only way.  Every faith base has something to offer to the conversation and I welcome engaging you all on a variety of topics…volatile and not. So here goes, laying it out…

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[adamdyersays]

A United State of Inequity

A United State of Inequity @UUA @SFrederickGray @RevIMonroe @GregMEpstein

The most inequitable activity on the planet is the continued erasure of women’s agency to their full humanity.  We see this in rape as a weapon and as a result of political conflict or as an expression of cultural class dominance. We see it in obstructing women from education. We see it when weaponized religion becomes policy as in the current religiously driven overturn of a woman’s right to an…

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[adamdyersays]

Being Well

"Being Well"...address for the baccalaureate at Amherst College. Such an honor! @AmherstCollege @UUA

Rev. Adam Lawrence Dyer delivered the keynote address at Baccalaureate 2022 Last month, I had the great privilege of delivering the baccalaureate address for the class of 2022 at Amherst College.  This was such an honor and I am incredibly grateful to Harrison Blum and the whole office of Religious and Spiritual Life for their support in making this happen. You can find audio of the whole program…

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[adamdyersays]

Values

Values...where are they in this moment? #VigilForValues at First Parish in Cambridge tonight at 6:30 @UUA @SFrederickGray, @RevIMonroe, @GregMEpstein

The following statement was shared with the First Parish in Cambridge community in response to the latest gun related violence: We are living in a nightmare.  It is not the more than 1M deaths from Covid; it is not the catastrophic implosion of the environment that supports human life; it is not whiteness as an excuse for violence; it is not brutal gender hierarchies.  It is a nightmare brought…

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[adamdyersays]

A Prayer for Motherhood

A Prayer for Motherhood @UUA

Pray for mothers and motherhood, That most sacred place between being and not being The gift of grace The promise of personhood The dawn and the dusk. For, mothers everywhere Mothers of all kinds Give life to dreams And illuminate our souls They are often our best selves Within us and our world. Pray for motherhood That is more than just a choice But rather a lived dialogue between the human and…

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White Bricks

White Bricks...congregational polity...destroying people of color in Unitarian Universalism @UUA @SFrederickGray

  Congregational polity is destroying people of color in Unitarian Universalism. I am currently in the process of returning to work after a 5 month medical leave.  In September, I realized that stress, internal organizational conflicts and pressures had simply gotten to be too much for me.  I was not caring for my body, I could not “wind down” and sleep had become a losing crapshoot.  As a 56…

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[adamdyersays]

The Anti-Equity Agenda

The Anti-Equity Agenda @revimonroe @gregmepstein @sfrederickgray @uua @revmitulski @revdocjay

Link to original Washington Post Article here and below… …The comfort of invisibility, the ease of ignorance As I continue to study the ethical foundations of equity, particularly as those foundations show up in public policy, I learn more about the various personal motivations that seem to sit at the heart of cultural belief.  I’m struck by how, in a very general way, when I engage…

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[adamdyersays]

Sacred Choices

Sacred Choices, @revimonroe, @gregmepstein, @UUA, @sfrederickgray

“You have to pick. That’s the fundamental problem. And one interest has to prevail over the other at any given point in time, and that’s why this is so challenging, I think.”[1] – Justice Brett Kavanaugh during opening arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, Dec. 1, 2021 Where is the voice of liberal religion in the spiritual debate about abortion?  Is liberal religion only concerned with…

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Being

Being @GregMEpstein @UUA

Original photo by Martin Schoeller for Forbes Capitalism and the free-market economy are based on the exchange of value and the key freedom of participation.  One is free to work; one is free to pursue economic ends; one is free to do and create things in exchange for compensation or other value.  On its surface this is simple.  It is in many ways the commodification of doing.  But the ethics of…

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[adamdyersays]

Black Boy Joy

Black Boy Joy...new poetry coming. @RevIMonroe, @UUA, @CornelWest

Me in 1967. New poetry coming in December…here’s a taste… Black Boy Joy For all the black boys who won’t look in mirrors, for fear of what they might see… For every prince called “thug”, For every guy on the hustle who is only just trying to stay alive, For every Mandingo, BBC, Anaconda whose greatest gift was between his ears and behind his eyes and not in his trousers… For every Emmett…

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Can "Wild Goose" Be Reborn?

Can "Wild Goose" Be Reborn? @revimonroe, @SFrederickGray @UUA @robertpjones @gregmepstein @revmitulski @iammickyjones @aliciatcrosby @brianmclaren

On Route 25 from Knoxville, TN to Hot Springs, NC When Amy Hayes, from Baptist News Global asked to speak to me about the Wild Goose Festival, I was initially hesitant.  I had just begun a leave from church work (which I am currently still on), in part to regroup from having had to do intense professional and personal race work on top of managing the pandemic with my congregation since March…

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"Meta" Supremacy

"Meta" Supremacy - Dismantling white supremacy is not the answer...it is only a start.

The self-conscious approach to dismantling white supremacy reinforces white priorities thereby affirming white supremacy. Māori Party co-leaders Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer say that officially changing New Zealand’s name to its indigenous version, Aotearoa, would unite the country. Photograph: Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images (image, caption and full article appears in The Guardian –…

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Hattie Wins the Prize

Hattie Wins the Prize @revimonroe

Hattie McDaniel – Studio Portrait In 1937 Zora Neale Hurston published her groundbreaking novel Their Eyes Were Watching God. In 1939 Marian Anderson sang on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in protest of the Daughters of the American Revolution while Billie Holiday was recording the song Strange Fruit. In 1940, education pioneer Mary Mcleod Bethune was elected Vice President of the NAACP and …

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The Wrong Medicine

The Wrong Medicine - Sexual violence is a collective sickness and requires a collective response. @revmitulski @revimonroe

*trigger warning – this piece includes reference to my experience with sexual violence. Watching the situation surrounding Governor Andrew Cuomo unfold, I keep coming back to the very powerful sense that the system is applying the wrong medicine.  Whether or not he accedes to requests to step down, the focus on his individual responsibility will not in any way address or fix this problem.  We are…

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Naming the Principles

Naming the Principles @sfrederickgray @uua @uuworld @DRUUMMJTW @UUAGA

Seven Principles Wheel (c) Kimberly Debus and Ian Riddell Where Are UUs? As I look at the news this week of more unmarked graves found at former “Indian Schools” in Canada, and as I hear the news of the inquiry now expanding to the United States, it feels like Unitarian Universalism has come up woefully short in how we hold our own historic role in the oppression of Native and Indigenous people. …

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