In Nantucket, there is an interesting conflict between churches after the Nantucket Unitarian Universalists (NUU) canceled its traditional celebration. In a letter from the church and the Rev. Erin Splaine of the Second Congregational Meeting House Society, residents were told the traditional reading of the Declaration of Independence would be canceled to better focus on the “on-going process within the congregation to better understand our own whiteness.”
Across the country, July 4th celebrations are being canceled, and protests are planned for the nation’s 250th anniversary. MS NOW anchor Ali Velshi declared this week, “I feel a deep unease about the celebrations to which I am invited to mark the 250th anniversary of our so-called democracy.” The comment mirrors a recent poll showing that 85% of Democrats describe the U.S. in negative terms, and only 10% said they view it positively.
For 25 years, the historic Nantucket Unitarian Meeting House has hosted a public reading of the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights.
The letter announcing the cancellation from Splaine and the NUU Nantucket church is full of the usual virtue-signaling jingoism that has become common on the left:
“Our cancelling the 4th of July celebration this year reflects … an on-going process within the congregation to better understand our own whiteness.
…For those of us who are white the experience of the Rights and Privileges conferred by the Declaration of Independence, The Bill of Rights, and the Constitution of the United States have, for centuries, been tragically, often violently, and unequally applied to fellow citizens who are not white.”
This type of pandering and posturing has become the norm today. In a time when the American flag is denounced as a divisive and “triggering” symbol, a refusal to celebrate our Independence is yet another way of proving one’s bona fides to the perpetually enraged.
Splaine and the church stressed that she would not “engage” with critics on social media because “Social media is not the place for important, tender conversations.”
For some of us who believe that the Declaration of Independence embodies natural rights that ultimately prevailed in a more perfect union, the letter is maddening.
As I discuss in Rage and the Republic, the continuation of slavery was recognized at the time as a fundamental betrayal of those values. However, we created a system that would ultimately reject slavery and then later segregation. It was indeed a stain on our history and a sin of our founders to continue slavery. Yet, despite those imperfections, we rallied behind the founding values that define us as a people.
Thomas Paine, who (like other founding figures) was vehemently against slavery, still celebrated the founding of a new nation and a new people: “We have it in our power to begin the world over again . . . The birth-day of a new world is at hand.”
John Adams represented Massachusetts, including Nantucket, at the Continental Congress and fought to end slavery, but still understood that they had created a country based on freedoms that would ultimately prevail for everyone. He wrote his wife Abigail to predict that Independence Day would be:
“celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the Day of Deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations from end of this continent to the other from this time forward forever more.”
Rather than Adams, Massachusetts now has figures like Rev. Splaine who focus not on the natural rights that bind us to those ongoing conflicts that divide us. This is a holiday that allows us to take one day of the year to celebrate our shared values. In an age of rage, it is a respite from the anger and hate that consumes so many in this country.
Yet, there remain some in Massachusetts who still understand what Adams was describing 250 years ago. Another church has stepped forward to take up the celebration. St. Paul’s Episcopal Church announced it would read the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights. St. Paul’s Rev. Max Wolf declared, “We may not be there yet but we felt it was important to gather together and try to live up to the promises our country has made. Those documents are aspirational.”
Amen, Reverend, Amen.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the New York Times best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
It’s a Unitarian Church, what do you expect?
Its Massachusetts, what do you expect?
I think you mean Taxachusetts don’t you?
Southern by the grace of God! Salted peanuts in a RC cola or a Moon Pie!
Eight Ball:
Just had both at a party last year! (my first experience with either) And I am not Southern. In return, I introduced them to iced oysters on the half shell, with saltines and a vodka tonic! Can we split the difference and share a Hostess Twinkie washed down with some Ovaltine?
There once was a hag from Nantucket
Who so hated our country she said ‘F*ck it’
She should choose to leave here then
Perhaps go live in the Sudan
Where women are sold like sheep in the pen.
Since I probably can’t post a link in your comment section Professor, I have changed my avatar to Show how I have come to understand my own whiteness…
https://gordythomas.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/wp-1780402572919.jpg
New England and Unitarian Universalists are just plain weird.
Says an atheist who worships goats?
Good grief. These people. Insufferable is too kind, and again the irony of being perfectly allowed to protest in their imagined ‘fascist’ country is entirely lost on their tiny, squishy minds. Actual clowns are slapping their foreheads.
James..
They hate this country. Yet make no effort to leave.
Democrats hate America, the left wish to destroy western society.
maybe we need to ABOLISH THEM! DEFUND THEM!
They don’t hate America, they hate people like you, as you hate people like them.
Only you fool
how many times do Democrats have to tell you…they HATE America…before you believe them!
time to end federal aid to cities, states, non-profits, colleges
Outlaw Public Unions
and then see how democrat management really works
NY gets TWICE the Federal Aid per person as Fl.
Democrats WANT failure…and we currently PAY THEM TO FAIL!
That is why importing illegal invaders to shower in FEDERAL AID…is rewarding!
Lets seem them import illegals…with ZERO federal aid…no SNAP, No Medicaid, no housing, no security money, etc
ZERO AID TO STATES!
Also any non-profit where anyone gets $100k+…100% taxable…say like Harvard! Their endowment is just a hedgefund…to ENRICH their leaders!
The white Christian community would do better contemplating the eschatology of Shia Islamism, as well as the Middle Eastern proverb “When Saturday is gone, one will find Sunday”. Rather than having concerns about the color of their skins, to do the aforementioned might just serve to save it. The world’s Jewish community understands it well. They’ve already been there.
Professor you know what is interesting, none of this nonsense existed in 1976 and we had a historically unpopular President. I believe the age of rage changed everything….
I think you are referring to Jimmy Carter, but he did not take office until Jan 1977. Gerald Ford was President at the time of the Bicentennial. But you are right that none of this nonsense existed back then.
That was before the Republicans decided to secede from governing and move to pillaging America.
The pastor of this benighted church seems to have forgotten his state’s history and their long standing fight to end slavery. Since he is resident on Nantucket then he must be intimately away of the Bilge that he is preaching.
False virtue and pride are sins he must know. The fact that the Episcopal Church has taken over the reading is humorous in being an offshoot (since separated) of the Church of England, adding some irony to the story.
“Our cancelling the 4th of July celebration this year reflects … an on-going process within the congregation to better understand our own whiteness.”
Does the congregation not have any POC members?
Thank goodness for the Episcopal Church!
Black is beautiful and Tan is grand but Orange is the color of the Big Boss Man!
WTF does state history have to do with canceling the 4th and slavery?
Who knows !!!! What does 72 genders have to do with us common folk absolutely nothing!!!!!
Anon, it’s because only 2 genders have a snowballs chance in hell of reaching heaven.
Jonathan, your selective defense of free speech is on full display here. For years, you have used your platform to argue that the First Amendment protects the right of private individuals and organizations to refuse to speak, decline to participate in rituals, and express dissent from the majority. You have championed bakeries, web designers, and private clubs that stood up against social conformity. Yet, the moment a private church exercises its constitutional autonomy to alter its own voluntary holiday programming, you abandon your free speech absolutism and reduce their expressive choice to ‘pandering’ and ‘virtue-signaling.’
A church has the absolute, unchecked right to decide what texts are read from its pulpit. If the Nantucket Unitarian Universalists believe that reflecting on historical inequalities is more aligned with their current mission than a traditional reading, that is a protected exercise of both religious freedom and free expression. Your appeal to ‘natural rights’ is equally contradictory; the very essence of natural rights includes the freedom to dissent from state-sanctioned nationalism. You cannot claim to be a champion of the right to decline speech while simultaneously writing scolding columns when a private group actually chooses to exercise it.
With all due respect, you may have missed the point. This wasn’t about free speech.
Prof. Turley did not write or state or even mention the church was violating any free speech laws.
The Professor was merely showing how there are those that choose to “focus not on the natural rights that bind us but to those ongoing conflicts that divide us.”
He also said “This is a holiday that allows us to take one day of the year to celebrate our shared values. In an age of rage, it is a respite from the anger and hate that consumes so many in this country …”
May you too have a good and Patriotic celebration
And to be clear he is a champion of the right to decline speech.
You missed the point.
The professor is complaining about a church’s decision not to do something it traditionally does because it chose to reflect on a different issue. If they changed their mind and decided not to recite the declaration it’s entirely their right which makes it a free speech issue. What’s the point of the complaint or criticism? Does he attend this church?
You do sound much like X/George, are you afraid to claim your comment?
I do not see any “complaining” here except from you? I thought it was very kind of the good professor to not mention that Rev. Erin Splaine is a lesbian with a female “wife” who adores and follows Joe Biden.
Nor did Professor Turley attempt to characterize or degrade what appears to be the “big tent” effort of the church to support its increasingly diverse congregation, especially with respect to sexuality and gender preference. My own personal inference, after reviewing several articles and particularly photographs of its members, is that I am struck with the impression that several members seem to be buoyed by the ornate worn robes they are awarded as they praise and elevate each other in the fulfillment of a Love campaign.
That they support and elevate each other is OK with me. That they engage in “This type of pandering and posturing” (Turley, supra) is perhaps better reflected as more like this type of placating.
None of this matters, of course. But my takeaway from this blog article is simply that I am curious to know if, in her wise, introspective role of examining White America, Rev. Splaine will probe the subject of Black Africans who betrayed and sold their own brothers into slavery? And whether she considers Spaniards as White people?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/when-the-slave-traders-were-african-11568991595
p.s. Here’s a photo of another “Rev. Erin” reflecting what the takeover and future of religion looks like in America.
https://www.facebook.com/sewaneetheologsalum/posts/congratulations-to-the-rev-erin-keakealani-richardson-severin-t25-ordained-over-/1163620569034563/
Lin, pointing out a logical double standard is an analysis, not a complaint.
A church possesses complete autonomy over its Sunday programming. A private congregation’s internal schedule should not concern outsiders, especially when a decision to self-reflect has no physical, financial, or legal effect on anyone else’s life.
Furthermore, introducing historical whataboutisms regarding global slave trades or the racial classification of Spaniards is irrelevant. This is a local American institution examining American history. Reacting with offense simply because a congregation chooses to look at uncomfortable historical truths to better understand our nation’s progress misses the entire point of their reflection.
if you say so, X/georgie. Too bad you are not smart enough (without AI in your back pocket) to comprehend that first, looks like you responded to a comment pointing out a double standard. Stepped right in it, didn’t you?
Next, your own biased conclusion that the commenter was “reacting with offense” is HILARIOUS. sorry, had to use your cry.
After all, “examining American history DOES include examining how Blacks got to be slaves and how they got to America, yes?
@Anonymous
You are being obtuse, and you know you are being obtuse, but that’s your right. Here’s my free speech: you’re an idiot.
How does the church’s decision affect you? What is the point of complaining or criticizing their choice? Do you look forward to their reading of the declaration every year? Are you disappointed that they chose to do something different?
A right to speak is not the same thing as a right to be respected or taken seriously. Far from it, in fact.
They are not asking to be respects or expecting it. How does their choice affect you? What’s the point of criticizing them?
Anonymous is right. So many people preach tolerance until it conflicts with their person views. If a church needs to educate its congregation on the virtues of the principles of autonomy , then let them do it. We declared our independence from England on July 4th. We cited some natural right conditions in the document that exist as pre-codification concepts and should be retained. Let’s be clear about what we are celebrating o the 4th. It is autonomy at a national scale. Realizing “whiteness” is not the event we are celebrating.
As an observer of America from a perch directly north of your nation, I am gravely concerned about the virulent rejection of all that has made your country a beacon for freedom and opportunity. My sincerest wish is for a return of the America that has been so important as a world leader.
What those Unitarians in Nantucket are doing not reflecting on their whiteness, they are celebrating their purity from racism. It’s a disgusting display of white conceit, “tender conversations” notwithstanding.
Here’s an idea. Make July 4th about the next 250 years. Only converse with those who can earnestly, authentically express what aspects of American life should be preserved and found intact over the next quarter millennium. Celebrate with realistic optimists, not dispirited utopians.
pbinca,
Some people would rather wallow in misery, hate and rage then contemplate what they could do to make not only themselves but the nation better.
@ pbinca, if I may,
Your argument sounds reasonable at first, but it overlooks how real self-reflection actually improves and strengthens the very values we want to preserve. You cannot build a healthy, lasting future for the next 250 years if you refuse to examine the structural cracks in your foundation. By pausing to reflect on where American ideals have fallen short, this church is not being “dispirited”—it is doing the necessary, active work to ensure those founding promises become a reality for everyone.
This brings up a deeper question: why does a private church’s decision to quietly self-reflect offend so many people when it has absolutely zero impact on their daily lives? Nobody is stopping you from celebrating with your fireworks, parades, and “realistic optimism.” Yet, there is a bizarre rush to condemn a single congregation just because they chose a moment of thoughtful pause over a loud performance.
True patriotism is not a forced, one-size-fits-all party where dissent is banned. A truly free and strong nation doesn’t just demand mindless praise; it welcomes communities that care enough about American values to stop, look in the mirror, and figure out how to make them better.
^^^this sounds very very very much like an AI response.
Perhaps the unutarians might reflect upon the fact that God created a man and a woman. It would be time better spent. In fact they might also reflect upon the empirical biological imperative in mammalian life to be fruitful and multiply. It’s observable and correct. After that Perhaps our whiteness but doubt it.
Maybe I am missing something, but it seems to me the standard these churches are using to condemn America is the very standard they are now refusing to read. The Declaration and the Bill of Rights are supposed to be our civic guideposts. If we have drifted from those principles or applied them unequally, that is not the Declaration’s fault, it is the culture’s.
When Rev. Splaine and others decry discrimination and inequality, they are at least measuring those wrongs against the Declaration’s claim that all are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights and that government exists to secure those rights, whether they acknowledge that or not. They are judging our badness by the goodness of the founding principles while acting as though the principles themselves are the problem.
That is why cancelling a public reading of the Declaration in order to “better understand our whiteness” is exactly backward. The Declaration is not the problem; it is the mirror. Our task is to keep holding that mirror up to ourselves, to read those words aloud, and to teach each new generation what they mean, then judge the culture by how far it falls short, not discard the document that allows coherent moral judgment in the first place.
Your “mirror” analogy is an excellent way to frame this, but it actually highlights why the church’s decision makes sense. A mirror is only useful if you are willing to stop, stand still, and critically look at what is being reflected—including the flaws. For 25 years, this church held up that mirror through a public reading. This year, they didn’t throw the mirror away; they simply paused the celebratory ritual to examine why the reflection has been distorted for so many Americans throughout history.
There is a fundamental difference between discarding a document and acknowledging the historical pain of its unequal application. When the Declaration was written, its promise of “unalienable rights” explicitly excluded enslaved people, Indigenous populations, and women. Acknowledging that reality isn’t “condemning America”—it is practicing historical honesty.True civic engagement doesn’t require us to mindlessly recite a text every single year on a specific day. Sometimes, the most profound way to honor an aspirational principle is to step back from the “pomp and parade” and do the quiet, uncomfortable work of figure out how to actually live up to it. The church exercised its freedom to reflect rather than just perform, which is exactly what a free society allows.
@Esquire
Of course they’re allowed. It doesn’t make it any less intellectually masturbatory or self-serving, which we are allowed to notice and comment on.
@ James,
You are missing the point. There is absolutely nothing wrong with what this church chose to do. The real issue is why so many people are offended by a congregation choosing self-reflection over a routine celebration. Pausing to look at the ugly and uncomfortable realities of our history isn’t an attack on the Declaration itself. It seems there is a widespread aversion to acknowledging basic historical truths, and you are conflating an honest self-examination with a personal attack on American principles.
The question is, are they really doing sole searching or are they doing virtue signaling? The timing raises the question. Why did they not do this before? Is this a new leader of the church? Is the congregation behind it? If these questions and others were answered then the truth would be evident.
I am not denying our past as a country, I am praising and willing to celebrate how far we have come, in spite of how far we have to go.
@ rcs,
Your suspicion about their “motives” or whether this is just “virtue signaling” misses the real reason this timing matters. The fact that this decision is happening right now is completely relevant to the nation’s upcoming 250th anniversary. A milestone anniversary is exactly when a nation—and its local institutions—should stop to evaluate if they are actually living up to their founding promises.
You ask “why now?” and wonder about the church’s leadership, but that completely ignores the core of why people protest. The church explicitly stated they are reacting to current, real-world events, specifically pointing to recent Supreme Court decisions that roll back civil and voting rights. They chose this specific historical moment to pause a routine celebration because they feel those 250-year-old promises are actively being broken today.
There is no rule saying we can only mark the 250th anniversary with blind praise. If you are truly willing to celebrate how far we have come “in spite of how far we have to go,” then you should appreciate that a free society gives a church the absolute right to choose self-reflection over performance. Interrogating our current flaws is a much truer way to honor the legacy of dissent than just mindlessly reading a script every July 4th because that’s the way it’s always been done.
I have no problems with what, when or why the pastor is doing. My questions were for clarification, and/or information to clarify if this is just a one time thing or something that they will do annually, weekly, monthly until they are satisfied their concerns have been met.
As to the voting rights acts that you claim were reversed, creating a voting district based on one particular race is discrimination, which we are trying as a country to move past. What about the other races that are being discriminated against in preference of the chosen race? Color blindness is not racism nor is it denying anyone the right to vote and chose amongst the candidates.
@ rcs,
I’m confused as to why it would matter if they chose to change their tradition? If they choose to no longer read the declaration every year and focus on self reflection on the nation’s sordid past abuses of power and injustices how does that affect anyone else? I think it’s about some taking personal offense at the notion that there are things we as a nation need to acknowledge, but it’s taken personally for some reason.
Your VRA argument completely mischaracterizes how the Voting Rights Act works. Under Section 2 of the VRA, the government does not just arbitrarily create a voting district based on one particular race out of thin air. Instead, minority-majority districts are only legally mandated when a court finds that the local majority has already spent decades systematically voting as a unified block to completely dilute and erase the minority group’s political voice.
If a local government were to redraw lines to deliberately split up and dilute a wholly white community to make it impossible for them to ever elect their preferred candidate, the VRA would protect that white community just as fiercely. The law is not preferring a “chosen race”—it is a mathematical correction used to stop a biased majority from rigging map lines to wipe out a specific neighborhood’s voting power.
Your appeal to “color blindness” sounds good on paper, but it is an ideological shield used to ignore how maps are actually manipulated. Ignoring race when looking at racially gerrymandered maps doesn’t fix discrimination—it legally protects it. True fairness means stepping in to stop map-makers from diluting any community’s vote, whether that community is Black, brown, or white.
^^^This sounds very very much like an AI response
It doesn’t matter, Esquire. These are dead churches. True churches do not die.
“There is absolutely nothing wrong with what this church chose to do.”
Unless, of course, one rejects collectivism and racism.
It’s a social club, Esquire. Wine and snacks…
^^^ happy hour 😏
I think you are missing the point. Even at the time the Declaration was written, society’s failures did not define the scope of its principles.
Yes, many in that culture excluded women and non‑white people from the practical benefits of “all men are created equal,” but that indictment falls on the society, not on the Declaration itself. The text stands on its own as a statement of universal truths about human beings and government, a document written “for a candid world,” not just for a moment in the colonies.
So choosing not to read the Declaration because the culture that produced it was morally compromised is to blame the mirror for the face in it. The moral failures of the culture then and now are not the Declaration’s fault; they are precisely what the Declaration exposes and calls us to correct.
@ Olly,
Your defense of the text completely misses the reality of how history works. You are treating the Declaration like a holy relic that fell from the sky, completely detached from the human beings who wrote it and used it to govern.When the authors wrote “all men are created equal,” they were not writing in a vacuum; they were establishing a legal and social framework that explicitly protected the wealth, property, and power of white male landowners. Acknowledging that historical reality isn’t “blaming the mirror.” It is recognizing that the mirror was originally built to only reflect one specific group of people.
Furthermore, the church did not “blame” the document, nor did they refuse to read it out of spite. They chose to pause a celebratory performance to examine why, for 250 years, those universal truths have been violently and unequally applied to millions of American citizens. If the Declaration truly calls us to correct our moral failures, then a congregation dedicating a holiday to that exact self-correction is doing the truest patriotic work possible. You cannot claim the document demands correction while screaming “virtue signaling” the moment a church actually stops to do the work.
Esquire, I am not treating the Declaration as if it dropped from heaven; I am treating it the way any serious organization treats its vision statement. It is a present‑tense picture of the principles a people commits itself to, even before they are realized, written “for a candid world” rather than just for one moment in the colonies. “All men are created equal” is not a memoir of 1776 social practice; it is a standard that later generations, including those first excluded, have used to indict that practice and demand better. Our Constitution is the mission statement, the framework meant to form us into that more perfect union the Declaration describes. So when a church cancels a public reading of the Declaration in order to talk about its own “whiteness,” it is not doing hard self‑correction; it is doing theater by hiding the very mirror of the Declaration, the one thing that could show it precisely where it has failed the principles it now invokes.
@ Olly,
Again, with all due respect,
You are twisting yourself into knots with corporate analogies just to avoid an incredibly simple fact: this church made a private choice that has absolutely zero effect on your life, your freedoms, or anyone else’s.
Your argument about “vision statements” which I assume you meant “mission statements” is completely irrelevant. A church is a private, religious organization, not a franchise of the federal government. It is not contractually obligated to read your preferred secular texts on your timeline to prove its loyalty. If a congregation decides that its specific spiritual mission for one Sunday is to pause a 25-year-old tradition and look inward, they have the absolute right to do so.
Furthermore, your claim that they are “hiding the mirror” is a total fabrication. They didn’t burn the Declaration; they simply chose to stop performing it. By taking a break from a routine, celebratory recital to actually talk about the real-world, historical failures of those principles, they are doing the actual, hard work of self-correction and introspect. You are the one doing theater here—inventing a grand, existential crisis over a local parish schedule change just so you can avoid admitting the simple truth that a private group exercised their freedom to do something you disagree with.
Can we at least agree that at the end of the day, it is still a perfectly valid choice for the church to make?
Esquire, I have never questioned the church’s right to do this; of course a private congregation can change its liturgy. What I am questioning is the wisdom and honesty of the choice they made and publicly announced. They explicitly framed canceling a 25‑year public reading of the Declaration as a political protest and as part of “better understanding our own whiteness,” so it is a little late to pretend this is a purely private, spiritually neutral scheduling tweak. A church that is truly doing hard self‑reflection does what it does with Scripture: it reads the text, then examines itself in its light. Here, the one concrete act is to put the civic text away and talk about themselves. They are using the Declaration’s moral yardstick to condemn our history while treating the yardstick itself as a problem to be shelved. They are absolutely free to make that choice; I am just not willing to call that “hard work” instead of theater.
And just to be clear, I did not misspeak about vision and mission statements. A vision statement names the “where” in present‑tense terms we have not yet reached; a mission statement describes the “how” we intend to get there. The Declaration reads like a vision statement for a free people, and the Constitution is the mission framework for forming “a more perfect Union” around that vision.
@ Olly,
You’re arguing from a contradictory position. You claim to recognize the church’s absolute right to change its programming, yet you immediately try to dictate the exact conditions under which they are allowed to use that right.
You say you respect their freedom, but then argue that the only “honest” way for them to express it is to read the exact text you want, in the exact way you demand, on the exact day you specify.
Additionally, you claim the Declaration is a timeless “vision statement” meant to serve as a mirror for self-correction. Yet, the moment a church steps back to use that exact mirror to reflect on our history, you condemn their self-correction as “theater.” You are arguing that the document demands hard moral work, while simultaneously attacking a congregation that is actually choosing to sit down and do it—all over a local decision that has absolutely zero impact on your life.
Esquire, that is precisely the problem. You keep saying the church is “using that mirror,” but their one tangible act is to take the mirror off the wall. Canceling a public reading of the Declaration is the opposite of looking into it. If the universal truths in that document are really the standard by which we judge our history, then the honest way to do “hard moral work” is to keep those words in front of the congregation, not to put them away and talk about themselves. They are free to remove the mirror; they are not entitled to pretend that removing it is the same thing as using it.
Enquire, it was so at the time. White men had work to do. The purpose? I cannot say.
It was inspired.
^^^This sounds very very much like an AI response
Olly, there one word that captures the cancellation message against the Declaration and Bill of Rights. Surrender.
This is not about the Declaration. It is about deflection. Instead of doing the hard work of examining their own failures and the failures of human nature, they attack the document that names the standard.
@ Olly,
With all due respect, you are the one deflecting here. You claim the church is running away from the hard work, but you are completely avoiding the fact that their choice to self-reflect has everything to do with the document itself. They aren’t attacking the Declaration; they are actually taking its core message seriously.
By pausing to examine how “universal truths” have been violently and unequally applied throughout American history, the congregation is doing the exact “hard work” of examining human nature and systemic failures that you claim to value. Your insistence on turning an honest moment of church self-reflection into a malicious attack on the founding text is the real deflection. It is far easier for you to shadowbox against a fake anti-American conspiracy than it is to sit down and grapple with the uncomfortable historical realities that the church is actually trying to face.
^^^THis looks very very much like an AI response
Esquire, let me ask you something as plainly as I can. In this same church, when they want to reflect on their own sinful nature, do they put the Bible away and avoid reading scripture so they can focus on themselves, or do they read the text and then examine their lives in its light? If they will not treat the Declaration with even that much respect on the one day a year set aside to remember it, then what they are doing is not “hard work” or “patriotic self‑correction.” It is using the language of reflection as cover to avoid standing under the very words they claim to take seriously.
@ Olly,
Characterizing a secular civic choice as “sinful” is completely disingenuous, and comparing a political text to Holy Scripture is a deeply flawed argument. The Unitarian Universalist tradition is non-creedal and does not view the Bible as an infallible, absolute authority that dictates all civic or moral discussions. Asking that they treat a 1776 political document with the exact same religious reverence they would give to the bible makes no sense.
Your criticism is intellectually dishonest because it completely misrepresents their actions. The church did not “put the text away” out of disrespect; they paused a public, celebratory performance. In a free society, a community has every right to stop reciting a text to critically discuss how its principles have been historically applied. You are using the language of religious guilt to police a private congregation’s calendar, simply because you seem to prefer a blind patriotic ritual over honest historical reflection.
Based on your characterization of their choice as “sinful” I assume you disagree with the idea that this is a legitimate religious body.
Esquire, a quick clarification first. I did not call their decision about the Declaration “sinful,” and I am not asking a UU church to treat a 1776 political document as scripture. My “sinful nature” reference was about how churches ordinarily do spiritual self‑examination in their own tradition: you keep your core text in front of you while you examine yourself. My critique of their July 4 choice is civic, not theological, and I have said nothing about whether I regard this church as a “legitimate” religious body. That assumption is yours, not mine.
On the civic point, the issue is simple. They are invoking the Declaration’s principles to condemn our history as unjust, while choosing not to put that text in front of their own people on the one day set aside to remember it. The one concrete act is to pause the public reading of the standard that gives their critique its moral force and replace it with a conversation about themselves. They are entirely free to make that choice; they are not owed my agreement that this is “hard work” rather than posturing.
Exactly, so please don’t use any portion of the Constitution. Perfect!
Bye bye HAL
Olly, as usual, you are missing nothing and are spot on.
I’ll 2nd that.
👍
Thank you sir!
OLLY,
As I mentioned above to pbinca, I think the problem is people would rather wallow in misery, hate and rage then look into the mirror and consider how or what they could do to be better. To make the nation better.
Sounds like work.
The seem more inclined to want to rip the Constitution up, without even having read or understand it, and declare it . . . something.
Upstate, I can almost picture someone in that sanctuary doing a kind of moral self‑flagellation over their “whiteness” without any clear idea how they even decided what counts as failure. They are busy beating themselves up, but they have quietly set aside the one concrete standard that could tell them where they have actually gone wrong: the words of the Declaration itself.
Seriously, how do they measure their “whiteness,” and by what standard are they about to judge themselves? If there is any fixed standard in this story, it is the one written in the Declaration that all are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights, and that government exists to secure those rights.
My guess is that, whether they admit it or not, that is the yardstick they are using when they call our history unjust. The “universal truths” they invoke come from the Declaration; the “whiteness” metric is pure theater.
@ Olly and upstatefarmer,
The hostility in these comments proves that your outrage has nothing to do with the Declaration and everything to do with your dislike of who this congregation is.
This church made a private decision about its own Sunday schedule that has absolutely zero legal, financial, or physical impact on either of your lives. You are still completely free to celebrate the Fourth of July however you want.
Yet, because you dislike their progressive identity, you invent histrionic fabrications about them ‘wallowing in rage’ or ‘ripping up the Constitution.’ They aren’t ripping anything up; they are doing the quiet, uncomfortable work of historical reflection. Your claim that analyzing systemic inequality is ‘theatrics’ while mindlessly reciting a script once a year is ‘real work’ gets reality completely backward. You aren’t defending American principles here; you are just bashing a private, Unitarian church because they exercised their freedom to do something you didn’t like.
Esquire, at this point it is clear that what you are really defending is the church’s identity, not its argument. You keep insisting I am attacking their legitimacy as a religious body, when I have done no such thing. I am treating them exactly as I would treat any other institution that issues a public statement justifying a public change in practice: I am taking their own words at face value and questioning whether the reasoning holds.
They chose to cancel a long‑standing civic ritual, explain it in explicitly political and moral language, and tie it to “whiteness.” Once they do that in public, they are no longer just managing a private calendar; they are making a public claim about our common life. That makes their choice as open to criticism as a school board resolution or a city council vote. You are free to like what they did. But trying to recast every disagreement as “hostility” toward a “private Unitarian church” is just a way of changing the subject from their decision to their identity.
@ Olly,
You accuse others of changing the subject to “identity,” but it is you who remains obsessed with how this specific progressive, Unitarian congregation chooses to behave. If a conservative church publicly announced it was changing its service to focus on a different civic or theological topic, you would rightfully defend their private autonomy. Your continuous griping over this specific church proves your criticism isn’t a principled civic debate—it is a misleading attempt to hold a private religious body accountable to your personal political standards, over a choice that will never impact your life.
You claim you are treating the church like “any other institution,” but your comparison of a private, independent church council to a taxpayer-funded “school board” or “city council” is a legal and structural category error.
A government entity vote affects public policy and carries the force of law over every citizen. A private church changing its own morning schedule—and explaining why to its members—affects absolutely no one outside that sanctuary. Sharing an internal decision publicly does not magically turn a private house of worship into a government agency, nor does it strip them of their First Amendment right to run their services as they see fit without outside interference.
Esquire: Now I know for sure you are a bot-tish AI writer because you are capturing many words and phrases that I just used here, including “but it is you who..” and “If I may,” You are truly HILARIOUS!
Esquire, you keep insisting this is about my attitude toward “a progressive, Unitarian congregation,” but nothing I’ve written turns on their theology or identity. If a conservative church announced it was canceling a long‑standing public reading of the Declaration as a “political protest” tied to some other cause, and offered the same rationale in an open letter to the community, I would say exactly the same things. If my own church made this same announcement, I would be having the very same conversation with my pastor, elders, and church council. This is about what any institution chooses to do with the Declaration in public, not about who happens to be doing it in this case.
You’re also blurring two different questions. One is whether they have the legal and constitutional right to change their programming; on that, there is no dispute. The other is whether the public explanation they chose to give for canceling a 25‑year civic ritual makes sense and is open to criticism, like the explanation of any other institution that issues a public statement. Once they publish a letter saying, in effect, “We are canceling our Independence Day reading in political protest and as part of our work on whiteness,” they have stepped into a civic conversation. At that point, responding to the content of their reasoning is not “policing their calendar,” it is exercising the same freedom of speech they are.
You are free to think their move is profound self‑reflection. I am free to think that canceling the public reading of the very document whose principles they invoke, and then calling that “using the mirror,” looks more like theater than courage.
Esquire, I’m thrilled they aren’t reading it.
Olly,
First let me apologize for hijacking the topic but I had a good discussion last night with a left leaning friend and an issue that I struggle with came up and I was thinking, “I wonder how Olly would resolve this”. We were talking about the three branches and term limits (which I did my best to represent the Federalists viewpoint) and this evolved into regulation. I have often argued that what made us a great country was not regulation but freedom and liberty to create. Of course the retort was that “there needs to be some regulation”. Now earlier in the conversation my friend and I agreed that politicians can get owned by the corporations, which I mostly blamed on ourselves for voting such “for purchase” people into office. So I brought up the typical downfall of democracies when the voting society realizes it can vote in kickbacks for itself. So this all leads to a dilemma in my head, how does a govt. have a supposedly necessary regulation without these regulations leading to corporate bias. My friend on one hand hates that big business owns/runs the politicians and then on the other hand, wants to give these politicians the power that will eventually lead to their own corruption. It’s almost as if there is a built in flaw with a free market coupled with the human deficiency.
Jim, not a problem at all. I enjoy the opportunity these sort of discussions provide me to question what I believe to be true.
I think the way to get unstuck is to go back to basics. Human nature does not change just because you put it in a corporate charter or a government office. Corporations are just people acting in concert, with all the same appetites and fears, but with far more concentrated resources and influence than any individual citizen. Laws and regulations, at their best, are supposed to be the guardrails on that nature, for us and for them. The problem is that the players with the most to gain or lose from those guardrails are also the ones best positioned to capture the people who write and enforce them. That is what economists and political scientists mean by regulatory capture: the point at which the rules that were supposed to protect the public start quietly serving the industry instead.
So your friend is right that “there needs to be some regulation.” A world with no guardrails would not be freedom; it would be the law of the jungle. But he is also naïve if he thinks you can keep handing more and more discretionary power to the same political class and then act surprised when corporations, unions, and other organized interests buy up that power and bend the rules in their favor. A constitutional republic cannot erase the “built‑in flaw” of human nature. The most it can do is narrow the scope of what government is allowed to do, keep the rules as general and transparent as possible, and make sure the people writing and enforcing those rules are less dependent on the very entities they are supposed to restrain.
Olly, Thanks for the reply.
It’s hard to imagine that any guardrails however well intended, will just give the politician a taste of a slope that is greased with power and influence. In a way, it’s like hate speech. If we have free speech, then hate speech can not exist because of the common sense argument of who gets to decide and who decides the arbitrary line of enough? Guardrails have the same problem. Who gets to decide them and why does company A have them but company B does not? If five regulations are good, wouldn’t six be better and so on? Look at the CA fires. Pure common sense would say that these people should be able build back what they lost. I wonder if the the Founders thought about this. They predated the Industrial Revolution so I wonder if they could foresee regulatory capture.
By the way, I’m through the first 17 Federalist papers. I read them with highlighter in hand and in front of the computer to look up words quickly. It amazes me that these were published for the common man to digest. I have to remind myself that they also lived in a time where there wasn’t a 24 hour news cycle and attention spans were bigger than a rodents.
Jim, you’re closer to Madison than you might think. He didn’t have the phrase “regulatory capture” but Federalist 62 describes the mechanism almost perfectly: “every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue, or in any manner affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to the sagacious, the enterprising, and the monied few … a state of things in which it may be said, with some truth, that laws are made for the few, not for the many.”
The California rebuild situation is Madison’s nightmare made concrete.
Your “who decides” question is exactly right, and the Founders had an answer. It wasn’t “find the right wise men to decide.” It was to write the rules down, fix them publicly, separate the powers, and make them hard to change. The moment you hand “who decides” to an administrative class, you’ve recreated the very problem the Constitution was designed to prevent.
And keep that highlighter moving. The fact that those papers were written for the common man is itself the point. That was citizen formation in action.
Olly, watch the lecture series, “Justice”, Professor Sandal, Harvard polysci. It’s youtubed, 12 lectures. It gives a snapshot of DEI and the lack of moral/ethical standards. Sandal does an excellent job and the class is entertaining. It seems you may be looking for the scaffold of ethics prerequisite to informed citizens?
A suggestion.
I will certainly check it out. Thank you.
Olly, I read a couple of his books over a decade ago, and I think Justice was the one I liked; another, not so much. I think the second had too much leftist spin, if I remember correctly; the first seems similar to the promo for this series.
These people disgust me. Their behavior is fatuous, pointless, and absurd. Their world view is a pathetic disgrace.
and they are insincere about all their positions because they are only meant to destroy America.
you mean EVERY DEMOCRAT Voter?
Meanwhile, Rev. White Splaine refuses to allow unhoused homeless people of color to live rent-free in her church. Why? Because White Splaine is a bigot and racist, by her own standards. If White Splaine really cared about BIPOC, she would open the church doors, welcome anyone and everyone inside, and let them live forever. Rev. White Splaine’s racism is on display for all to see. Maybe White Splaine should step down and turn over her job to a person of color, and actually live by the standards she sets for America.
Unhoused? Guess that is the new buzz word about homeless people, which term was used after the “unhoused” name.
It may be a “church” building, but it is filled with too many holier-than-thou folks. What a disgrace to the parishoners of the past! Now … nothing more than a group who pander to the religion of victimology and DEI.
This Massachusetts Church needs to quit attacking and discriminating against albino people.
I don’t know a single white person (albino). People of European descent have melanin in their skin so are not white.
Biologically their skin contains melanin, so descriptors like “pale,” “fair,” “light,” “ivory,” or “beige”
Um, there’s blinding white skin that does not tan. The eyes are blue or gray. Pretty much no melanin. Wear a hat.