In the holding environment of true community, people share experiences of meaning—they share storylines, which are more compelling than the barriers or boundaries that separate them. These common narratives prepare the way for reconciliation. — Rev. Jacqueline Lewis, The Power of Stories Think...

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. — The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted and proclaimed by the United Nations on December 10, 1948 Think about how you act in support of certain rights. As you do so, consider these questions: What role do items like...

The moral virtues are produced in us neither by nature nor against nature. Nature, indeed, prepares in us the ground for their reception, but their complete formation is the product of habit....

All action is for the sake of some end; and rules of action, it seems natural to suppose, must take their whole character and color from the end to which they are subservient. — John Stuart Mill, 19th-century British philosopher and civil servant Between workshops, pay attention to policy...

Two things awe me most, the starry sky above me and the moral law within me. — Immanuel Kant Before the next workshop, pay attention to statements made by family, friends, acquaintances, or public figures that express a universal, unchanging moral truth(s), from their point of view....

Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth. — Albert Einstein Share with family members or friends the story you wrote about in Activity 3, What Guides Me? Include children and youth as appropriate. Invite others to share stories that help them frame their ethical and moral...

(In) the early '60's I realized that the world was being turned into a poisonous garbage dump. By the time the meek inherited it, it might not be worth inheriting. — Pete Seeger, folk singer and activist You can't expect people to fight for a cleaner river until they learn to love it. — Pete...

The natural response to genuinely-felt gratitude is generosity. — Rev. William Metzger, UU Minister, from a sermon, "Gratitude and Generosity," First Unitarian Church, Philadelphia, March 4, 2007 IN TODAY'S WORKSHOP... We talked about the two-part cycle of gratitude and generosity. A person...

If you give (a person) a fish, you feed (them) for a day. If you teach (them) how to fish, you feed (them) for a lifetime. — Chinese proverb IN TODAY'S WORKSHOP... We considered how each person is an important member of a community. We explored our talents and thought about how we each can make...

This we know. The earth does not belong to us; we belong to the earth... All things are connected like the blood which unites one family... Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth... Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. — attributed to Chief Noah Sealth,...

IN TODAY'S WORKSHOP... We talked about how sanitation protects the water people drink, and learned that in many places, a simple lack of toilets reduces the supply of clean, fresh water. We talked about conserving the water we use....

The protection of nature depends on more than the organizational strength of stewardship organizations; it also depends on the quality of the relationship between the young and nature—on how, or if, the young attach to nature. — Richard Louv, author, Last Child in the Woods IN TODAY'S...

Anyone who can solve the problem of water will be worthy of two Nobel prizes—one for peace and one for science. — John F. Kennedy IN TODAY'S WORKSHOP... The group experienced, through a guided meditation, needing a drink of fresh water when none is available. We learned about the Earth's water...

There's a river of my people and its flow is swift and strong. — Pete Seeger, Unitarian Universalist folk singer and activist IN TODAY'S WORKSHOP... We talked about stewardship and water. We saw that when people gather in community, they are strong....

We come to a time when we realize that the faith we have inherited is inadequate for what we are facing...at such moments we have three choices: We can hold to our religious beliefs and deny our experience, we can hold to our experience and walk away from our religious tradition, or we can become...

The program presents the problems of the invisible minority as they face a society where the majority view homosexuality with confusion, fear and hostility. The emphasis throughout is on understanding and accepting all people as human beings of worth and dignity....

The sexuality education program is about wholeness and healing. It is about justice and equity. It is about responsibility to self and to others, and it's about enhancing the meaning and value of life itself, and those are all religious pursuits. — Judith A. Frediani, quoted in the 1999 UU World...

Something changed during that program at the church; we added our music to the women's movement. Singing together as women created something very special. We went into the service thinking of ourselves as a political activist group and came out of it singing! — Audrey Drummond, "Honor Thy...

"Black Empowerment," "walkout," "racist"...the words we use, the language we have to describe the period of the late 1960s and early 1970s are loaded. Why, for example, do we use the term "Black Empowerment Controversy"? It seems to make the anguish of that period the fault of the relatively small...

I am more sorry than I can say that your fellowship is again being caught in the grinders of the advance of history in the south. I hope desperately that the group will not suffer unduly as the result of the events in which our people are participating in Jackson and Mississippi....