Unitarian Jihad

[Wombat]

I'd prefer to take inspiration from Lessing's Nathan der Weise and chant "If we can take it as a working assumption that there is at most one God, then let's take it in turns to be his prophet".

In true Unitarian spirit, let's form a committee and discuss this over coffee.

I invite you both to join us at the Humanitarian Beverage Responsibility Committee to discuss whether you really want to discuss your catchy slogans over a beverage steeped in the blood and tears of exploited coffee farmers without health insurance.

Thank you for your kind offer. I'll put it to the committee as soon as I'm through with my panic attack.

[Rod Sprague]

I invite you both to join us at the Humanitarian Beverage Responsibility Committee to discuss whether you really want to discuss your catchy slogans over a beverage steeped in the blood and tears of exploited coffee farmers without health insurance.

In my church, the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Palouse, that is not an issue. I kid you not; some of the church ladies in the Purple Paisley Quilters’ group, one of the most influential groups in our church’s politics, made sure we get our coffee from a company set up specifically to grow coffee in a socially and environmentally responsible manner.

[Coffee]

Aka fair trade coffee.

[hyldemoer]

And of Jim Stone's concern about Pro-lifers not being welcome,
I know of 3 totally out of the closet Republicans in "The Book" at Saint Frank Lloyd Wright's (aka Unity Temple UU Congregation) in Oak Park, Il.

[Wombat]

And of Jim Stone's concern about Pro-lifers not being welcome,
I know of 3 totally out of the closet Republicans in "The Book" at Saint Frank Lloyd Wright's (aka Unity Temple UU Congregation) in Oak Park, Il.

There was something about that remark that was puzzling. Did Jim actually check that it was the pro-life views that were deemed unacceptable or the closed-minded attitude perhaps with which they were held and expressed? It's a common mistake/tactic of activists to interpret all opposition as opposition to the 'message' when much of it is opposition to bad debating manners.

Ideally, I'd want a fly-on-the-wall view of the social interaction Jim is talking about before I'd accept, without qualification, that Unitarians were intolerant of anything other than intolerance itself. Well, at least I'd want a transcript of what was said by both parties.

[hyldemoer]

...
Well, at least I'd want a transcript of what was said by both parties.

and perhaps a bibliography sighting the sources as to what motivated them to feel that way because, though we might not agree, it might be to all our best interests to have an understanding.

[Lambchop]

"The Sabre of Desirable Mindfulness" It fits! Oh, it FITS!

[Flyingcursor]

Unity Temple UU Congregation? I thought Unity was different from UU.

Time to do some Googling.

[Jayhawk]

Unity and UU are different, but there are a few UU churches that hold the Unity name. I can't recall if they're congregations that switched over, or, more likely, congregations that used the Unity name before Unity became what we know as Unity today.

Eric,

Lapsed UU
From the Hometown of Unity

[hyldemoer]

Unity and UU are different, but there are a few UU churches that hold the Unity name. I can't recall if they're congregations that switched over, or, more likely, congregations that used the Unity name before Unity became what we know as Unity today.

Uh huh.
Unity as the name of a religion comes fairly recent compared to the tradition of Unitarian or Universalist congregations (or any congregation of any of many faiths) having used that name to name their congregation.

In this case, 2 UU congregations in a small town (one of the congregations had split off from and another UU congregation about a mile away not very many years earlier) joined together and decided to change the name of their joint congregation to something that didn't lord the other one's history over each other.

After much committee deliberation (much of it debating if they should call themself a "church" or not because so many members who were ethnically Jewish had "issues" with such a Christian sounding title) they decided to name the congregation after the building they met in, Unity Temple (though that structure had been built by a then mostly Universalist congregation to replace an original structure called Unity Church that burned down after being struck by lightning in 1905).

There's a Unity Church in the town as well but Frank LLoyd Wright didn't design the building that group (not related to the UUA) meets in.

[spittin_in_the_wind]

I am a Unitarian Universalist, but it wasn’t in till today I was introduced to a very odd Internet phenomenon; http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... BCFLG1.DTL
http://www.uuism.net/uuwiki/index.php?t ... rian_Jihad This is the strangest thing I’ve ever seen!
Sibling Howitzer of Warm Humanitarianism

You laugh, but this is my church...

Sister Immaculate Boomerang of Equanimity

[dow]

I love it!!!

Brother Claymore of The Short Path

[WyoBadger]

I've always wanted to go to a Unitarian Church--how do you worship? What do you worship? If you're really accepting of absolutely everyone, how on earth do you accomplish anything?

Glittering Spearhead of Meekness wants to know.

[Bloomfield]

I've always wanted to go to a Unitarian Church--how do you worship? What do you worship? If you're really accepting of absolutely everyone, how on earth do you accomplish anything?

Jeah, just like Jesus. He never accomplished anything, either, by really accepting absolutely everyone. And then they killed him.

[Craig Stuntz]

Being accepting of everyone is not the same as believing everyone's beliefs. The seven principles of the UUA focus on individual spiritual growth. You're encouraged to find your own path and respect the paths of others. "Respect for the paths of others" might seem like a small or obvious thing — indeed, many people who are not UUs say that the seven principles are just a basic description of views which they presume a majority of people share — but I personally feel that if everyone really lived these principles to the fullest, then society would be a freer and happier place.

So how do UUs get anything done? Well, a lot of people seem to interpret the notion of "getting stuff done" as causing change in other people. In fact, however, there is nobody in the world that any individual has more power to change than themselves. UU churches aim to provide a nurturing environment for personal spritual growth, with the idea that this is by itself an important thing to do, and my personal opinion is that an individual cannot do anything for others until they reform/develop themselves.

As for how worship is organized, unitarianism and universalism both come from christian traditions, and UU services are in my experience very similar to christian services, insofar as there are readings, singing, sermons, offerings, etc. But the content is different; although the christian bible is used from time to time and christian principles might be discussed, they're not nearly so central as in a christian church. And ideas from other religions and non-religious philosophers play a major role as well.

For an example of some of the readings used and sermons in one UU church, here's an archive of selected sermons from my church. I particularly like this one [PDF].

-Craig