Please join our discussion with Martha Gallahue, who will share her experiences at the Cancun Climate Change Conference.

Our ESWoW Community Call is Sunday, April 3, 2011 at 12m PT, 1pm MT, 2pm CT, and 3pm ET.

Please join us to share your thoughts and concerns. The number to join the call is 866-740-1260 and the access code is 5766842#. Please invite others who might be interested in this topic to join our call.

Have a nice weekend!

Philosophical Foundations of Ethical Culture 
David Sprintzen's address to the Ethical Culture Society of Westchester on Sunday Jan. 17, 2010

Foundations of Ethical Culture: Ethical Culture History
Dr. Howard Radest
http://www.nysec.org/2009/10/22/radest-foundations-ec-history/

Sustainable Living and Ethical Culture
Bart Worden
New York Society for Ethical Culture Sunday Address
January 24, 2010
http://www.nysec.org/2010/01/24/worden-sustainable-living-and-ethical-cu...

Reclaiming Ethical Culture Spirituality
Anne Klaeysen, Leader, NY Society for Ethical Culture. 
Anne gives us a guided meditation for the opening words of this Platform. She shares on the distinctive niche Ethical Culture fills in the world. You can find her talk on the website of the Ethical Society of Northern Westchester (in NY) (http://www.esnw.org/Main.html). You can then select Listen to ESNW Lectures in the left-hand column and find Anne's talk on that page.

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Copenhagen Talking Points

Climate Change Working Group, CoNGO Committee on Sustainable Development, New York

The following is Martha Gallahue's Platform address on the day of her certification as an Ethical Leader at the June 2009 AEU Assembly in St. Charles, MO.

Yesterday, in a Workshop, we were reminded that when we want to know where our commitment lies, we might look to where we put our bodies. It brought to mind why I've chosen to put my body here today as a clergy leader in Ethical Culture. Like most of us, I have needed to be where I can be most authentically myself. And like most, I've needed ethical heroes to learn where that might be. Let me tell you about three of my ethical heroes who have helped me figure out what is for me authentic and what tools I needed to live into that so that I could be here this morning… They are my mother, my life partner and my mentor.

Mother first modeled the way for me. She lived a disciplined life that in her time was counter cultural. In the l940's, she stepped up to the scourge of racism through a human rights initiative called the Council of Human Rights. The Council's Leaders were African-Americans who recognized the value in training white people to shift the racist system we all live in. Some days she would come home in tears for being called a communist. She learned first hand through her friends what it was to be terrified through subtle and not so subtle intimidation. Read more »

Guest Platform by Martha Gallahue, Ethical Culture Clergy Leader Intern

At this time, the future of human rights has never before been more jeopardized. Last summer, a mid-eastern coalition of States challenged UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon that the Universal Doctrine of Human Rights was merely a western imposition upon sovereignty. Vicious wars in the Congo, Darfur, Somalia continue and tensions between Pakistan and India grow. Thus, this anniversary may be a turning point where human rights will either emerge as an ethical cornerstone to all humanitarian law or it will recede into the background as some sort of western utopian scheme dreamed up to promote western values.

I choose to be hopeful about the progress of human rights throughout the world for three reasons. 1) More people particularly women are learning about their inherent rights to dignity and safety from violence. Once people know of their rights, there will always be those remarkable ones who will give their lives to seeing them realized. Those of us who know of our rights continue to make connections with those who do not to send the message. This occurs at meetings of non-governmental organizations at the United Nations.  Read more »

by Martha Gallahue, Leader Intern, National Service Committee

Yesterday, during our General Meeting, I took my turn in presenting a quiet reflection from our various spiritual traditions. Here is what I said: "Ethical culture celebrates the composite whole in greatest diversity." We have a motto that is above our Platform space. You can find it at The New York Society for Ethical Culture. It reads, "Where we meet to seek the highest is holy ground." Just as we are here together to work toward the highest possibility for the United Nations, my people gather to seek their own in community. Highest may be understood to be that exquisite sense that happens when we realize the all that surrounds and permeates what is alive down to the smallest pebble. Highest may be a communal experience of harmony forged from persevering struggle for the best.  Read more »