I'm sure this sub gets questions like this all the time; apologies for another one.

I was raised in the church, episcopal and presbyterian while we were living back east and then non-denominational once we moved to California.
As a kid in Sunday school I always asked questions that the leaders in the church didn't like or have answers for.
Then when i was 14 I started acting out at home, nothing too serious but I was struggling with my sexuality in the late 90s and really had no one to talk to.
My mother determined that I needed guidance from the church and set up a meeting with our pastor.
i told our pastor at the non-denominational church that I thought I might be gay and he literally threw a bible at me, told me I was a sinner and going to hell.
Really solidified my non-belief in the church.

All these years later I identify as an agnostic and have been dealing with some serious health stuff.
Am on the transplant list waiting for kidney.
All my friendships and relationships with family have nearly evaporated - family has always been strained and i think friends just don't want to see me this ill.

While i don't miss organized religion and zoo boat stories make me bristle, i do miss having that sense of community and belonging.

Would UU be a good place to find community and like minded people?
Is it fair that I'm 'ill' and in need of support/should i wait till after I've had my transplant?
Do UU ministers preach from the bible?
Are all UU chapters/ministries/congregations the same?

Sorry for the questions/lengthy post.

Thanks in advance!

"The unborn” are a convenient group of people to advocate for.

They never make demands of you; they are morally uncomplicated, unlike the incarcerated, addicted, or the chronically poor;

they don’t resent your condescension or complain that you are not politically correct;

unlike widows, they don’t ask you to question patriarchy; unlike orphans, they don’t need money, education, or childcare;

unlike aliens, they don’t bring all that racial, cultural, and religious baggage that you dislike;

they allow you to feel good about yourself without any work at creating or maintaining relationships; and when they are born, you can forget about them, because they cease to be unborn.

You can love the unborn and advocate for them without substantially challenging your own wealth, power, or privilege, without re-imagining social structures, apologizing, or making reparations to anyone.

They are, in short, the perfect people to love if you want to claim you love Jesus, but actually dislike people who breathe.

Prisoners? Immigrants? The sick? The poor? Widows? Orphans? All the groups that are specifically mentioned in the Bible?

They all get thrown under the bus for the unborn.

Methodist Pastor David Barnhart

Hi, I grew up Catholic and have lived my life as an agnostic for most of my adult life. I loved being Catholic and I miss it, but so much of the teachings just don’t align with my values anymore. Probably all the things everyone has a problem with the Catholic Church are what bug me. The town I left, I was going to attend a service there and I streamed a couple on YouTube to get a feel for it. The only problem I had was that it all seemed very political which is one of the problems I had with the Catholic Church, except in this case the politics are the complete opposite. I am pro choice and supporter of LGBTQ, but what I’m really looking for is a more spiritual environment I guess. I think issues in the community are an important part of that, but I would also like to think for myself on certain things. I hope I don’t start anything on here or offend anyone, but this particular church’s agenda was devoted to defunding the police in the area, or at least that’s all they talked about. I’m of course against police brutality, but my husband is an ex cop and I’m in the military and it just made us feel very unwelcome. I originally looked into this place because I have children who identify LGBTQ and wanted them to feel accepted. I’m starting to feel like a church for all of us doesn’t exist. Are all UU churches pretty similar in this area?

How do you approach dialogue with friends and families about your involvement in the UU community? I love UU’s commitment to diversity and pluralism, but wanted to hear some specific and concrete answers and anecdotes on religious dialogue with others.

I’m personally not UU, but I’m transitioning to having a UU spiritual mentor at the moment. I feel comfortable within my own faith community, but I often use a UU framework and general sense of perspective when doing proper ecumenical work with others.

Thanks! Jake

https://www.uusc.org/5-ways-higher-immigration-helps-everyone/

Contrary to all the fearmongering, increased migration is a massive net benefit.

By Josh Leach on February 21, 2024

These days, there seems to be only one thing politicians in Washington can agree on: bashing immigration. President Biden went before the cameras last month to call on Congress to grant him unprecedented authority to suspend asylum processing. Senators of both major parties recently negotiated a bill that would have gutted asylum protections for many people fleeing danger. (Fortunately, this proposal failed—but not because politicians chose to protect asylum. Rather, it was because far-right politicians preferred to leave the status quo unchanged, so they could campaign for even crueler measures!)

Yet, for all of this negative hype about “the border,” the real evidence shows that immigration brings tremendous benefits. These include not only new opportunities and increased safety for immigrants themselves, but gains for everyone else in society too. Here are just some of the ways that immigration helps us all:

• Immigration fuels economic growth. When the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released their latest economic projections, they estimated that higher immigration levels, if they continue through at least 2026, will “add […] about 0.2 percentage points to the annual growth rate of real GDP” over the next 10 years. That translates to $7 trillion of increased national prosperity.
• Immigration lowers inflation. More people accessing asylum and parole has eased inflation, in part because immigration helps address labor shortages. And as price pressures have dropped, real wages have gone up. This means that the actual purchasing power of everyone’s take-home pay has increased too, thanks in part to immigration.
• Immigration addresses our (i) demographic and (ii) budgetary problems. Despite the widespread belief that “too many people” are coming to the border, the nation actually needs immigration to keep its population stable. Immigration also thereby ensures there are enough working-age adults paying social security taxes. This helps keep the federal government solvent, in the face of an otherwise aging population.
• Immigration lets us live up to the best of U.S. values. The U.S. population has been formed in part through waves of mass migration—some forced, some voluntary—that have made us into what Frederick Douglass called a “composite nation.” This diversity has been a source of national strength through many challenges. Being a haven and a place of opportunity for new arrivals is core to the best of who we are—and can continue to be such if we do not turn our back on our national ideals.

To be sure, the many societal benefits of immigration do not mean the current system is working well. Politicians of both major parties are right to point to the pressures facing the asylum system; and many mayors and city officials are justifiably concerned about their ability to provide shelter for growing numbers of asylum-seekers under current budgetary constraints.

The solution to these problems, however, is not to decrease migration, but to encourage it. Processing backlogs in the asylum system are due in part to the fact that so few alternative pathways exist for immigrants to work in the United States. Opening up new migration channels would help alleviate some of the system’s administrative burden.

Likewise, the shelter capacity challenges facing American cities could be alleviated by removing the cruel and unjust restrictions that asylum-seekers face on their ability to work in the United States. Most asylum-seekers, after all, would not need or want to rely on city shelters, if current U.S. law did not perversely block them from obtaining work permits. The Asylum Seeker Work Authorization Act&text=This%20bill%20directs%20the%20Department,by%20the%20Department%20of%20Justice.) (ASWA), which UUSC and our partners support, would address this problem in part by enabling asylum-seekers to join the workforce within a month of their arrival. You can take action to support this critically-needed bill here.

Too often, when politicians are confronted for backing anti-immigrant policies, they defend themselves by saying they are just reflecting U.S. public opinion. But public opinion does not grow in a vacuum. It comes in part from the stories we tell about migration and the ways we frame the issue.

It’s time, then, for a major reframe of the way we talk about migration. The real-world evidence is clear enough by this point: immigration is not a threat; it’s an opportunity.

​

so I have some questions with a follow up statement.

so if everyone in the universalist belief will one day be saved, does this mean this also includes Satan? if not, why? if god is all loving, and wants to save everyone, why doesn't that include Satan?

im not trying to be rude or anything, but even with the universalist belief, i'd rather stay in hell if not everyone including Satan can be saved, because to me that means god is fine with some sentient creatures suffering forever.

I wouldn't say it's the only factor in me dumping her but I'd say it was the straw that broke the camel's back. She's born and raised Conservative Jewish while I'm born and raised Unitarian.

We get stereotyped as being only nominally religious but that's not the case for me. I spend well over a third of my yearly income and spend on average about 28 hours a week at directly UU-related functions usually as part of an older Northeastern US fellowship but I'm also active in helping support smaller facilities and causes.

Of course I was plenty open to converting to Judaism, even an Orthodox conversion since that's usually what's preferred for marriage even among the most liberal Jews. However I made it clear that I would continue to be active in my community and would expect her to at absolute minimum be respectful of my participation.

I did my best to tell her about how many Jews see zero contradiction between their Jewish faith/identity and UUA.

Yet whenever I took her to services and other events she was disparaging, called it the "most goyish thing" she'd ever seen.

Without getting into too much of a rant, she went out of her way to be disrespectful to myself and others.

It got to a point where she was bringing it up to say that I'm not a real man, which burns extra deep since I'm a trans man.

Long story short I basically told her this was a dealbreaker for me and that we could either come to some sort of compromise or we could go our separate ways. She wouldn't budge so as much as it hurt, I dumped her.

It sucks because out of all the people I've dated she's someone I very deeply fell in love with. We were friends and Krav Maga sparring partners for about a year before we started dating but it looks like we won't be able to be friends, it's too raw and painful.

But there's tittles of pride in that I put up a boundary and stood my ground even when it was torture.

This isn't necessarily a call for advice more of a vent. Share your own insights and experiences if you want.

Raised catholic, would consider myself agnostic at best now and curious about UU. I’m missing catholicism and feeling an odd connection and wanting to “incorporate” elements of it, but never want to go back and feel disgust at the same time? I keep childhood stuff in a memory box and recently I came across some communion and confirmation gifts i got when i was younger and i felt pain my chest. I had a gold crucifix, 3 blessed rosary beads, lourdes keychains etc etc as well as pocket miracles booklets the works in the box.

I suffer from an anxiety disorder and insomnia and a sort of meditation and i suppose general …non traditional prayer with the rosary beads invokes a sort of positive less anxious feeling, same with wearing a st christopher’s medal. however, i can never forgive the years of purity culture and catholic guilt and also the general crimes of the church. I’m pro choice and pro LGBT all the way. it’s a really weird feeling honestly. I consider sometimes joining a UU church and maybe getting some prayer/meditation beads or just having a flick through the bible critically? Wondering if other ex catholics or similar on here have had this experience and if you’ve donated the catholic paraphernalia, thrown it out or just incorporate it in some way into your own life or practice?

I heard ~11% of Cohousing residents (in the US) are UUs! Three cohousing communities are participating in events at the end of February. If you’re interested in learning more about San Francisco Bay area cohousing opportunities, consider joining February 24 or February 25 in person event. Details are posted here https://www.cohousing-solutions.com/artofneighboring

In a recent interview, Okun says that too many have been misinterpreting and misusing her famous '15 Characteristics of White Supremacy Culture.'

Tema Okun decries the misuse of her ‘White Supremacy Culture’ list

A quote from her interview includes:

“The way it’s misused is that people turn it into a checklist to assess or target someone and say: Look, you’re exhibiting these characteristics. And that means you’re colluding with white supremacy culture, and you’re a bad person, you’re a terrible person. Or to accuse them of being a tool of white supremacy culture.

And generally, what I find is that when people misuse it in that way, they haven’t actually read it, or they certainly haven’t read the website, because there’s no way you could read the website and come away feeling like it’s meant to be used as a checklist in that way.”

Hi everyone! So my story with UU started when I was in high school, an edgy Christian-turned-atheist who was brought to a UU service by my best friend. Ever since then I’ve known of its existence and it always struck me as something very cool and important. I have a background in psychology and the years I’ve lived and the education I’ve received only served to cement the importance of a spiritual practice, especially one that could be community-based. I attended quite a few times at my university town; the sermons often moved my to tears, and it was just so fascinating to see nature and science take center stage as inspiration for a spiritual practice.

As an immigrant, for a long time undocumented, POC, I felt the social justice aspect was particularly important to these congregations, and I loved that. I settled in a major city last year and I’ve gone to a few sermons at my closest UU temple, and have had many very pleasant chats with people during coffee hour, and I have always enjoyed the sermons. But I was busy with other stuff and I definitely always intended to make it a more common habit but it hadn’t happened yet. My father passed in October, suddenly at 57. After a couple months I knew I was going to need to develop a spiritual practice (and in need of a supportive community) if I was ever to start healing. So I became really proactive about getting my holistic wellness in order.

Being signed up to their email list, I received one for a Women’s retreat. I had zero idea what to expect as I’d never been to one. I emailed the organizer to ask if it was normal and okay that I wasn’t part of the community. She encouraged me to attend as there would be newer people there. So I did it, especially because I was wanting to at the very least focus on mindfulness for a few days, and a retreat seemed like a great way to do that!

It was a life-changing experience. At 26, I was the youngest there. But I am not weird about intergenerational friendships, in my culture I was raised with a lot of respect for elders, and for a lot of love and warmth for older women especially. I met dozens of women whom I connected with on a very special level. When I was done with the retreat I journaled just a bit about the experience and I could recall 26 different names, and I know I am forgetting people, as every now and then I remember more. I met so many incredible, unique, talented, HILARIOUS women. All so open to learn, to share. I felt so unbelievably welcome and comfortable there. Like I never have before. I shared a lot of intimate parts of my story as an undocumented immigrant, and people were so respectful and curious and kind. I even met two other POC of similar backgrounds, which was really incredible.

People helped me deal with the death of my father and some shared their own experiences with it, as many went through the same thing. Many shared experiences with their own grief in general and that was really valuable to me too.

Then there was the spiritual aspects, but the post is getting too long as it is. It was all so much better than I could have imagined, and I did imagine it would be pretty cool, but never in such an impactful way.

I even started volunteering at a migrant center with one of my new friends, which has already led to even more enriching connections.

Tomorrow I am going to church, and I’m excited to see the dozens of new friends I made during the retreat. After I am having brunch with one of the other POC I met, and our families. I am so excited, and so thankful.

I am a 32 yo female of Native American descent who was adopted as a baby and raised by white parents in a predominantly white community. I have a college education and lived for a time in a major American city, but found myself back near the town I grew up in prior to the pandemic. During this time I (like many others) struggled with my mental health being isolated and feeling a significant lack of community in my life. I made a lot of changes once the world started to get back to normal and one of them was a goal to find community. I have tried a number of activities and hobbies, some stuck, many didn’t. It was on my city Reddit that someone had suggested the UU church and its groups as a place to meet people. I looked it up and decided to jump into an online journey group focused on “Firsts”. Seemed perfect considering this was my first UU activity. It became a highlight getting on zoom and connecting with some wonderful older women every other week to share deeply personal stories and experiences. I’m now in my second round of journey groups. This time I’m involved in two centered around specific reading materials. The chance to read, think critically, and discuss in a safe environment with like minded people has added greatly to my life! I have felt welcomed, zero judgement, deep understanding of my reluctance towards heavily Christian topics and jargon, and possibly the best part of all appreciated for the value my truth brings to these groups. As a non-white person it has been deeply validating to be part of a community that actively thanks me for simply being willing to share my honest opinions, feelings, and experiences. So to anyone out there hesitant to trying out activities at their local UU church I really cannot recommend it enough. Community will change your life and in my experience it was more than worth the risk.

Peace and light✨

Seeing QuakerSpeak's video about a Muslim Quaker got me wondering why are Quakers considered Christian, even though they accept other religions like UU does? What is it that makes them different from the UU in a way that makes them Christian?

Seeing QuakerSpeak's video about a Muslim Quaker got me wondering why are Quakers considered Christian, even though they accept other religions like UU does? What is it that makes them different from the UU in a way that makes them Christian?

This story was published in the Winter 2017 issue of UU World Magazine:

https://www.uuworld.org/articles/emptying-my-shoe

Emptying my shoe

I can’t imagine where I’d be had I not found my Unitarian Universalist congregation.

How did I get here? How could I have gone so quickly from a warm loving family to a barren empty flat?

Those questions echoed in my mind’s dank chambers as I surveyed the unfamiliar living space. Floor-to-ceiling stacks of boxes obscured stark, bare walls. Could the pieces of my shattered life ever reassemble into something resembling normal? Nothing was normal, and maybe never would be again after the metaphorical hurricane that had laid waste to my life.

That hurricane had a name. Transgender.

The media would have you believe transgender people “always knew” their gender. The news shows us story after story of little girls knowing in their hearts they are boys, or boys asking to wear dresses and play with Barbie dolls. Even if this knowledge goes unexpressed for decades, we’re led to believe, their gender was obvious to them from a young age.

People are far more comfortable allowing the messy business of a gender transition if it is presented by storytellers as a foregone conclusion from the start.

But reality is nowhere near that neat. I spent the first fifty years of my life with no earthly clue I might be transgender. An observer might have found my teenage preference for female friends unusual, but I did not. Teenage gender norms and those of the liberated era in which I was raised allowed anyone to be friends with anyone else, and I put together a rich social life.

Things changed after graduation. People began pairing off, and social overtures toward single women were generally interpreted as romantic. Finding friendship among females became more challenging. However, I made the best of my opportunities, getting married and raising two children. I was mildly uncomfortable with my role as husband and father, but since I had never really felt like I fit in anywhere, that seemed unsurprising and certainly not an indication of anything unusual about my relationship with gender.

As a married man, I found that developing friendships with women was nearly impossible. I couldn’t come up with any way of approaching women socially without looking like I was interested in an affair. Luckily, my wife and I were great friends, keeping the loneliness of my married years partially at bay. I had family and career to keep me busy, so it was not until age fifty that I turned my focus toward the gaping holes in my social life.

I set about putting together the puzzle pieces of what until then had seemed unrelated traits. My reading habits involved almost exclusively books written by, for, and about women. While awaiting the doctor, I invariably chose the women’s magazines. My favorite movies featured stories about strong women who overcame adversity, and my favorite songs tended to be those from female artists whose mighty voices sang of feminine empowerment.

I also began for the first time to examine a feeling I’d had since my teen years: regret that I was not born female, with a female body. I would frequently try a thought experiment: Would I give up everything to magically become a woman? The answer invariably came back “yes.” I would gladly trade my own life for just about any female one.

My wife supported my explorations until the clues began to suggest I might be transgender. “If you transitioned, I’d probably leave you,” she told me one night, and I did not object. I certainly would have been upset to find myself suddenly married to a man, and I understood why remaining in a marriage with a woman would not be her choice.

So I was cautious. I tested the waters, first presenting as a woman in public and then joining a transgender-friendly women’s reading group. A realization took shape: I was far more comfortable as my female self. Female social interactions seemed “right” in a way that male interactions never had. I began to see my female life as the “real me,” while the prospect of spending the rest of my days as a male looked unbearably dreary. I was conscious of a part of my being that demanded I be true to it by living as a female. I could no more change it through an effort of will than I could my height or eye color.

However, many whom I took into my confidence urged me to save my marriage by remaining in my male life and avoiding disrupting my family. I had survived a half-century as a male, surely I could survive the rest of the way.

After much soul searching, I still couldn’t agree. Imagine you are on a long hike, feet throbbing with discomfort. You soldier on, because everyone on the hike is complaining. But then you all take a break, and you find that your shoe is full of pebbles, while everyone else’s shoes are clear. You realize that, though no one’s feet feel fine, it’s been far worse for you than for others. A simple solution exists—remove your shoe and empty out the pebbles.

What would you say to those who remind you that you’ve hiked this far, surely you could hike just a little farther? That the hike is more than half done, and you’d inconvenience everyone else, who would have to wait for you to untie your shoe and then lace it back up again? What would you do? Would you just finish the hike, knowing that every step will hurt, or would you beg their indulgence while you emptied your shoe?

In the end, I reluctantly and with much trepidation decided that, while I wished I could have remained as I was for the sake of my marriage, it was asking too much of me to insist that I spend the rest of my life pretending I was someone I’m not. I needed to change, and if my wife left me because of it, I couldn’t control that and shouldn’t try.

That decision shattered our marriage. After months of vitriolic wrangling we decided she would buy my half of the house. My daughter, then a junior in high school, remained living with her. I moved into my own place, my wife furious that I’d chosen transition over her. My son was away at college by then, so for the first time since getting married I was living alone.

I had been cast from paradise. My new fabulous life as my female self had come down to barren walls and brown cardboard boxes. I needed to rebuild my life. But where to begin? How could I find a place where my brand of newly minted femininity would be supported?

Some weeks earlier, I had attended a gathering of transgender people at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Baltimore. There, I had run into someone I had worked with years earlier. She wasn’t transgender, but was there as a member of the church. She was eager to give me a tour of the historic building, including the magnificent sanctuary where William Ellery Channing gave his famous sermon. When she learned that I didn’t know the first thing about Unitarian Universalism, she gave me a brief primer and read me the seven Principles. I recall thinking it was remarkable that they seemed to express almost precisely my own personal values.

However, I was raised Jewish, a religion that has seen itself as under siege since its inception. Jews are trained to resist the draw of other religions, seeing conversion as a betrayal of not just our faith but our very culture, our families, friends, and traditions. So I had filed my knowledge of the UU Principles among the general factual trivia that clutters my mind.

During those early days of living alone, though, feeling adrift and disconnected, the idea of joining a faith community began to seem attractive. I looked into some of the Reform Jewish congregations in the area, but I was not enticed. They appeared more focused on the observance of rituals than any real spiritual exploration.

I got a much different impression visiting the website of our local UU congregation, the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbia, Maryland, “UUCC” to pretty much everyone. I found myself registering for a Get Connected class, and on a windy February morning I took a seat in a makeshift circle of chairs at the center of a seemingly cavernous sanctuary in Columbia’s Owen Brown Interfaith Center. By the time the class started there were ten women seated there, and we were joined by a young couple a few minutes later. The first order of business involved introductions. As we went around the circle, I was astounded to find that among the ten original women, five of us were queer, including the assistant minister leading the class.

What I heard that day convinced me that UUCC was a great fit. I left intending to take advantage of all the social, spiritual, and educational opportunities I had time for. The only events I planned to skip were the weekly services. My childhood memories of synagogue involved excruciating hours listening to interminable chanting in Hebrew about the greatness of God. The only spiritual experience they seemed to offer me came from the overwhelming relief when they were finally over.

While leaving the Get Connected class, I said as much to one of my fellow students, who also came from a Jewish background. She persuaded me to give the service at least one try. So on a Sunday morning in early March 2014 I first heard the senior minister, the Rev. Paige Getty, preach.

The topic that week was “family,” and the service included testimony by members of three dissimilar families. One involved a blended family and the trials and rewards of merging their two households. A single woman told of her life, and a gay man spoke of initially being rejected but then finally accepted by his partner’s mother. Getty painted an expansive view of the world, one where diverse family structures contribute to beauty and variety. So sincere and affirming was her message that my eyes weren’t dry for a moment during the entire hour-long service.

Fast-forward to the present, and nearly every friend I have I met at UUCC. I never miss a chance to hear Getty preach if I can help it, and I look forward all week to the lazy lunches after services, discussing the sermon, current events, and what’s going on in our lives, or just kicking back and enjoying our food. I teach religious education classes every week, have helped lead services, and have participated in reflection groups, fun feasts, game nights, and other events too numerous to name. When I had gender-confirming surgery, I came out as transgender to the entire congregation during the sharing of joys and sorrows. I spoke of my excitement and fear, and I was met by an outpouring of support and a promise from a lay member of the Pastoral Care Committee to call me frequently during my recovery period.

As I write this, I have just returned from three days at a spiritual center after participating in the annual UUCC women’s retreat. During one of the fascinating workshops there, it occurred to me how amazing it was to bask in the love and support that warmed that all-female space. And how unremarkable it felt that no one had ever questioned whether, as a transgender woman, I belonged there. The subject simply hadn’t come up.

I can’t imagine where I’d be had I not found UUCC. My life would certainly lack much of its richness. The dark, lonely period after my separation now seems a distant memory.

Suzi Chase is a member of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbia, Maryland.

Basically what the text said. I am the OP from the post yesterday, Expensive_Case, and I had a nice chat with my brother in law who is a lawyer. Turns out I have a pretty good case against the mod for harassment, defamation, and emotional damage. Half of the stuff the public reddit didn’t see because it happened over chat. My speech is protected by the first amendment, the mods was not and falls in the categories that I stated above. I’m going to give the mod 48 hours, so by Friday 2/16/24 @ 6PM EST, to take the horrible post they made about me and my transition pictures down and make a MAJOR public apology explaining that they acted in the wrong way and frankly broke the law with what they said about me and explain that I am the person in both of those pictures, which I have endless proof for and can send to anyone who wants it. Just contact me on my expensive_case account cuz this is a burner one. So by Friday 2/16/24 6PM EST, if there is no apology i’m going to go ahead with my lawyer and move forward with this. I will also reach out to reddit corporate. I really don’t want to bring it to that point, but if I don’t see a major apology, I will. I will tell you that conservatives have NEVER treated me as a trans person this horribly, and as the group that is supposed to be loving and accepting of all kinds, that is the furthest from the truth. Im not no cry baby but I hold people accountable for their actions, and it looks like the mod is going to get into some legal issues with this one if action is not done.

Also I’d like to say that the poster this morning was not me and for anyone who harassed that person, shame on you. I watched it all go down as I was collecting evidence for my BIL.

So mister u/cult_buster2005 if you don’t want this to all go down, I suggest you do some serious work on yourself and how you treat others. If I end up going forward with this, i’ll know exactly who you are and i’ll let your church know what you did and how you broke every single rule of UU.

And mister u/tgjer you’re up next if this mod doesn’t do anything so if I were you, I’d be crossing my fingers that the mod takes responsibility for their actions.

Edit: If reddit wants to ban me, they wil. But they should also ban the person who broke the rules of their own sub and the law.

I wish to especially note the brilliant and powerful contributions of:

u/tgjer

After receiving complaints about the troll, Expensive_Case9796, and reviewing most of the conversation that was taking place, I banned them and then got slammed with several statements blasting me and other UUs for our "hypocrisy" in not being willing to tolerate their nonsense. Well, I guess every major scientific association in the world must be hypocritical as well.

For today, I left the post made by Expensive_Case9796 up so I could make screenshots of everything that was said there, as well as the messages that were thrown at me, for future reference. It will be deleted tomorrow.

I suspect that the whole affair was an attempt by "gadflies" to make us look stupid in public, but they clearly didn't count on tgjer and others being knowledgeable enough to directly counter their trolling.

It is you advocates for genuine truth, justice, and compassion for trans people that make me proud to be a UU! And if any of you want to become a mod alongside me, feel free to comment with a request for promotion.

UPDATE: the troll made another post attacking us:

https://www.reddit.com/r/UnitarianUniversalist/comments/1aqzzg7/op_from_that_post_got_lawyer_involved_and_mod/

And then insulted everyone's intelligence by deleting it right after I noticed it.....and also deleted his first post. It's the same stunt Herman Goering pulled after the Nuremburg War Crimes Trials: "You can't kill me, I'm killing myself!"

Which is stupid as hell anyway. But his attempts to hide the evidence of the stunts he pulled are futile. I made over 50 screenshots of all that happened yesterday for future reference.

UPDATE TWO: Here are screenshots of both the troll's posts attacking us:

https://imgur.com/a/xMMteja

I love smartphones!

I got myself so caught up in the world’s negativity and disapproval of leftist propaganda. I am gay and trans but i feel like the left now goes against what I believe in. So i decided to try to help myself heal at UU. I started going three weeks ago and the second time i went was about the laws against trans kids in my state. Great just exactly what I came here NOT to hear. Is it really going to be like this the whole time? I just don’t want to sit there and get preached at that i’m oppressed because, here in America, i’m not. From what I understand, UU is supposed give a sermon and people can pick and choose the good messages that they feel that applies to their life. But I simply cannot do that about the sterilization of children that don’t know any better, or other leftist hypocritical talking points. In no way am I conservative, I disapprove of their talking points just as much to make it clear. Please tell me this whole thing is not the leftist agenda pretending to be a religion.

I read "The Kingdom of God is Within You" last year and it really set me down a path out of traditional churches and towards things like Universalism, which I just rediscovered after asking Gemini if there were any Christian denominations that rejected the idea of hell and damnation. I live in Tennessee and it's a very Christian Nationalist environment, which repels me! Looking for a Church that emphasizes ethical living and optimism while saying away from politics. I'll settle for two of the three 😉

1. To what extend are UU churches Christian? Do they read a Bible? Do they pray to the Christian God. Or is it more like UU acknowledges it's Christian roots?

2. Are Churches generally active in left wing causes or a haven for liberal Christians? Are they mainly a reaction to over-the-top right wing Churches.

3. Are there books you'd suggest where I can learn more about core beliefs of UU?

I was thinking about the common theme of eating food from the underworld and being trapped there, and how this was present in both Greek and Shinto Mythology.

What are some of y'alls thoughts on this in parallel with the forbidden fruit from Genesis and the resulting exile?

I keep thinking this theme comes up so much in modern stories as well, and was wondering if there is some deep archetype all of these stories are meant to preserve. Would love to hear peoples 2 cents on the topic.

Hello everyone and thanks for reading this. I feel really alone sometimes. I am asking for prayers and good vibes for the healing of my body and soul.

A few years ago I was diagnosed with Neuropathy in my legs. It started out not too bad, but just like the doctor said it progressed and progressed hard. My legs are constantly tingling and they burn so bad I cannot stand it. I now can no longer stand for more than 15 minutes. I am on medication and going to the doctor regularly and since I can't work I am considered poverty and qualified for Medicaid so I am thankful for that, but still it doesn't help the pain much, the doctors or the meds.

This has also left me in a dark depression since I have been off work. I was a construction worker, but I had to quit about 12 months ago. I applied for disablilty immediately. I got denied and called an attorney, and they are going to take the case I think. I filed for an appeal, but it could still take months and I have applied for food stamps but still nothing on that yet either. It's getting hard. I am probably going to be evicted, no food, no money, no truck (kicked the bucket and sold for parts months ago) and just at the end of my rope. Mentally and physically.

I know one day I will get better. I hope, at least, but my legs hurt constantly and I would do anything to go back 10 years. I am in my early 40's and I would take living to 50 only gladly if I could just get a few years pain free. Life is life though and I know that's not possible. Friends, I do know my God is a healer though, and even though I have never felt further from him in my life I know he can steal heal my body and soul, and I have asked, maybe I haven't humbled myself enough idk, maybe someone needs healing worse than me? I am almost certain they do and i know I am not his only child who needs healing, but this hurts. I know that he will leave the 99 to rescue me, but hurry my shepard, this lamb is lost thirsty and hungry. I look forward to heaven, and crave it like like home, even though I have never been there.

I am going to keep clawing and fighting through this and praying the whole time. Like I said before though, it gets really hard especially when I am flat broke. I have no food or anything and never in a million years did I think I would have to ask, but if anyone could help me with anything I would be forever grateful and pay it back when I get on my feet. I have cashapp and my name there is $blueneonfish if anyone can help me with anything. I also have Venmo. My name there is @rccarracer9 I mean it, anything helps. I don't have anything. If you cant help, thanks for reading this anyways and still pray for me please, I understand everyone is having it hard right now so I understand if anyone can't give, I just figured I would try this because it's my last resort becasue I have no speakable family and my credit is awful where I have lost everything. I have tried some churches, but most of them cannot help as they are out of supplies themselves. I know this looks really suspicious, but I promise you it's not. I am just this desperate for help. It's like I am trapped in a prison in my mind and body.

I know it will get better at least I hope, I just really do not know how much more I can take. I am not going to give up though.

Hi. New here. Started going to a UU service about a month ago and found it so refreshing to listen to moving sermons that bring me to tears and declarations of intent that I dare hope could ignite love and justice through a world that feels so unjust and frightening.

No mater what I think about whiteness, how detestable and false I find white supremacism concepts I'm perceived as white by the people who find that consequential and it has real effect on how easy it is for me to move in the world. That means I have an easier time getting jobs, moving around unafraid of police, and xenophobia, unexamined or explicit. I wasn't born understanding this. Even though I came of age in a very diverse public school system. I had to break out of the matrix of whiteness as a norm.

Here's the good news, from my experience. when you start really digging into what race means critically, you will be uncomfortable for a time, you will be scared, and then you'll be MAD, and then you might spend some time being sad, then hopefully you'll start to see that there's plenty to do about it. You'll start recognizing the heroes that have done something about it and are doing something about it. And you won't do the work to be "good" and you'll know the work may never be finished. You'll do it because you see your non white friends better, Understand their experience better, You'll love and respect them for their resilience, and be grateful for how their work and the work of their ancestors is liberating ALL of us.

I think a lot of people come to UU because they want to be liberated from oppressive concepts like original sin, which is total misogynist mumbo jumbo with no basis in anything, where as critical race theory and anti racism is based on a long history of atrocities, made evident by peoples living conditions RIGHT NOW.

To get started on the track of awakening justice into the world, I can suggest the 13th available on netflix. I think it should be required watching for Americans, especially people living a white experience.

If you want to go deep into deprograming your own internalized white supremacy (your not inherently evil, it happens to everyone in a white supremicist world, anyone can be fooled) I highly recommend Dawn of Everything by David Graber. It's long but the first 3rd is what is especially useful.

I've been deep diving in this subreddit and have found a lot of discussion around the money/tithe/pledge issue. It seems there are a lot of people who ultimately felt unwelcomed, or were outright told they were unwelcome, based on income. There are also a lot of folks saying that it doesn't matter, at least at their local churches.

I am stuck. Ten years ago I attended my local UU Church until it came time for pledging. I was a broke college student and struggled with transportation to the church. I distinctly recall talking to another member about how I couldn't afford even the lowest check box to pledge, and they told me to go without Starbucks once a week... I didn't eat out or drink at all at that point in my life. I didn't even respond because that response was enough for me to feel like these weren't my people, despite otherwise feeling very welcomed and like I belonged.

I am finding myself again in a place with a deep need for community. My family and I went to a service today and during the "offering", the stand in minister said that the offering was just as important as any other involvement in the church, if not more. It was heavy on the guilt. Only after the plate was back up was it stated that if we were joining for the first time, to skip the plate. Somehow, I forgot about this aspect of the church entirely. I was so stressed out the whole time about money. A family member had a donut and a cup of coffee and all I could think about was that we were being judged for what we left in the offering plate vs what we took. Probably paranoia, but I was really overwhelmed at the thought.

The church's website says that we should be giving 5-10% of our income. We are deeply in debt, have several thousand in medical bills alone every month, and are desperately trying to catch up. I'm not hurting like I was as a college student, but I'm still hurting in a way that 5-10% of our income would leave us beyond fucked, if I'm being completely honest.

I don't know exactly what I'm looking for with this post. I'm so lonely but I can't afford to pay for companionship at the level they want. And the church didn't feel like it once did. It was so empty, hardly anyone stayed to chat after service, and the service was awkward and boring. This month is apparently pledge month too, so we picked the worst time to start coming (again?).

https://websites.umich.edu/~jrcole/bahai/1999/jssr/bhjssr.htm

[Part one]

Despite the large literature on American religious bodies, some groups remain curiously off-limits to careful investigation. In many instances, these largely unstudied contemporary faiths carefully cultivate public images that hide important facets of their outlook and internal workings. Thus, the collapse of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh’s Oregon commune surprised many observers. Some of these groups have developed control mechanisms that discourage adherents and often even apostates from writing about these workings. Scientology, for instance, employs techniques of harassment against critics. Others employ shunning which can be an extremely powerful deterrent, endangering a lifetime of friendships and even family relationships. The problem with strict internal controls for missionary religions, however, is that they are most often incompatible in Western societies with significant growth. One solution to this difficulty is to attempt to control what are thought of as key pressure points—vocal intellectuals, media, prominent institutions—and to give greater leeway to ordinary believers. This solution has the further advantage of making charges of repression less plausible to the rank and file, who have not personally experienced such constraints.

Here I wish to examine social control mechanisms in the American Baha’i community. These include mandatory pre-publication censorship of everything Baha'is publish about their religion, administrative expulsion, blackballing, shunning and threats of shunning. What are the ideological bases of these control mechanisms? How is power attained and managed in a lay community without a clergy? I wish to stress here that this article is not concerned with the essence or scriptures or theology of the religion, but with the actualities of its day-to-day technologies of control. Many of my remarks cannot be generalized to other national communities, and concern mainly the U.S.

Anyone familiar with the public relations literature produced by the movement will be surprised at the description of control mechanisms given above, since Baha’is are often grouped in the media with Unitarian-Universalists. Why should the Baha’i authorities wish to project an image more liberal than the reality? First, the movement’s scriptures are liberal in their orientation, and as a result even administratively conservative Baha'i leaders support the U.N. and race unity, and pay lip service to the rule of law. But when it comes to the internal governance of the religion, the same leaders wield these control mechanisms to enforce on prominent believers what might be thought of as “party discipline” in the Marxist sense. Second, Baha’i leaders are aware that if the U.S. press understood how their administration actually operates, journalists might be far less favorable to them than is now the case. Third, the Baha'i leadership and intellectual class includes some powerful liberals, and some of the contradictions between self-presentation and policy derive from conflicts among the leadership. Fourth, since the 1960s this non-Christian Iranian religion has not attracted many white evangelicals or working-class Catholics, whereas more pluralist college-educated persons have been much more open to it. Thus, an open insistence on a fundamentalist orthodoxy and a clear condemnation of human rights principles might deprive the religion of an important recruiting ground. Although antiliberals have captured the key posts, they shape the community’s ideology subtly, by controlling media and silencing liberals who begin to become prominent. Because of these techniques of dissimulation, power can remain in the hands of conservatives, while liberals can continue to be recruited at the local level, and often remain unaware of how marginalized they really are.

In the past, the paucity of anything but official literature formed a difficulty in studying the approximately 60,000 adult American Baha’is, but the emergence of Baha’i electronic mail forums in the 1990s has led to the airing of Baha’i individual opinions in public. I will outline some key control mechanisms employed in the U.S., based on published literature, following email debates, and participant observation. The author has been studying the Baha’i religion for a quarter of a century, and spent much of that time as an adherent. This movement originated as a messianic offshoot of Twelver Shi`ite Islam in nineteenth-century Iran. By the time it came to the United States, in the 1890s, it was already an established religion in Iran and elsewhere in the Middle East (Smith 1987). It is now among the more widely-spread religious bodies in the world, and since the mid-1980s has officially claimed about five million adherents (Smith and Momen 1989)--a number that has remained stagnant since then and which was probably somewhat exaggerated even at the time. Let us begin with a brief historical overview.

Historical Background of the American Baha’i Community

The religion was founded in the Middle East in 1863 by the Iranian prophet Baha'u'llah (1817-1892), who taught the unity of the world religions and the unity of humankind from his place of exile in Palestine (Cole 1998). It came to the U.S. in the early 1890s, and was nurtured by the religion's second leader, `Abdu'l-Baha (d. 1921) (Stockman 1985-1995). From 1921 to 1957, the world community was headed by Shoghi Effendi Rabbani, Baha'u'llah's great-grandson, who died childless and without a successor as "Guardian" or interpreter of the religion. After a hiatus, the Universal House of Justice, consisting of nine men, was elected by the members of the National Spiritual Assemblies of the world in Haifa, Israel, in 1963, in the wake of a Baha’i world congress held in London (Smith 1987). This legislative body, which had been called for by Baha'u'llah but was now elected for the first time, quickly confirmed that no further Guardians could be appointed (Universal House of Justice 1973:11). The Universal House of Justice created a new appointive institution, the Continental Boards of Counselors, to carry out the functions of propagation and protection—that is, of encouraging proselytizing and imposing orthodoxy (they are assisted by regional “auxiliary board members” and their “assistants”). Some members of the Universal House of Justice were drawn from the ranks of Americans who had served on the U.S. National Spiritual Assembly, and for a time vacancies on the UHJ tended to be filled by former secretaries-general of the U.S. body. More recently vacancies have been filled by counselors appointed by the UHJ. The Universal House of Justice presided over a vast expansion of Baha’i numbers among peasants in the global South, especially India (Smith and Momen 1989). Growth remained slight in Europe.

In 1963, the American Baha’i community had about 10,000 adherents. Here, the religion felt the impact of the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, the youth counterculture, and Watergate. The late 1960s and the 1970s were for many Americans a period of profound disillusionment with their social norms and government institutions (Bellah 1976; Wuthnow 1976). This dissatisfaction significantly raised the number of potential converts to less well known religious bodies. Suddenly, the Baha’is' proselytizing ("teaching") efforts, which had had only desultory results previously, reaped tens of thousands of converts. "From 13,000 in 1969, the U.S. Baha’i community grew to 18,000 in 1970; to 31,000 in 1971; 40,000 in 1972; and 60,000 by 1974" (Stockman 1994:18). (Note, however, that Stockman is reporting all the persons who ever registered as members without formally withdrawing, whereas Baha’i authorities soon lost track of about half of them; these persons are unlikely still to be Baha’is.). There were relatively few Baha’i youth (ages 15-21) in the community in 1968, but by the early 1970s there were some 19,000. The influx of youth created frictions with the older Baha’is. Some large proportion of the converts from the youth culture subsequently withdrew (cf. Caton in Hollinger 1992:264-271). Some of those who remained went on to obtain higher degrees, giving the community for the first time a significant number of intellectuals, though these remained poorly integrated into the Baha’i milieu. The Baha’i administration was to have increasing problems with these intellectuals’ “culture of critical discourse” (Gouldner, 1979) in subsequent years. By 1978, the Baha’i administration claimed 77,396 members, though it had confirmed addresses for only 48,357 of these, and the number of youth had fallen to only about 3,500 (National Spiritual Assembly of the U.S. 1979).

In the early 1970s, as a result of proselytizing by young people, thousands of rural African-Americans in South Carolina and northern Georgia adopted the Baha’i faith, attracted by its emphasis on the elimination of prejudice, though most of these converts did not give up their identification with their Christian churches (Hardesty 1993). The members of the U.S. National Spiritual Assembly (based in Wilmette, Ill.) had for the most part become adults in the 1940s and 1950s when the Baha’is numbered only five thousand or so and constituted a relatively closed club. They appear to have worried that the previously-existing community might be swamped by the newcomers. The rolls were becoming cluttered with many declarations of faith based on misunderstandings, and newcomers often had no conception of the rules of Baha'i administration. According to one eyewitness Firuz Kazemzadeh, a longstanding member of the N.S.A. and then a professor of Russian history at Yale, was worried that the community did not have the resources, financial or human, to manage a further influx of poor southern Blacks, and felt that resources should be put into absorbing the thousands that had already come in (personal communication, 16 May 1997). Other, less conservative N.S.A. members strongly argued for allowing the chain conversion to take its course, but these lost the debate. The N.S.A. then deliberately halted the teaching campaign in the South. This is corroborated by a number of sources, including a message posted to the Talisman listserv discussion group (which was run 1994-1996 by John Walbridge, professor of Near Eastern Studies at Indiana University), in which a correspondent reported that he was told by an older African-American Baha'i who had been prominent in teaching the South Carolinian converts more about their religion that

his study of 25 years of national elections led him to think that there would be very little variability in the ethnic makeup of the N.S.A. membership, that a specific ratio of racial diversity was carefully being maintained (sort of an enhanced tokenism?), and that there were lots of fears by the powers that be that if the mass teaching in the south had been allowed to go forward at full steam that a black N.S.A. majority would probably have been elected, so the mass teaching was stopped. (Talisman, April 1996)

Of course, this is only one opinion, and may be incorrect, but the quote shows that some African-American Baha’is entertained these doubts. It does seem clear that the U.S. Baha'i authorities (unlike their Indian counterparts) chose to impose the sort of controls that might risk stagnation rather than take a chance on vast but uncontrolled growth. An eyewitness told me that House of Justice member Ali Nakhjavani deplored the decision as having set back the U.S. Baha’i community “by a generation.” On the other hand, the N.S.A. did show concern to socialize the new Southern African-American converts to Baha'i values; admitted a representative of that community to the N.S.A.; and has done community service work, including setting up a radio station in South Carolina.

The next large-scale event involved the immigration to the U.S. from 1978 through the mid-1980s of some 12,000 Iranian Baha’is fleeing persecution at the hands of the Khomeinist government in Iran. The American rank and file responded to these events with active campaigns on behalf of their beleaguered Iranian co-religionists and enhanced monetary offerings. The House of Justice in Haifa, however, took a different approach. At first it was reluctant to abandon its quietism in order to protest the persecutions. Moreover, it offered no support to Iranian Baha’is attempting to flee, and even punished many who succeeded, on the grounds that they could only have gotten out by denying their faith. In many instances it refused to certify such Baha’is as members, preventing them from being granted asylum and thereby putting them in severe difficulty and sometimes even danger. The U.S. N.S.A. also took this hard line, refusing to welcome large numbers of the escapees into the U.S. community. House of Justice member Ali Nakhjavani vocally and sternly defended these policies on trips to the U.S. The House of Justice did come to support the U.S. N.S.A. in its policy of putting pressure on the Iranian government through cooperation with human rights organizations, though it sometimes continued to balk at certifying escapees as Baha’is.

The period after 1979 was a time of big changes in the U.S. The influx of Iranians, some of whom eventually were accepted into the community, was sufficiently geographically dispersed to require Baha’i communities to come to terms with a more multi-cultural ethos, and most Baha’i communities now included white, Iranian and African-American members. South Carolina and California are the two biggest population centers, but Baha’is have made strenuous efforts to build communities in every state, having by the mid-1990s some 1300 local spiritual assemblies throughout the country and a national annual budget of around $20 million (though contributions to the national fund in 1996 were only $11 million and were not keeping up with inflation). The N.S.A. claims 130,000 Baha’is in the late 1990s, but this is a vast exaggeration, even if one counts the children. The N.S.A.’s own survey of 300 communities showed that only a third of members regularly attended the nineteen-day feast (National Spiritual Assembly of U.S., 1997). Wilmette insiders give a figure closer to 60,000 for adults in good standing for whom the authorities still have a confirmed address, and probably only half of these could be considered “active” or committed. After all, converts can only be removed from the rolls by writing a formal letter to the National Spiritual Assembly explicitly renouncing belief in Baha’u’llah. Most of those who leave the religion do not bother to do so. One Baha'i tells the story of how an attempt was made in the 1980s to contact the Baha’is in Compton, California. Official records showed 22 Baha’is there for which the N.S.A. had addresses. But an exhaustive search turned up only two who still considered themselves Baha’is (personal communication, May, 1997). This case cannot be typical, but it is suggestive. It is sometimes argued that those converts of whom the authorities have lost track may not have entirely given up their allegiance to the religion. In 1990 CUNY conducted a poll of 110,000 U.S. households with regard to religion, and, only finding 24 adults who reported themselves as Baha’is, estimated the size of the community as 28,000 adults. These findings, while perhaps on the low side, confirm that there are not large numbers of lost Baha’is floating about in the general population (Kosmin and Lachman 1992:17, 151, 287).

[to be continued]

Are there any UU congregations in Iceland? We're planning a vow renewal there and I'm wondering if I can reach out to them for an officiant.

So I spent my early years in a UU church, left before reaching double digits, remained church-free for most of my life, but have recently felt drawn back to religion in some capacity. I have always been at least a little spiritual, but I'd love to join a space and community where I can actually do something with that spirituality.

A friend and I went to a UU service yesterday at a local parish, and we're planning on going to more to get a feel for it. We enjoyed the sermon — the pastor got into Martin Buber's "I-Thou" concept, something we had familiarity with and find incredibly fascinating! But we were curious if there might be a better fit for us elsewhere and if anybody has info on other congregations.

What I'm looking for might be a tough search, but I guess that's why I figured this subreddit might be a big help!

• As the title says, I live in New England and I'm within an hour's drive of Boston. (An hour is probably the most I'd drive for a congregation, but I'd be open to farther than that if the fit is truly that good.)

• I'm an eco-socialist who is looking for a congregation that is even more left-wing than the average UU base — i.e. more of a transformative/liberation theology outlook that goes beyond tolerant liberalism. Anti-capitalism is baked into my spiritual ontology and I'd love to be a part of a congregation that is both affirming and revolutionary in what it emphasizes in sermons, how it engages with the world, the works it does, etc.

• With that above point in mind, greater diversity in the congregation would also be very much preferred. The service we went to yesterday was at least 95% white and maybe 75% over the age of 60. A variety of different perspectives — beyond just those of predominantly upper-middle-class white boomers — is crucially important, especially when the MO of your church is openness and an embracing of the marginalized. And, I suppose "selfishly", I'd also like to meet people my own age (I'm 31), or at least have that age be a noticeable-enough minority within the wider congregation.

• And finally, I'd ideally like it to really dive into the mystical and the ineffable. I know that UU is expressly non-denominational and thus doesn't stake out clear theological positions. But I was hoping that an emphasis on ritual, mystical experience, and meditations on the eternal (all of which can still very much be experienced by atheists and secular people) could still be common-enough within certain UU congregations that they could be more clearly recommended over others in this regard. This includes the above-mentioned ritual, but it could also include stuff like seasonal festivals and events, seminars on different spiritual/mystical perspectives, smaller "coven-esque" groups that dive more deeply into a specific outlook, etc. I like when metaphysics gets equally immanent-within-the-Earth and transcendent-into-Eternity — and while I realize the value in remaining non-descript to an extent so as not to alienate people, I also firmly believe that those metaphysical views are truly embracing and far-reaching, the stuff that UU aspires towards.

TLDR: I'm looking for a congregation in New England that is diverse, leans eco-socialistic (or at least capitalism-critical) in its sermons and works, and is mystical in its spiritual practices and outlooks. Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated! 🙂

Am I the only one who's been excommunicated, so to speak? I didn't even think that was possible in the UU community. I've tried reaching out to the congregation about their decision and they want nothing to do with me. They won't even explain the decision. I know part of the reasoning, but they won't hear anything I have to say. Feels like they're violating the first principle.

I'm sure I'll meet resistance here, too, but so be it. I guess I'm destined to be a problem. That's not what I want, though, all I ever wanted was community.

How UU Became a Church of Shaming, Bullying and Coercion

Hello! I am a doctoral student exploring the outcomes for adult alumni of the foster care system and how trauma informed care may improve outcomes. Understanding that UU communities are passionate about social justice issues, I am considering the possibility that former foster youth may seek community in this space. If you are 18+ and experienced foster care, will you please take a moment to help me in my research? I appreciate your time! Thank you!

How UU Became a Church of Shaming, Bullying and Coercion (substack.com)

I want to get more involved but there seems to be a serious lack of millennials and gen z. Is this just where I am, or do you all find this issue as well? How can we get more young people involved?

My husband and I just joined a UU congregation late last year. We both grew up Catholic and wanted somewhere that was much more inclusive and in line with our current beliefs.

The church we joined is great - we are very introverted, and the people there have done a great job reaching out and making us feel welcomed.

We just want to feel like we belonged somewhere and have a community to fall back on. Having the UU values instilled in our children is also a big plus.

However, since I joined this sub, people make it seem like UU is nefarious in someway. Obviously every church has it's downfalls, but I'm curious why people here are so negative about UU. Am I missing something??

Or does everyone's experiences just vary wildly from church to church?

Maybe this is a misstated question, but what exactly are we worshiping when the minister says "Come, let us worship."

I know for many UUs, the answer would be God. But for other UUs?

Hi everyone. Any other Chicagoland UU’s around here?

I (23F) grew up attending our local Unitarian-Universalist church. Due to both personal and external reasons, my family stopped attending shortly after I went through Coming of Age at 16. I was ok with this, because at the time, as I believe many teenagers feel, I thought I had better things to do with my Sunday morning than go to church.

However, as I’ve gotten older, and had time to reflect back on my relationship both to UU and Capital R Religion in general, my perspective has changed. I find myself being interested in finding a faith community, and the freedom of belief and identity that exists in UU is still attractive to me.

So I guess I’m just looking for perspective. I’m interested to hear from people that were UU, left, and then came back after a period of time, and what that experience was like. I’d also love to swap stories with other’s that grew up in a UU community.

Either way, I’m excited to explore deeper explore my own relationship with the spiritual, and I hope everyone is having a nice night :)

I just want to attend church at my local UU congregation on Sundays... it's free right? I know it costs to be a "member" but does it cost to just attend? Thanks

Hi everyone, I'm looking for a UU home that fills the following:

1. Online/mixed service between 9 am - 2 pm EST
2. Established trans and/or non-binary congregation (tokenism sucks)
3. Culturally-diverse
4. Age-diverse
5. Strong focus on animism, pantheism, humanism
6. Does not feel like Christian-lite
7. NOT performative; actual critical thinkers

Any suggestions for congregations? Suggestions for other groups that are not UU are also very welcome!

Thanks in advance.

Can anyone explain why the line "We work to be diverse multicultural Beloved Communities where all thrive." is in the Justice subsection and not in the Pluralism subsection?

I have no problem with the line, just wondering why it wasn't in Pluralism.

This has been a troubling trend that I have seen in my UU congregation that I attend at least twice in the 20 years that I have been attending. It feels like our congregation is either not sure or doesn't want to deal with folks that enter our presence that are struggling with mental health and addiction issues.

What brings this up is there has been a young man who started attending service and participating in activities when we reopened post-Covid. I am starting to realize that I am the person in the congregation that has probably bonded with this person the most since they have been there, including socializing with them outside of the church setting. Over time I have noticed some possible mental health and/or addiction concerns that are going on with this person. They recently returned after months-long hiatus and whatever is going on seems to be getting worse. This person has told me that they struggle with some mental health things, but the conversations also lead me to speculate addiction issues as well.

What is bothersome is how I have been dismissed by my congregation when I try to discuss these issues with them. Or am told things like "he is trying to sort things out in life" or repeat the face saving reason he gave when he left the first time (even though I knew more was going on). I am not doing it to gossip, but rather out of concern. It is my hope that the church would build a welcoming sense of community around this young man. We have a number of folks in the congregation who work in mental health, social work and other related professions who could address these concerns. I also am looking for support in responding to our relationship.

The minister has been marginally more supportive of my relationship with this person, but stated that he can't really do much unless this person comes to him with their concerns, or are experiencing suicide ideation, are being disruptive or are a threat. I have another meeting with him next week to discuss this issue. But he did tell me that he has noticed that this young man is "anguished by something" when he sees him in the pew.

I ran into this our congregation 10 or so years back with another person going through similar issues. The church also took kind of a "hands off" approach as well. That person ended up dying by suicide.

Is this something that folks experience in other UU congregations or have answers as to how I could respond to this better?

I’ve looked around and from what it looks like, they’re just to give you more responsibility in the congregation? I would assume if you pay for it, that’s how the congregation is upkept because the Sunday donations go to local causes?

Someone please correct me if I’m wrong; I’m just trying to understand the difference between member and nonmember.

I've been struggling a lot lately and am at a point where I really feel that I need community and something to really touch on the spirituality side of things. However, I have very very little experience with religion in general, and what little I do is tainted.

When younger, around 17, I was dragged to sunday service at a non-denominational mega campus style church, the kind where the church resembles a massive Ampitheater and there's a starbucks. It was, interesting, and you could kinda just wander in, all sorts of people would show up, you could get lost in a crowd. I stopped going and haven't really interacted with religion or spirituality in any serious way since.

Now, I'm a late 20s visibly queer brown woman, and from what I've read, UU congregations tend to skew older and white. I also imagine they are smaller. I'm terrified of showing up. I did find a service I want to attend (UU of Church of Buffalo), but have zero clue what to expect or how to show up.

Questions I have in no particular order:

-Do I need to RSVP before hand, or contact them to let them know I'll be arriving?

-What should I wear (I really only have ragged jeans and a tee)?

-How early should I arrive?

-What's proper etiquette?

Thanks for any help. I really want to show up.

​

Hello everyone and thanks for reading this. I feel really alone sometimes. I am asking for prayers and good vibes for the healing of my body and soul.A few years ago I was diagnosed with Neuropathy in my legs. It started out not too bad, but just like the doctor said it progressed and progressed hard. My legs are constantly tingling and they burn so bad I cannot stand it. I now can no longer stand for more than 15 minutes. I am on medication and going to the doctor regularly and since I can't work I am considered poverty and qualified for Medicaid so I am thankful for that, but still it doesn't help the pain much, the doctors or the meds.

This has also left me in a dark depression since I have been off work. I was a construction worker, but I had to quit about 12 months ago. I applied for disablilty immediately. I got denied and called an attorney, and they are going to take the case I think. I filed for an appeal, but it could still take months and I have applied for food stamps but still nothing on that yet either. It's getting hard. I am probably going to be evicted, no food, no money, no truck (kicked the bucket and sold for parts months ago) and just at the end of my rope. Mentally and physically.

I never really had any family, just foster care, so I am used to being alone, it's bad to be hurting and be alone though. It makes you crave human interaction, which I have had none of. I was always ostercized by my foster parents and made to feel like I was not worthy all of my life and was kicked out at 18. But, again, I know there are people out there with it worse than me.

Cherry on top of the cake, I am also just starting to transition into the woman I have became. I hate that I waited this late in life to do it, but I did. I do feel some peace from finally accepting who I am, but as most people already know, transitioning is hard. It's even harder when I am in constant pain and do not even have food. Also, my former foster parents hate my decision to do this, so they will not have anything to do with me. But, I am proud that I am transitioing. Before my first mom got on drugs and we got threw into foster care, she would buy me dolls and I think she always knew I was a little different. I remember one time at a yard sale, I was ashamed to buy a Barbie doll and my mom asked, "would you like me to tell them it's for your sister?" I will never forget that and I would do anything to see her again but shes long gone. I heard she overdosed when I was 15. But I still miss her.

I know one day I will get better. I hope, at least, but my legs hurt constantly and I would do anything to go back 10 years. I am in my early 40's and I would take living to 50 only gladly if I could just get a few years pain free. Life is life though and I know that's not possible. Friends, I do know my God is a healer though, and even though I have never felt further from him in my life I know he can steal heal my body and soul, and I have asked, maybe I haven't humbled myself enough idk, maybe someone needs healing worse than me? I am almost certain they do and i know I am not his only child who needs healing, but this hurts. I know that he will leave the 99 to rescue me, but hurry my shepard, this lamb is lost thirsty and hungry. I look forward to heaven, and crave it like like home, even though I have never been there.

I am not going to give up though. I am going to keep clawing and fighting through this and praying the whole time. Like I said before though, it gets really hard especially when I am flat broke. I have no food or anything and never in a million years did I think I would have to ask, but if anyone could help me with anything I would be forever grateful and pay it back when I get on my feet. I have cashapp if you want to help. I also have paypal if you want to DM me and I will give you my name on there. My name on cashapp is $Lunarsolsticewind If you cant help, thanks for reading this anyways and still pray for me please, anything will help though, I just have no money and no food to my name. I have tried churces and food banks to no avail, as they are all empty. I understand everyone is having it hard right now so I understand if anyone can't give, I just figured I would try this because it's my last resort becasue I have no speakable family and my credit is awful where I have lost everything. I know this looks suspicious and is a new account, but I have never interacted on reddit just always lurked. Like, I said, I am beyone embarrased to ask, so please do not try to belittle me more, because I honestly do not know how much more I can take.

I feel like Job.

I (30F) have recently rediscovered Unitarian Universalism and have been attending a church. I feel like this religion can appeal to vast amounts of people but I feel like no one knows they exist. Is this religion growing or dying and how is the UUA going about attracting new members? I’d be sad to see this religion die. It feels like such a good force for good. Also what are some of the issues the UUA is facing?

For anyone whose board (or congregation) hasn't reviewed amendments to Article II proposed by congregations, several still need a congregation or board to support them to make it. There are only 5 total that have been proposed. You can find two threads at discuss.uua.org. One thread has amendments that have not yet gotten enough support and the other thread has the ones that have. Please, they only need draft minutes from your board with approvals! Emails are provided for the contact people and they should be able to share with you forms to attach your minutes to.

Hi all,

I've been studying the evidences for the Trinitarian view of God and have good answers, as far as I can tell to many of the common Unitarian objections. For example:

1) "The Trinity is essentially polytheism."

- This seems to be easily dismissed by many Trinitarians by simply saying that the doctrine of the trinity affirms a singular being called God who has the requisite faculties to qualify as three distinct divine Persons.

​

2) "The Trinity is incoherent and defies the laws of logic"

- It doesn't seem to me that this argument stands. The only way that the Trinity would defy logic is if it asserted that the Godhead was composed of one person and also three persons. Or, if it asserted that the God was made up of one essence (or substance) and also three substances. I have never heard a trinitarian affirm either of these. This means there is either 1) no argument to be made about this, or 2) the trinitarian is not fully aware of the consequences of their doctrine though it has been studied for centuries.

3) "Jesus did not claim to be God in the New Testament"

- Again, John 1:1 seems to affirm that very early in the history of the church, the disciples of Christ believed he was divine. If Jesus did not teach this (or even outright denied it as many unitarians believe) then why do we have passages that are at the very least ambiguous as to the validity of this fact within the christian scriptures?

​

There are more but I was just wondering if there are some good arguments for these before I continue. Thanks for any responses!

Anyone else part of a Soul Matters circle? What do you think of it? The quality of one's experience in a small group format like this greatly depends on the facilitator(s) and other participants and I'm grateful to have good folks. Only recently joined in but so far, so good.

I’ve been feeling a pull towards god for about the last year after spending my whole life as an atheist. I’ve looked into Islam and Christianity but just recently had the Unitarian thing recommended to me. Any info or insights into it would be super helpful.

I’m completely new to UU. I started going to a church less than a year ago and decided to take their adult OWL program so I can know first hand what they teach about sex and what my son would be learning someday. Last week they talked about relationships and for some reason there seemed to be a lot of focus on polyamory. Is that because it’s common in UU communities?

For some reason it makes me uncomfortable and it feels like the first red flag I’ve experienced in a community I otherwise have really enjoyed. I’m waiting a whole year before I decide to join and I’d hate for this to be a deal breaker. I can’t say I’d feel ok with my son learning about or being encouraged to get married to more than one adult and raising a family that way.

Can anyone who has been in UU longer talk about how common polyamory is in their fellowships? Are a lot of people in these communities swingers or have polygamous families? I guess it’s just something I’ve never been around or understand.

I used to go to one when I lived in Westchester County, NY. I first went out of curiosity. I kept going because it was nice enough. At a session for new people, they told me a lot of the members were atheists like me. But that got me thinking - why go to this place every week while being atheist? I can be exactly as atheist in the comfort of my own home AND not have to give money every week. So I stopped going.

So…why go at all? I can be atheist, recycle, and have coffee at home. Why go to this one particular place every week to do all that?

The 1979 book published by UUA’s publishing arm Beacon Press is still used against trans people, particularly trans women, a group UUA allegedly claims to support. I went to a UU church in Westchester County, NY and some trans people brought up the fact that UUA published the book via Beacon Press, but no one made any comment on it.

Have they ever apologized for publishing it and causing harm to the trans community?

More specifically, I'm wondering how many of you are excited about the ideas of Daniel Schmachtenberger, particularly what he has to say about emergence.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, here's a taste: https://civilizationemerging.com/media-old/emergence/

I am interested in starting off pretty light with Christianity, I don’t want anything super “hardcore” but I still want it to be Christian, would a UU church still reference the Bible and Jesus? If not, which church that is “light” but still teaches Jesus and the word of God through the Bible would I be best at? Thanks!

Recently, I was trying to remember the water brother ceremony from Robert A. Heinlein’s novel Stranger in a Strange Land (pub. 1961) and googled ‘Water Communion’ and was interested to see that is a practice in the UUA, started in 1980. Stranger in a Strange Land is a very spiritual book (the central message of which—or at least the message of the protagonist if not the author—is ‘Thou art god’) about which had an enormous influence on new age and ‘hippie’ (meant without pejorative) culture, and one of the central features is the ceremony of sharing the water of life (ie just water) , which establishes brotherhood (a term explicitly glossed in the book as being without gender due to the Martian language—one of the first water brothers of the protagonist is a woman). In other words, it’s plausible that people interested in the UUA would be reading and influenced by this book.

​

However, sharing water is hardly unique to Heinlein, and I don’t know anything about the history of Water Communion in the UUA beyond a cursory googling. Does anyone know if those who created the practice were inspired by Stranger in a Strange Land? Or is it just one of those coincidences, perhaps the two being cousins influenced by the same longer traditions about water?

Hello - Atheist here, 47f married, 2 kids. I zoomed into my local UU church service after reading Reba Riley's Post Traumatic Church Syndrome. It's a funny memoir where the author endeavors to attend 30 churches before she's 30. She experiences everything from a day with the Amish to a Native American sweat lodge. It was fascinating! I ended up tuning in to UU's service out of curiosity.

I didn't grow up religious.

I find the I-love-Jesus-types cringey. I mean, why? He died for our sins and now I'm supposed to owe him? Whatever. I won't get off track. I just wanted to post to say that the UU service was surprisingly un-cringey. I liked it.

All of this has me wondering... should I attend church? If so, why? What do you get out of it?

I could always use more friends, but my life doesn't really lend itself to a lot of free time. If I decide to pursue this, it will be for me. My husband, also an atheist, isn't interested. We have a firm belief that children shouldn't be brainwashed into believing anything until they are capable of choosing for themselves. It's unlikely I will take them. Although I didn't find anything about the service that I objected to with that regard. Still, I'll probably wait on exposing them to a church-like setting.

Is it worth the time/effort to invest in church?

​

**EDITED TO ADD: WOW! These responses are amazing. There seems to be a theme of overwhelmingly positive. In my personal life, I recently changed professions from working in dull offices to pursuing a fulfilling job with special needs children. It's been life changing! I've never been a social activist, but I can see how adding that layer to my life could be equally life changing. While I won't be rushing my children off to any services, I can tell by your responses that -- should I gain the confidence and trust to do so -- they would benefit in a way that my atheist* heart would appreciate.

*Side note: I am an atheist first but I do have interest in Paganism because the religion is so simple and some interest in meditation. Maybe I'll discover more about myself than I originally thought?

It saids in the wikipedia that there is a problem of racism within the unitarian church

Internal controversy over the hiring of the UUA's Southern Region Lead (a white man from outside the region was hired rather than a Latina woman who resided within the region) led to resignations and apologies in 2017. UUA President Peter Morales, the denomination's first Latino president, resigned amid criticism of his failure to address the diversity controversies.[122][123] The three co-presidents who took over commissioned a "racism audit" to address white supremacy within the denomination.[124] In April 2018, The Washington Post reported that the UUA "in the past year has been asked to help resolve 15 congregational conflicts involving religious professionals of color".

I just want to know if is true...

Hey, I've become interested in spirituality and UU particularly (due to the pluralism/syncretism, rationalism, and lack of creeds) recently and came across these articles detailing some things that seem problematic to me - was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on them?

The first is at https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2024/01/02/the-uus-go-woke/ which links to https://news.fairforall.org/p/the-ideological-takeover-of-the-church

Hi, I've found I really agree with most of the points of Unitarians after discussions with a denomination that solely focuses on the Bible and Wow is it refreshing. I'm planning to go to my local chapel on Friday to ask a few questions with the pastor but what should I expect from the actual service itself?

Hi, I'm Em/Eli and I'm new here and to Reddit. I came here from a UU discord. I go to UUYO. They/Them please.

Do people have good examples or stories of digital forums to create connection and improve communication within a UU congregation? Any lessons learned to share? Open social media isn't cutting it. The idea is to have a closed, curated membership forum where people will be more open to sharing and discussion.

I'm presently advocating for a Discourse forums, or similar, in my own church. Here is a UUA example https://discuss.uua.org/.

Thanks.

​

​