Tapestry of Faith: Faith Like a River: A Program on Unitarian Universalist History for Adults

Faith In Action: Our Covenant

Materials for Activity

Preparation for Activity

  • Obtain a copy of your congregation's covenant and add the text to Handout 1, if you have not done so already. Print out and copy the handout.
  • Invite a minister, historian, or other appropriate person in your congregation to tell how the congregation came to create or adopt its covenant.

Description of Activity

Learn the history of how your congregation came to adopt its covenant or came to use a common Unitarian Universalist covenant.

Name the ways in which you see the idea of covenant embodied in your congregation, whether that covenant is specifically written out or not. What are the ways your community builds mutually beneficial relationships? What milestones along the way led your congregation to work together and create or adopt a covenant?

Covenants rarely define the remedies or courses of action to take if the covenant is broken. Consider ways in which congregations might bring people back into right relationship when the covenant has been broken or a relationship has been damaged. Does your congregation have such remedies? Are they inherent in a covenant or must the remedies be specifically spelled out?

Identify strategies your congregation currently uses. Explore how you might broaden the list of actions currently used to establish or re-establish right relationship.