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Community Conversation: To What Do We Pledge?

Date:
Sunday, October 4
Time:
11:30 am - 1:00 pm
Cost:
Free
Organizer:
Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education
Phone
(503) 553-9057
Location:
Oregon Jewish Museum and Center for Holocaust Education, 724 NW Davis Street, Portland, 97209 + Google Map
Phone:
503-226-3600

Presented in partnership with Oregon Humanities and community organizer Wendy Willis, this conversation will explore what it means to “mutually pledge” ourselves to one another today.

While the opening of the Declaration of Independence gets the fanfare and the fireworks—“When in the course of human events” and all that—the closing clause contains a quiet promise: “We mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

When we talk about the founding, we often think of it as a severing from a distant power and a proclamation of individual rights. And yet, buried in that big individualistic origin story, there is a pledge of support, solidarity, and mutual aid. Today, as we witness political violence, hostility, and polarization, this conversation invites us to explore what it means for us to be bound to one another and to ask ourselves: is there any idea, any value, any dream for the future that we care about enough to tie ourselves to one another to protect or pursue it?

Event Accessibility:

  • Wheelchair-accessible venue
  • Service animals welcome