Recent Stories
Will we accompany immigrants and deportees?
What is the 'gospel' Unitarian Universalists have to share with migrants and deportees?
What can you see from your back porch?
I used to think my grandfather's worldview was limited and small-minded.
O gremlins, O St. Anthony!
My faith is in science, but I try to keep an open mind.
Yellow shirts for climate action
More than 1,500 Unitarian Universalists took part in the People's Climate March.
Zentangle chalices, doodling, and meditation
Meditative doodling as a Unitarian Universalist spiritual practice.
A kind of mirror
I never considered myself a visual artist, but then, I never expected to have cancer.
T-shirt evangelism
Wearing my Standing on the Side of Love shirt tells the world, including me, what I stand for.
Room to be both Jewish and UU
Religious pluralism was as much a part of our lives as the Southern drawl that flavored our interactions.
Questions of comfort
Where do you find comfort in suffering if you don't believe suffering has a greater purpose?
Sankofa Ghana: A spiritual journey home
What did I need to retrieve from a visit to the slave ships' point of departure?
Following my moral compass
We all navigate through circumstances at the limits of human experience.
One simple, transformative practice
A search for connection is at the heart of all spiritual traditions and practices.
Live better, help often, wonder more
The Sunday Assembly movement shares Unitarian Universalism's values, but has a lot more fun expressing them.
Light a candle or two this Thanksgivukkah
Where are you in the stories of the two holidays that just happen to coincide this year?
How to become a peacemaker
Four broad, ancient guidelines for human behavior at the heart of every religion.
A pond behind the church?
In my experience, no one improves by way of a scolding.
Living your faith online
How do you use social media as part of your religious life?
Simply listening
I hated candles of joy and concern, until I started listening.
You don't say
We can’t help seeing through words, but it’s worth trying.
May you have ease of well-being
Do I really want to spend this entire day with whatever might come up about my mother?
Where is your water from?
When you pour water into your congregation's Water Communion bowl, where will it come from?
Bound in covenant
Congregational covenants are declarations of interdependence.
Now let us sing
What is your favorite Unitarian Universalist hymn?
Praying for each other
People felt closer to the church community, knowing the struggle of another in the room.
Writing to the general
Or, how I realized that copying letters for Amnesty International was a spiritual discipline.
A humanist's guide to prayer
What would the prayer of a humanist sound like?
Speaking with many voices
True multiculturalism means being humble and brave enough to explore differences.
Pet ministry: Caring for all creatures
UUs are providing comfort for ill or dying pets and their caregivers.
Unitarian Universalism's two truths
What is our healing message? To what are we being beckoned when we gather?
The next Jesus to come through the door
When I meet a Jesus, I like to keep an open mind.
When God is a baby
A soul story is a dream from the depths of a culture.
Stitching it together
It would be easier to use a blanket, but we ask more of people who enter our churches: We ask them to be quilters.
The taste of awakening
On having a spiritual practice.
Sitting and writing
'Small noticings' can lead to larger insights.
Sermon bingo
We come to church to hear meaningful words spoken to us.
International flower communion, June 10, 2012
Czech Unitarians mark their church's 90th anniversary.
Listen from the heart so others can speak from the heart
In Soul to Soul groups, silence can connect us more deeply than using words or questions.
Flowers for communion
What does your Flower Communion bloom symbolize?
Prayers of desperation
My prayers are prayers of desperation lest I wish ill on the merely irritating.
Practice religious hospitality
Simply smiling and saying hello to visitors would transform our congregations.
Winter solstice and the shaman within
It is we ourselves who must don the shaman's mask.
Faith takes practice
Our religious ancestors recognized each day as a chance to form their spiritual character.
How to give a blessing
I didn't mean to give an honest answer when asked, 'How are you?'
A candy bar for death
I remember exactly when I first became afraid of death in a more-than-childish way.
How Unitarian Universalists break the rules
Rule breaking just might be right up our alley.
Shopping for God
However people first come to a Unitarian Universalist church, their questions often include something about god.
The soul's address
Why do we discount our bodies as unworthy of reverence?
A panhandler's greeting means 'Look at me'
I stop for everyone who greets me, including panhandlers.
Slow making
What if our new metaphor for time was craftsmanship?
My patient's faith
Before I began the operation, my patient asked, 'Could I say a prayer first?'
Sing me to sleep
I wanted things to go back to normal. I wanted none of this to be happening.
Chaos cats
They will spring your traps with impunity and lie in wait just to show you who's in charge.
My home, your home, our home
What can we do to help others feel at home?
Mi casa, tu casa, nuestra casa
¿Estamos dispuestos a incluir personas de diferentes culturas en nuestras congregaciones?
The Honey Springs worship committee ponders a revival
What would a Unitarian Universalist revival be reviving?
Service is our prayer
When we serve we become more compassionate, more sensitive, more understanding, and more aware.
The demon of certainty and the curious heart
Certainty is the most dangerous demon of all.
Choirs bring a 'heart connection'
Unitarian Universalist church choirs strengthen community, deepen personal spirituality.
We are already in paradise
There is no land promised to any of us other than the land already given.
Sitting, with a good Buddhist novel
Telling stories could be one of the most 'present' things we could do.
The Honey Springs worship committee plans its Easter service
A minister, a Pagan, a Christian, a Humanist, and an anthropologist set to work, in a congregation not unlike yours.
Why I pray for others
I asked my friend to pray for me.
Who are you?
Do not be afraid of self-examination.
Merry Christmas, Garrison Keillor!
Just as Unitarian Universalists don't all pray from the same prayer book, we don't all sing from the same hymnal.
Chalica, new weeklong UU holiday, slowly gains adherents
One of the seven UU Principles honored each day.
The DIY spiritual practice
A spiritual practice my wife and I cobbled together.
Practice gratitude
Like hope, trust, and love, gratitude is both a feeling and a spiritual practice.
Their spirit is still with us
One year after a gunman opened fire in the Unitarian Universalist church in Knoxville.
The church board and the Illuminati
What did the Décor Committee know, and when did they know it?
Sabbath, an ecological spiritual delight
Slow down and walk lightly on the Earth, even if just for a moment.
Imagineers of soul
Our churches should be sorcerer’s apprentices in the art of opening the doors of meaning. Why, then, are we so scared?
A religion for hard times
Faith is what’s left when you stop responding to radical uncertainty with panic and denial.
Serving Dionysus
I worshiped the gods of comedy and tragedy long before I worshiped Jesus's God.
That elusive more
What do Unitarian Universalists need to go deeper?
Hold on: The wisdom of endurance
Suffering and anxiety are usually just as finite and
time-limited as high passion and unalloyed joy.
Renewing the world
Modern and ancient New Year's celebrations from around the world.
A broken hallelujah
Praise in the midst of a broken world and a broken heart?
Assembly of a lesser god
Belief and worship are powerful tools for organizing thought and behavior. If others get control of those tools, they can make us dance like puppets. But if we’re careful, we can learn to pull our own strings.
Ceremonies for everyday life
Establishing connections with self, family, and the earth.
Home grown Unitarian Universalism
Developing home-based community rituals that root UU adults and children.
Praying as Unitarian Universalists
How can we pray with integrity, grace, power, and purpose?
Sketches of Crete
A sense of humor builds a bridge across cultures.
A Unitarian Universalist view of 'The Secret'
Despite the silly 'science' and fake experts on the hit DVD, some of The Secret's advice actually helped me.
Sitting between the extremes
Why a journalist writes haiku.
Even secular parents are religious educators
If you don't answer your children's religious questions, someone else will
Reading our lives
Take time to read the story of your life.
The spiritual practice of hospitality
Welcoming people to our congregations is a way to encounter the mystery and wonder of life.
Unitarian Universalists on the Eightfold Path
Buddhism puts down roots in American congregations.
Don't be stingy with your faith
Unitarian Universalism saves lives. Don't keep it to yourself.
Unitarian Universalist spiritual directors form network
Network can help religious liberals find a spiritual director.
A theology of gratitude
Gratitude should be the center of Unitarian Universalist theology.
Mayhem and the manger
Why didn't you warn me about Christmas pageants?
The storyteller by the sea
And the amazing, soulful, transforming stories she tells.
Fortune cookies for the soul
If I owned a fortune cookie company.
Why I am fasting for Ramadan
A Unitarian Universalist embraces a month-long discipline of letting go.
Pilgrimages: Places that touch the spirit
Glory be to time and to water.
Our calling, Summer 2006
Unifying features of Unitarian Universalist worship.
Unitarian Universalists and Pentecostals sing together
A chance encounter in a hotel lobby leads to new understanding.
Skeptical of sacred stories?
Are the stories of Passover and Easter good for you?
A ritual is born
Once, twice, ritual!
Outdoor labyrinth
Virginia church practices a centuries-old tradition.
Many religions, but only one earth
Can reverence for the earth bring us together across religious differences?
Creating UU family Christmas rituals
Finding the right mix of family traditions.
Winter holiday resources for UU families
Recommendations from the UUA's Lifespan Faith Development staff.
Halloween's ritual roots
Even in its secular and commercial form, Halloween ritualizes our inescapable destination.
New songbook explores new music styles
A review of Singing the Journey.
Spiritual lessons from running
Ten spiritual lessons that running has taught me.
Beltaine (May 1)
Make an altar to celebrate the senses.
Small group ministry creates sacred time
A time when the stories of our lives are heard.
The ceremony of innocence
A ceremony of innocence is a statement of faith and an act of hope.
Let's take back our time
We work more hours than medieval peasants did.
Orthodox Jewish wisdom for religious liberals
Engaging my ancestral Judaism enriches my Unitarian Universalism.
Reconciliation as a spiritual discipline
In our own souls, between individuals, within groups, and between groups.
The practice of reconciliation
A personal guide.
Rituals for holidays and everyday
Five rituals to try at home.
Creating rituals with and for children
Celebrate your family's values with your own traditions.
Bearing witness to human diversity
A visit to Auschwitz.
