I’m an atheist who recently heard out Unitarian Universalism. I’m not exactly looking to join a church, as Groucho Marx used to say, I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member. Nonetheless I enjoy learning about religions so I kept reading on about it.

At first glance UU sounds like a religious humanist group that studies the world’s religion from a “Jeffersonian” stand point. The mileage of wisdom one can find in any giving religion will vary, but it’s an intriguing idea for a religious group.

From my research I gathered two things. One, that the UU churches are more interested in social justice activism then actual religious studies and two, the faith they seem most interested is neopaganism or “Earth-centered religion.” As I’m sure you know, there is even a sub-set of UUs called CUUPS that focuses solely on paganism. This contradicts my original understanding of UUs as humanists. Humanism denies the existence of the supernatural, neopaganism doesn’t.

In a humanist “church” I expected to hear lessons focused on the naturalist aspects of religion, like Jesus’ words in forgiveness or the Buddha’s teachings on self realization. Paganism does teach some naturalist philosophy, like do no harm, but from what I gather UU pagans are big on pagan rituals which are rooted in a belief that these rituals can curb the trajectory of your life, or the events in the world at large. In short, it’s supernatural thinking.

As for the political activism, Now I’m not saying a congregation being active on social issues is inherently a bad thing, but I get enough politics elsewhere in my life. Plus not everyone has a bleeding heart and that’s ok. From what I gathered, the UU churches are all about being activists. As an introvert, I’m out.

I guess the point of this all is to ask, is this an accurate impression of UUism? And if so how did the church go from believing in universal salvation & denying the Trinity to a progressivist pagan church??? Is everyone in the church happy with the direction the church has taken or is there dissent?

Also, to be clear, different strokes for different folks. My impression of UUism is that it’s not for me, but if it works for you I’m happy for you.