Thursday marks the bicentennial of Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln’s birth. Different though they and their influences were, both contributed to a tectonic shift in ideas. Neither arrived at his culminating treatise: Darwin’s 1859 The Origin of Species and Lincoln’s 1865 Emancipation...

The journey was a long one. We started on an airplane, a 16-hour trip crossing the international date line. A van for an hour, then another hour’s plane ride. A pedi-cab trip, and a four hour van ride. Then another hour’s drive up a windy mountain road, turning off the road onto a rocky, bumpy,...

Leonard Cohen sings to us there’s “a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.” I believe this is one of the most important insights we can have. And so, today I want to talk about that crack, that wound we each have. Today let’s reflect a little about something perhaps a bit...

Every June, representatives of the congregations in the Unitarian Universalist Association gather for the annual General Assembly. Each year as we do so, we try to shed some light on a local issue of justice, and we invite people of all faiths to join us in working to make our world a better place.

We are five days away from what is has come to be traditionally celebrated as the birth of Jesus of Nazareth....

Many of us have stories about God. A college student once told me how he asked questions about God in his childhood church and the leaders did not know how to answer. He decided that God must not be real....

Gadgets: The downfall of a free society, electric litter paving an inexorable path to our culture’s moral, intellectual, spiritual, and inevitable destruction. If you are an American living in the 21st century, you likely have fretted over this topic, or some variation on it. You might even have...

Radical hospitality. Radical means “out of the ordinary,” “revolutionary,” even. So what would it mean to receive someone—a stranger—with a presence that was not just polite, but to receive them with revolutionary generosity? Activist Rosemarie Harding remembers her growing-up days, in...

When I was in third grade at Evergreen School in Plainfield, NJ, my best friend was John Carvana. At 8 years old, I was awkward physically and socially, and I was drawn to John’s intelligence and easy grace. The friendships of young boys are less about whispered secrets than about hanging out and...

Bob and Addie Polk had moved into the neighborhood in 1970, when the little houses were relatively new, and through the years they had been friendly with the neighbors. After her husband died, Addie kept more to herself, increasingly limited by declining health in older age....

I had jet-lag. That’s my excuse—that, and it was a hot, humid Sunday afternoon in Chicago, the end of a three-day family reunion. All of us were well-fed and happy, but tired and...well, the family had been together for three days. When my aunt remembered that she needed to return the flower...

On the cusp of this new day in our nation’s history, seems like everyone has something to say. I have been deluged with emails from the various groups I try to pay attention to: Planned Parenthood, the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, the National Religious Campaign Against Torture,...

Call to Gather “The struggle of today is not altogether for today; it is for a vast future also.” -- Abraham Lincoln’s annual message to Congress, December 3, 1861[1] Reading: “The Gettysburg Address” by Abraham Lincoln Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this...

In March of 2002, the Unitarian Universalist Ministers’ Association held its every seven years gathering in Birmingham, Alabama. I was excited to go to Birmingham, partly because it would be my first convocation with a thousand or so colleagues, but for another reason as well. My first husband,...

The early settlers who risked life and limb to come to this land—a land strange and unknown, but full of promise—these early settlers had a dream. That dream included freedom to worship as they wished; it included the opportunity to prosper, if they were willing to work hard; it included the...

Readings An excerpt from “The Sonnets To Orpheus” by Rainer Maria Rilke Wisdom of Solomon 10:15-21 Lyrics to Tracy Chapman’s song “Be And Be Not Afraid” Sermon The character of God said it to the reluctant Hebrew prophets who were always charged with speaking truth to power. “Be not...

Reading Isaiah 58:1-12 (excerpt) Shout out, do not hold back! Lift up your voice like a trumpet!Announce to my people their sins. Day after day they seek me and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that practiced righteousness… Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day, and...

Earlier this week I was speaking with a member of the church about the sermon I was going to deliver today. She said to me, “What’s the big deal?” This one’s easy. All you have to say is: “You have money. We need money. Give us your money. Then we can all go home.” So, you have money. We...

Jefferson Unitarian Church Golden, CO Mothers Day, May 13, 2007 Three weeks ago my wife, Phyllis, and I participated in our all church social action weekend. What a magical day that was! We chose to help out building the new community garden at 32nd Avenue just this side of I-70....

In a Barnes & Noble just before Easter, I watched a woman glance at a table of books and make a face like she'd just tasted something awful. Then she hurried on by as if she were afraid the books would bite. Curious, I looked to see what she had grimaced at: All the books on the table were about...