Set Sail on the Ally Ship
A Time for All Ages
Written by Helen Rose
Delivered at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Tallahassee
Sunday, July 14, 2019

This is an original piece by Helen Rose. Feel free to use for worship with proper credit given to the author. Email Helen with any questions.

• Invite young and young at heart to join leader up front.
• We’re talking about allyship today – who knows what an ally is?
  • Pause for response
• Awesome! Now, who knows what a ship is?
  • Pause for respone
• So, when we put those two things together, and we get…
• Ally-ship!
• I need y’all to help me with something – we’re going to row the allyship.
  • Invite participants to sit in two rows and face the leader
• Let’s all sit like we’re in a little boat. Everybody settled? Does anyone get seasick? Do we all have our lifejackets on? Awesome. Let’s start rowing. Grownups, you can help us row too.
• So, while we’re rowing this boat, we all have to work together, right?
• What happens if someone stops rowing?
  • Pause for response
• Oh, so we need everyone to work together to keep the boat moving, right?
• Now, what happens if someone makes a mistake? Should we kick them off the allyship?
• No! That’s right. We need everyone, so if someone makes a mistake, what should we do?
• Yeah, we need everyone to work together, so we should help our teammates learn how to do better if they make a mistake.
• One more question: What if you’re the one who makes a mistake?
  • Pause for response
• We don’t really like to think about that, do we? Well, if we make a mistake, we should try to learn from it, right? That way, we can do better next time, and maybe help someone else if they make a mistake later. And then we can all keep rowing together and the allyship keeps going.
• You guys are so awesome! Thank you for helping me. Let’s row back to our seats!