Many traditions hold gratitude as a foundation of the spiritual life. It is a wonderful entry point into covenant, too: we are in relationship with all of life before we make a single promise. At this Thanksgiving multigenerational service, all ages explore covenant together, with stories, play, and Giving Thanks, Chief Jake Swamp’s Mohawk good-morning message. November’s theme is Covenant.
Freedom is something we give one another. In 2024 the General Assembly of our faith placed love at the center of our covenant and pledged to honor, defend, and celebrate transgender people. Yet across dozens of states, anti-transgender laws have multiplied, carried by a wider current of misinformation, fear, and violence. We remember those lost, tell the truth, and renew our promise. November’s theme is Covenant.
No one becomes who they are alone. In the 1600s, our ancestors founded congregations not on a creed but on a promise: to walk together. By the twentieth century, we became known instead for defending each individual’s freedom and dignity — the free mind, civil rights, and the equal worth of every person. Today our faith is returning to that older ground. Our shared values begin with “we,” and a theology of relationship is at … Continue reading From I to We
Unitarian theologian James Luther Adams taught that relations between people should rest on mutual, free consent, never on coercion. A vote is one way we practice that. A covenant is another. On the Sunday before Election Day, we gather to steady our nerves and renew the promise that makes us a people: to pursue justice together, in every season, whatever the outcome. November’s theme is Covenant.
Among our Unitarian Universalist ancestors were those called heretics, a word that comes from the Greek for “choice.” They insisted on choosing for themselves rather than accepting answers handed down by church and state. In unsettled times, we often long for certainty. But what if an unwritten future is a sign of freedom, not a threat to it? How might we hold the hard questions of our country and our world together, as a community? … Continue reading An Unwritten Future
In his Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke urged, “Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves.” Unitarian Universalism has never asked us to sign on to a single set of answers. How might we take up the time-honored practice of holding a question, rather than rushing to solve it, as a spiritual practice of our own? October’s theme is Living the Questions.
As we move into October, we begin a new monthly theme, Living the Questions. We’ll start with questions of belonging, and what it means to call FUSF our spiritual home. Fitting in asks us to change ourselves to be accepted. Belonging means being accepted as we are, questions and all.
Our shared values include a promise: to create and nurture sustainable relationships of care and respect, mutuality and justice. We usually hear “sustainable” as a word about the earth. But what would it mean for a relationship to be sustainable? September’s theme is Interdependence.
