When It Hits Home: follow-up and the future

Last Wednesday, February 24th, 150 people attended When It Hits Home: an evening concerning intimate partner violence.  The event, sponsored by The Xenia Institute, the Center for Social Justice, and the OU Women’s and Gender Studies program, pre-screened One in Three, a film on domestic violence created by local Oklahoma filmmakers.  After the film, dialogue fellows from Xenia facilitated a public dialogue designed to create lists of ideas and topics for future discussion and action.  The various lists were assembled into a single document that was then sent to the event attendees.  It is our hope that the attendees will continue working with this issue alongside our work.  The list can be seen here:

When It Hits Home: ideas through dialogue

Additionally, three podcasts were produced leading up to the event.  One podcast was a conversation with the filmmakers of One in Three, another was a conversation with an OU law professor and former domestic violence prosecutor, and the final one was made up of highlights from the first Xenia/WGS joint event on domestic violence, held in April 2009.

Gabe and Leguiera podcast

Connie Smothermon podcast

Don’t Look Away podcast

Click here for a gallery of photos from the event:

When It Hits Home photo gallery

When It Hits Home: ideas through dialogue

Last week, after the pre-screening of the film One in Three, The Xenia Institute facilitated a public dialogue session with the screening attendees.  We asked the group leaders to report ideas that the groups came up with and topics for further discussion.  These ideas and topics are in raw form, but it is our hope that they might be considered carefully and worked with further.  After all, the idea to pair a public dialogue with a film screening came from a joint Xenia and OU Women’s and Gender Studies event almost one year ago.  Who knows what might come next…

Below are the ideas and topics in no particular order:

• A series of school assemblies with speakers and videos, maybe in conjunction with a direct service agency or a group that specializes in violence prevention.

• Training a team of youth who could make presentations at other schools on the topic of intimate partner violence and rape, in particular engaging students in role playing and engaging young men.

• Public service announcements through the local media: newspapers, radio, and the public library.

• Start in preschool/kindergarten by educating children in what it means to be authentic with one another, especially concerning gender relations.

• Training teachers to recognize the signs of abuse, neglect, and relationship issues.

• Parents beginning conversations with their children concerning appropriate and inappropriate forms of touching etc.

• People need to understand how to say “no” and how to hear “no.”

• Educating the general public on how to be a “viable and effective third party” when they are faced with a potential domestic violence situation. (Getting hotline numbers and resources into the hands of the general public.)

Xenia Institute completes video series, “What is Dialogue?”

In the past three years, many people have asked us the same question: what is dialogue?  Next come questions about specific meanings for the word “dialogue” and the way we use it at Xenia.  We also get several questions a week concerning our vision for the future: transformation through dialogue.  Since these topics are constantly in our hearts and minds, we decided to produce a series of short videos on this subject.

We proudly submit these four videos for the first time in one place.  Enjoy them as you contemplate the question with us: what is dialogue?

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Last video on Dialogue released today…

Today we publish our last segment of the series called, “What is Dialogue?”  This four part series was produced with help from Xenia dialogue fellows, volunteers, community leaders, and Dr. Tom Boyd, the keynote speaker at our fourth annual Sam Matthews Social Justice Award Banquet.

Please enjoy, and stay tuned as we continue to explore dialogue in various ways at The Xenia Institute.

Third Podcast Highlights “Don’t Look Away,” the event that started it all

Today we offer part 3 in our podcast series concerning domestic violence.  Part 3 is a collection of highlights from Don’t Look Away: violence against women and human rights in Oklahoma.  This event was held last April as a collaboration between The Xenia Institute and the OU Women’s and Gender Studies program.  This first collaboration created many friendships between the two entities and started a conversation on domestic violence issues that will continue for some time.

As we prepare for tonight’s event, When It Hits Home: an evening concerning intimate partner violence, we found we should take a look back at the event that started it all.

Don’t Look Away podcast

“What is Dialogue” video series: part 3

Today we release part 3 of our video series on dialogue.  Xenia dialogue fellows, community leaders, and friends of Xenia take up the question: what is dialogue, and how can it change the way we interact with each other?

Second podcast features law professor and former domestic violence prosecutor

Today we introduce our second audio interview in our continuing series related to “When It Hits Home: An Evening Concerning Intimate Partner Violence.”

In this interview, Clint Williams asks Connie Smothermon, OU professor of law and former domestic violence prosecutor, questions about Oklahoma’s domestic violence laws, questions about how to get involved, and discusses a domestic violence safety plan.

Connie Smothermon Podcast

Xenia releases first in a series of podcasts on One in Three

Today we introduce the first in a compelling series of audio interviews surrounding “When It Hits Home: An Evening Concerning Intimate Partner Violence.”

This interview is a conversation with Lagueria Davis and Gabe Miller, director and producer of One In Three, the film that will be pre-screened in Xenia’s joint event later this week.  To listen, click on the link.  To download this interview for further listening, simply right click on the link and choose “save as.”

Gabe and Lagueria podcast

5th annual Matthews Banquet highlights

The 5th annual Sam Matthews Social Justice Award Banquet was held on Thursday, February 11th in honor of longtime Norman resident and supporter of Bridges, Jim Agar.  Over one hundred people were in attendance to bear witness to this man’s amazing story and his work as a volunteer leader in the Norman community.

We were very fortunate to have wonderful speakers to help us with our evening.  Rev. Chris Moore, Associate Pastor at Mayflower Congregational Church in Oklahoma City, opened the evening with a blessing over the meal.  The blessing also challenged us to honor those in social justice who have come before by taking up the cause ourselves.  To see a transcript of Rev. Moore’s prayer, click here.

Commissioner Lisa Schmidt, of the Norman Human Rights Commission, read a letter from the mayor and made our keynote remarks on social justice and community engagement.  Lessa Keller-Kenton, one of Xenia’s interns this semester, wrote a wonderful reflection on Commissioner Schmidt’s remarks.  Take a look here.

Finally, here are a few more photos from the event.  To see all the photos, take a look soon in Xenia’s media gallery or visit our Facebook page.

Rev. Chris Moore’s opening prayer from the 5th annual Matthews Banquet

I always get a little nervous when preparations for our annual Matthews Banquet come around.  There are so many intricate details to be worked out, and many of them have to come in sequence.  For example, we can’t book the caterer or the flowers until we know how many people we’re expecting.  We can’t know how many people we’re expecting until we have sent out invitations.  And we can’t send out invitations until we have selected our award recipient.  I actually think there’s a line on my Matthews master checklist that says, “worry about absolutely everything until you can’t eat or sleep.”  My friends tease me about this last one because everything always turns out just fine, whether I worry or not.

At any rate, one thing I never have to worry about for very long is the lineup of speakers we get for our banquets.  We have been very fortunate in the last five years to have some of the best speakers in the area assist us in honoring our recipients, and this year we were particularly lucky.  Xenia dialogue fellow and local pastor Rev. Chris Moore offered our opening blessing, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.  It’s exactly the kind of charge I needed at that moment (I don’t mean a “charge” like the one you get drinking an energy drink, but charge as in “charged with a responsibility” or an assignment or challenge).

I offer you the opportunity to share in this charge, and I submit Rev. Moore’s prayer for your review:

Gracious God,

Open us up this evening. Awaken us to a new dawn.

Remind us again that you are the god who seeks not our offerings or sacrifices but seeks that we care for the orphan and widow, for the powerless and marginalized.

You are the god whose law is written on our hearts.

Create in us a new awareness. Birth in us a sense of our own power that we might act where we live and be your hands and feet in the world. Reign in our pride, temper our egos, and tame our wild individualism so that we might live out of your spirit of justice, peace, and creation in a world which does not hunger for more absolute certainty or judgement, but is starving for a little compassion.

Too often we think your work comes only in the big things, that we must change the world in a day if we are leading meaningful lives. Too often we only think of the glorious moments, we remember a speech on the steps of the capital in Washington D.C. that evoked a new dream of equality and still sends chills down our spines without also remembering of the marches yet to be walked, the sting of fire hoses yet to be felt, or the beatings and hatred yet to be endured.

We remember the names celebrated by the fleeting winds of fame, but have never know the names of people who just stood their ground, or signed their name, or simply did the right thing when the time was upon them. Remind us that your way doesn’t come in glorious light or shining spectacle. What you ask of us isn’t the spotlight or the 15 minutes. You seek our hearts and minds, you seek our dedication, you seek our souls.

As we prepare to share a meal together let us do so remembering all of those people who have produced it, from the farmers to the drivers, to the handlers to the cooks and servers. May this food nourish our bodies and may our fellowship feed our spirits. And as we gather together to celebrate one among us who has made a difference, let us remember that we can all make a difference with every day, every encounter, every decision. There are no small things to you.

Free us from the temptation of apathy or fame and set us on the same path of all of those nameless ones who have changed this world. Those who held no grand vision or elaborate plan, but who saw pain and healed it, who felt misery and responded to it, who witnessed suffering and addressed it.

Let us be present now, in this moment and beyond to a world in the need of the witness of the power of faithful love and unconditional grace. Let us, as your servant Ghandi once said, “be the change we wish to see in the world”.

Amen.

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