Are you looking for something different?

Do you dream of finding a community that embraces hope, equality, compassion, and reason?
Do you crave ritual and a sense of belonging, but don’t want to have to conform to be accepted?
Do you want a spiritual community that honors Jewish and Christian traditions, and also seeks to know the great truths found in other cultures?
Do you long for a fellowship that values science and personal experience and strives to answer big questions responsibly?
Have you ever considered that a church could be a place where questions are welcomed and no one claims to speak The Truth?
Would you like to be part of a community that doesn’t seek to save you from yourself, but instead to help you realize the beauty of the person you already are?

Then you just might be looking for Unitarian Universalism!

Unitarian Universalism, or UU, is a liberal religious faith that came into being in the mid 20th century, and was given a name in 1961 when the Universalist Church of America and the American Unitarian Association consolidated their resources to better serve their nearly identical missions, thus creating the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA). The Unitarians had a long tradition of working to make this a more just and equal world, while the Universalists were trying to overturn the idea that some people simply deserved better than others because of some supernatural right. Their unification may have been inevitable; all the way back at the beginning of the American Civil War Thomas Starr King, who was pastor of the San Francisco Unitarian Church, defined the difference in the thinking of each group, while admitting they both came to the same conclusion: “The Universalists believe that God is too good to damn them, and the Unitarians believe they are too good to be damned!”

Today, we are still working to define the future of this new religion. Our roots are long and spread wide, but where we go from here will be determined by the people who care enough to get involved. We have a proud history of involvement in humanitarian work and fighting for civil rights. The Red Cross was founded by a Universalist, Clara Barton, and twenty percent of Unitarian Universalist ministers responded to Martin Luther King, Jr.’s call to march for justice by marching through Washington DC. We have been working for decades for gender equality and to end all forms of discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, and queer individuals.

We have no creed or religious test-of-faith. Instead, we have covenants between members of congregations, congregation-to-congregation, and through our Association, to support and assist one another in living out our selected mission statements. We also uphold 7 values, with the most important and central of these values being Love

Love is the power that holds us together and is at the center of our shared values. We are accountable to one another for doing the work of living our shared value…
Interdependence. We honor the interdependent web of all existence…
Pluralism. We celebrate that we are all sacred beings, diverse in culture, experience, and theology…
Justice. We covenant to dismantle racism and all forms of systemic oppression…
Transformation. We adapt to the changing world…
Generosity. We cultivate a spirit of gratitude and hope…
Equity. We declare that every person is inherently worthy and has the right to flourish with dignity, love and compassion…

Further On-line Reading: