November 11
UULALA
Monthly Theme: GRATITUDE

IS DEMOCRACY POSSIBLE?

Please join the Congregation on Sunday morning as Bill Edwards, Historian and President Emeritus of the Fellowship, examines the problems in the democratic process.

By this Sunday, we will know most of the results of the current election, and will no doubt feel like discussing them. But we might also want to think about the democratic process in general. What does it actually mean? What should the rules be like?
How should votes be counted and a winner determined, particularly with more than two alternatives?
If we have representative democracy, how should representation be apportioned?
Who should vote?
How much power should the majority have, and what protections should minorities have?
The answers are far from obvious. Indeed there are some problems, under certain assumptions, that are known to be mathematically unsolvable!

In our religious lives, the democratic process requires trust in the development of each individual consciencea belief that such development is possible for each of us, as well as a commitment to cultivate our own conscience. We could call it a commitment to the value of each person. In the words of Theodore Parker, Democracy means not I am as good as you are, but You are as good as I am. My connection with the sacred is only as precious as my willingness to acknowledge the same connection in others.

Rev. Parisa Parsa, executive director of the Public Conversations Project (read more from Parisa in The Seven Principles in Word and Worship, ed. Ellen Brandenburg.)

Past President and long time member of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Lafayette, Bill Edwards is retired from the computer science department at the University of Louisiana. Bill also serves as the Historian for the Fellowship and Chair of the Services Committee.

Bill's hobbies include wood working, photography, and films.