When my daughter was nine years old, she asked me which religion was the “right one.” The reason this was even on her mind is that my children are part of an interfaith family. Their father was raised Jewish and I was raised Muslim. When we married, we had a secular wedding and for a time chose not to raise our children in either of the traditions exclusively. We thought we could get away with raising them with no religious identity. However, this turned out not to be the case.

At the time we were living in New Jersey and my children’s best friends (also siblings) attended a conservative Christian congregation. I would let my kids attend programs with them mistakenly thinking it would be benign. This changed after my daughter returned home at age 5 declaring to her Jewish father, “Jesus is the light of the world.” To which he responded, “No he’s not, we’re Jewish.”

I realized at that moment that we weren’t being intentional in how we raised our children and they were clearly wanting to engage in some kind of religious community, even at their young age. It was age appropriate, wanting to belong.

I had already known about Unitarian Universalism and promptly looked up the closest UU congregation. Thankfully, there was one just two towns away, in Ridgewood. We attended together and the rest is history.

One year later, I was the religious education coordinator for a small congregation in Orange, NJ and from there I dove deeper into the world of faith leadership, eventually becoming credentialed in religious education leadership, a long and thorough process demonstrating competencies in leadership, faith development and the UU faith, among other things.

The reason we chose a Unitarian Universalist community is that it is pluralist. UUs do not claim to be superior to any other faiths and we affirm that there are many paths to what we understand to be spirituality, whether or not that includes belief in a deity.

This is a profound and sacred notion for the modern era. Especially because it seems that the world around us is doubling down on religious extremism. Religious dominance causes intolerance of those who are of a different faith, or choose no faith at all.

Truly embracing pluralism and the freedom to coexist in the same society while maintaining your own religious identity is a transformative idea. We are witnessing in real time the impact of religious extremism, whether it is anti-trans laws that purport to “protect children” or taking away the right to bodily autonomy, this kind of thinking is oppressive at its core.

The path to a liberated society includes embracing pluralism and not holding up any one religion over another.

As for my children, they continue to be on their own path. I will not share where they are, as this is their story to tell. I will share that their values and who they are is shaped by growing up as part of a Unitarian Universalist community.

Altars, places to honor our ancestors along with displays of that which we experience as sacred, were never part of my upbringing. I didn’t start having an altar until well into my adulthood. A central part of my home altar is my connection to the ancestors. My ancestors include family and friends who died and some becoming ancestors too soon on their life path.

Our connection to those who lived before us can be deep and profound if we invite their memories into our lives. Not only their memories, but what they worked for and how
they lived.

Those of us who hold identities that have been the target of oppression know that our ancestors faced hardships we may never fully understand intellectually, but we carry the memory in our bodies.

As a woman born in Egypt and raised a strict Muslim in the United States, I have had to face challenges that include anti-immigrant sentiments when I was a child from those here in the United States, and in Egypt I was faced with misogyny and strict rules of conduct because of my family’s interpretation of the faith. I often felt stifled as a child and teenager, rules imposed on me did not apply to my male cousins of the same age. I was angry at the unfairness of it and  I finally left the faith in my early twenties.

I connect most closely with my female ancestors, especially my two grandmothers. I knew my maternal grandmother, Labiba (her first name) and I adored her. She was feisty, gregarious and honest to a fault. I am grateful that I remember my maternal grandparents. My grandfather Abdelgawed (his first name), was more of a quiet introvert, who was kind and generous. I have a picture of both my grandparents on my altar.

My paternal grandmother is my namesake, Aisha. By all accounts she was the life of the party, a vivacious, generous and welcoming soul. She died when I was young and I don’t have any memories of her. I was born in Egypt and spent my first year of life living with her in Alexandria.

There is a picture of me as an infant on her lap and it is the only picture I know of with the two of us together.

I will never know what my grandmothers had to endure as Muslim females who were mandated into behaving a certain way in order not to be ostracized. They made the best of their circumstances, that I do know given how generous of spirit they were and how I heard stories of their antics.

My grandmothers are the reason I am alive, they suggested to my parents that they marry each other. They were friends and loved to laugh with each other, host parties and socialize.

I think of them often with the knowledge that I am living the life they didn’t know was possible for a female. I am independent, a faith leader and working for liberation of all. I am my ancestors’ wildest dreams.

Despite the theological diversity within Unitarian Universalism, there are many things that we agree on and hold sacred within our communities. The following list is of 10 things that are important to know about what Unitarian Universalists believe, and how we try to be in the world.

1. Hell Outta Here
   We do not believe in hell nor any kind of afterlife eternal punishment.
2. Big Love
   We affirm that every person is worthy and deserving of love.
3. World Wide Web
   We know that we are interconnected with all other forms of life, and care about tending to that web of relationship and connection.
4. Curiosity Nourishes the Cat
   We are a people of questions and curiosity. Curiosity doesn’t kill our cats (or humans), it nourishes and expands their imaginations.
5. This Queer Pastor Loves You
   Many of our faith leaders are openly part of the LGBTQIA community.
6. Heaven on Earth
   We believe and work towards creating a more equitable and just society right here, right now.
7. Co-Exist
   We are a pluralist faith, we affirm all the wisdom traditions of the world and do not believe any one is better than another.
8. All Souls
   You don’t need your soul saved, your soul is already awesome.
9. Our Holy Trinity: Community, Liberation and Love
   We are a community of people trying to figure out what it means to be human and how to center love and liberation.
10. When Life Gives You Lemons, Turn to Community
    We affirm community care and nourishment. The world is a mess and we need each other more than ever, the CLF is the congregation without geographical boundaries. Join us
    from anywhere around the world and find community.

The months of May and June often bring transitions related to academic promotions, graduations, and other milestones related to the culmination of years of dedication and hard work.

At this time of year, we often celebrate loved ones as they move from one phase of life into another. We wrap up another year in the school or church calendar, and move into the different pace of life that summer often brings.

Beyond these expected changes, transitions occur in all parts of our lives and often at unpredictable times. How we navigate a wide variety of transitions can reflect our capacity for change.

Transitions that are rooted in celebration are welcomed, and joy is usually inherent in the acknowledgment of weddings, births, and birthdays. The transitions that are more challenging are those that we didn’t anticipate and didn’t ask for. The reality of change may hit us harder when we unexpectedly lose a job, end a marriage or other relation, or when we or someone we love goes through the ultimate transition: that from life to death.

The world around us is in constant transition. Particularly now, in this time of pandemic, climate change, and worsening inequality, change is never-ending. Before the pandemic, more people felt able to have some degree of disconnection from the impacts of modern day life on the planet and how systems of oppression impact the vast majority of beings on the planet. The pandemic has been a flashpoint and a transition for humanity that we are still grappling to understand fully.

We know that the world will never be the same after the past few years. The impacts of oppression and the devastating results of extractive capitalism are harder than ever to ignore. The realities of our changing climate and the stresses of continued inequality are sure to mean more widespread, global transitions are ahead of us. Though many people have always been aware of these realities, some people with privilege still often plead ignorance through their own mental gymnastics and the mistaken belief that we live within a meritocracy. In the short term, privilege may afford some people a better chance at surviving climate chaos and other large global transitions, but the impacts will eventually be felt by everyone.

Amidst the uncertainty of the future and where major global transitions will take us, there are ways we can prepare to weather the coming (literal and figurative) storms as best we can. The tools, practices, and structures of spiritual community have a lot to offer us as we seek to become more resilient within the changes we are already experiencing, and any larger changes to come.

Ultimately, transitions that bring unwelcome change can cause fear and anxiety. This is a completely appropriate response to events that sometimes shake us to the core. Being part of a community and strengthening our connections to one another is part of what grounds us during times of transition. We connect to celebrate, to lament, to find comfort and to know we are loved and not alone. This makes a difference, no matter what type of transition we find ourselves in.

As a faith community without geographical boundaries, the Church of the Larger Fellowship finds ways to invite people into connection and care with each other. We want you to know that you are not alone. While our community does not meet in person in the way that brick and mortar churches do, we offer connection in every way available to us. Being imaginative with how we build community and strengthen relationships is one antidote to the uncertainty of unwelcome transitions and change.

As you navigate transitions in your current life, or anticipate changes to come, always remember: your community is with you. We will always hold your sacredness and belonging, through the many transitions ahead.

The following is adapted from a sermon that Aisha gave in CLF online worship on Nov. 6, 2022.

A few years ago, I was having a conversation with a friend about learning to love myself fully, especially my body. I was jokingly explaining that I never learned to dress myself in a way that was truly flattering to my body type. She explained that the problem wasn’t that I didn’t know, it was that I was conditioned through marketing to think fashion looked a certain way and only on certain bodies. Primarily what looks good on thin, white women — and those things simply didn’t look good on me.

She suggested I follow plus sized, Black women on social media. She sent me invitations to gorgeous Black models and activists who I continue to follow.

As their posts showed up in my feed, I was able to expand my notion of what is beautiful and as time went on, I was able to see myself through a more expansive and generous lens.

These fashionistas are unapologetic, fierce and simply beautiful.

One of the people I found myself in awe of was Leah Vernon, a Black Woman whose posts continue to expand my imagination with regards to fashion, because she does not exist in a prescribed paradigm. She is the author of a new book, Unashamed: Musings of a Fat, Black Muslim.

Through Leah’s posts and those of Black leaders like, Sonia Renee Taylor, Ijeoma Oluo, Jessamyn Stanely and adrienne maree brown, among others, I was able to change my perception of beauty through changing the default of what I was exposed to throughout my entire life.

Through a friend’s recommendation, I was able to challenge assumptions I held about myself and about beauty for my entire life. This has helped me experience beauty differently and in a much more liberated and loving way, for myself and others.

This brings me to an email the CLF received a while back about the assumptions the writer seemed to hold. The person, who is not incarcerated, wrote to us asking why they seemed to be getting the “prison ministry version of Quest.” They said that, though they support work with incarcerated people, it is not their work, and they have no interest in being a part of that ministry — they would simply like to get the traditional version of Quest.

Over two long email responses, I told this CLF member that as we center liberation at the CLF, we care about giving opportunities for all to grow an awareness that extends beyond an intellectual understanding that there are “people in prison.” For those of us who are not experiencing incarceration, reading the thoughts and feelings of those who are is powerful. I invited this member to consider the possibility that they have something to learn and be moved by something written by someone whose words you may not otherwise be exposed to, and emphasized that the Worthy Now Prison Ministry is not separate from the ministry of the CLF. We are one entity and one congregation that centers Unitarian Universalist values of community care.

This exchange and the response of this person to the changes in Quest, a publication that for decades centered primarily on the words of ordained clergy, had me thinking about assumptions being made about others.

We are a faith community that does not promise heaven or hell. In essence, we are trying to figure it out. Why are we here? What does it all mean? How do we navigate this beautiful, scary, joyful and painful thing we call life?

I don’t have answers to these questions and the hard truth is no one really does with any degree of accuracy. No one is an expert at being human, not even faith leaders.

What we can offer as faith leaders is a place to grapple with the questions and create a container that invites into an expansive and loving way of being.

Faith leaders receive training to become either ordained, credentialed, or lay leaders in order to have a shared understanding of the container we are creating. Faith leadership is not a science, it is where those given the sacred charge of ministry (in all its forms) choose to be in an accountable relationship with the members of the congregation and in many ways an accountable relationship to UUism itself. I center UU values in how I approach my faith leadership, a leadership rooted in religious education.

Revelation is not sealed, and as part of the search for truth and meaning, learning from those most impacted by oppression is a crucial way to learn the ways we need to do better and love more as we work to dismantle systems that actively cause harm.

When the three of us, the current Lead Ministry Team, started our leadership of the CLF, one of the aspects of this ministry we knew we wanted to transform was that of Quest and how this publication can more faithfully serve all of our members, both incarcerated and free world.  The three of us were in agreement that Quest can both include reflections and sermons from faith leaders and our members, both incarcerated and those that are “free.”

In the email I referenced earlier, this CLF member took exception to being called a “free world member.” In retrospect, I realize that this person is accidentally correct to take exception to this term.

As Fannie Lou Hammer said, “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.”

Every day in the U.S., it is painfully clear how those in power who want to affirm white supremacy and patriarchy are doing all they can to make sure no one is truly free. The rights of half the population have been taken away with the overturning of Roe vs. Wade. There are hundreds of anti-trans bills across the United States and there are people running for office in the U.S. that are running on platforms of intentional disenfranchisement of those with target identities. While the CLF is based in the U.S, the results of policies enacted by the U.S. government impact people all over the world.

It is more important than ever that those of us in faith leadership positions center the voices of those most cruelly impacted by the systems of oppression that harm us all.

However, those with privileged identities have been deceived into believing they are separate and somehow protected from oppression. This is a lie. Humans are inextricably connected and the destinies of the most powerful are tied to the most marginalized, history has demonstrated this over and over.

Countries with wealth disparities like the ones we have now in the United States do not last, and in fact topple.

We have an opportunity to save ourselves by caring for each other and learning from each other by being open to the reflections from those who are most in harm’s way. Not only Black people, but also indigenous people, trans people, immigrants, those with seen and unseen disabilities, but also learning from people who are incarcerated, most holding some or all of the identities I just listed.

Let us embrace the opportunity to be nourished and impacted by the reflections of people we may never meet in person, but whose lives matter.

I want to share with you the words of Joseph, an incarcerated UU and CLF member. Joseph shared their reflection of the idea of sacrifice. They write:

The value of sacrifice is relative. Without sacrifice, I would not be here living life as I know it. If my mother hadn’t sacrificed her time and put her dreams on hold, then she wouldn’t have been able to raise me so lovingly. She was 20 years old, barely an adult and I feel certain I wasn’t planned. She probably had many other plans. Maybe traveling, concentrating on school. I thank mom for her sacrifice, it was very valuable to me.

Some sacrifices seem small to us but can be very valuable to the recipient. Perhaps you sacrifice some time once a week to go visit a nursing home. If you have spare time, you would normally watch TV or spend it on the internet, you could make a sacrifice that is of little value to you, but could be of enormous value to the nursing home resident who has no family.

Our sacrifices are offering to the group soul of humanity. No matter how small or large, if it does good for one, it is good for all. Depending on my commitment and intention, my sacrifice doesn’t have to be public. When things are done without my attachment to the result, they are more pure and powerful. Some sacrifice all their lives, in order that others may live. Some make small sacrifices of that social awkwardness to overcome that to share a kind word with a stranger. No matter how small a good thing is, it is still good.

In sharing their reflections in Quest, incarcerated CLF members — people who have had their freedom taken away — are now giving the gift of their presence and reflections.

It is incumbent upon those of us with more privilege to examine our assumptions and do what we can to learn from those most impacted by this cruel and harmful system we call the United States. It is incumbent upon us to center love, community, compassion and liberation.

May we be humble in how we receive and move through this faith community and the world.

One of the many reasons I choose Unitarian Universalism as my faith is that I don’t believe in saviors. When I say I don’t believe in saviors, I’m really serious. I don’t find that having famous prophets has consistently served humanity. We can’t seem to put into context the fact that those revered and held up as messengers of the holy are simply human beings. Humans who have made enough of an impact on those around them that their stories live on for millenia. Their stories become embellished and larger than life. I love stories and learning lessons from them, but whether or not some of these stories are “true” sometimes get in the way of how we are called to be in community.

The life and experiences of Jesus of Nazareth changed the course of human history. He is credited with being the catalyst for starting a new religion, Christianity. The fact is, he never wanted to start a new religion. By all accounts, he wanted people to become better Jews, not leave the Jewish faith altogether. He preached love, compassion and pointed out the hypocrisy of the religious leaders of his time.

He didn’t claim to be God, he wanted those in power to stop abusing their power and offer care and mercy to those with no power.

Each of us has agency to affirm each other in the fullness of our humanity. We hold the spark of the divine, and we are connected to each other through that spark.

We cause pain and horror when we forget this connection to each other. History has shown us that time and time and time again, when the masses succeed in dehumanizing whoever is deemed the “other,” this has resulted in horrors perpetrated to those who are oppressed.

The United States, since the arrival of colonizers, has been in the business of dehumanizing entire populations in order to steal land and steal labor. It is the only way violent extractive capitalism flourishes.

Black and Indigenous people have borne the brunt of the dehumanization and now white women, with the overturning of Roe vs. Wade, are facing a renewed understanding of what it means to not be viewed as fully human, and how one cannot rely on a system created out of cruelty and oppression.

Black and Indigenous populations have been sounding the alarm and trying to scream from the rafters what has been the core truth of this country, that in order for those in power to thrive under capitalism, there are those that must be subjugated. As time went on and this country grew,  the list of who became dehumanized grew and grew. Now we have the highest population of incarcerated humans of any industrialized nation on earth, we have caged children whose only crime was to be traveling with their parents in search of a better life. It is all so overwhelming, I sometimes want the story of a savior to be true, I mean now would be a great time for Black Jesus to come back and save us, but the truth—as I believe it—is that no one is coming to save us, we must work together and affirm each other to transform this country.

PHOTO BY LIAM EDWARDS ON UNSPLASH

I believe it is possible when we do what we can from where we are. I am clear in my support and affirmation of those with targeted identities, descendants of enslaved Africans, indigenous people, immigrants, those with seen and unseen disabilities, people in the LGBTQI+ communities and anyone else targeted, I am at the ready to fight for and affirm them. The ones I have trouble maintaining their humanity are those who are in power and the oppressors. I have had to remind myself that I do not condone (to put it mildly) oppression and I combat oppression in the ways I am able, and I also need to maintain that even those people who I distrust and abhor are still human. I do not want to fall into the trap of dehumanizing anyone.

I do have boundaries that I maintain, I do not pretend the world is not a scary and cruel place. I do not “agree to disagree” about the humanity of others. I do try to refrain from holding hate in my heart. I focus on liberation, rather than bitterness. It’s not easy; it is a spiritual practice for sure.

Yes, we must fight systems of oppression in all the ways available to us. AND we must remember that each day we can affirm each other and show up in love and with care.

It is this love, care and compassion that affirms community. Amen, Ashe and Blessed Be.