It was a hot, muggy morning. Christopher was not sure he really wanted to be out riding in a competition. His thoroughbred horse, Eastern Express, seemed a bit off, as if maybe he would rather be grazing in the field than doing the demanding work of running and jumping with a big, muscular man on…

Clyde had finished his farm chores. Now he was free to spend the rest of the evening doing his favorite thing: stargazing. He got out his telescope and he looked up into the night sky. While he looked at the moon and the stars he wondered about the universe….

I want to tell you the story of Adin Ballou. He was born over two hundred years ago. He grew up to be a peacemaker and a Universalist minister, but he didn’t start out wanting to be either. When Adin was seven years old, he went with his family to watch a company of militia out for a parade. They…

Adapted from “A Week at SOS Children’s Village, Tlokweng, Botswana,” by Annie Arnzen, on the “A Precious Cause” website. Used with permission. Annie first went to Botswana in 2006, when she was in eighth grade. She and her family attend the North Parish, Unitarian Universalist, in North Andover,…

Our hearts should be too warm and too large for hatred. More than one hundred fifty years ago, back when trains were new and airplanes and cars hadn’t been invented, back when women always wore long skirts and everyone wore hats, a girl named Fannie Barrier lived in a town in New York State….

“So, Ray,” asked his mother, “what do you want for your birthday?” It was a surprisingly hard question to answer. What did he want for his birthday? “I don’t know, Mom. Can I get back to you on that one?” Ray grabbed his skateboard and went out to the driveway to think as he rode….

One morning, more than a hundred years ago on the island of Jamaica, a boy named Ethelred Brown went to church. Usually at this church, the people sang their creed, their list of what they believed….

Adapted from multiple sources including a 2005 article, “Mrs. Mott, ‘The Celebrated Female Physician,’” in Historic New England online magazine. Harriot Kezia Hunt, 1805-1875, was barred from medical study at Harvard College because male students objected to her presence….

By Judith C. Campbell. Used with permission. From UU & Me!: Collected Stories, edited by Betsy Hill Williams (Boston: Skinner House, 2003). Originally published in uu&me, Volume 3, Number 3, December 1999. UU&Me! is published by the Church of the Largeer Fellowship. Hello….

“Mama, Mama, why do we just keep going and going and not going anywhere?” asked little Sophie. Her family was crossing the wide Pacific Ocean on a big ship bound for America. Sophie Lyon was an American girl, three and a half years old, making her first trip to America. She and her older brothers…

From A Lamp in Every Corner: Our Unitarian Universalist Storybook. To make the story more engaging and to help make it very clear who is speaking during dialogues, try developing different voices for the different characters in the story, especially the father….

In 1779, more than two hundred years ago, a girl named Maria Cook was born in New York State. When she was born, the Americans were fighting the British in the War for Independence. The Americans wanted to have their own country where they could be independent and free to make their own decisions…

Thanks to the Change the World Kids, Meg Miller and Phyllis Arata-Meyers for information and permission to tell their story. Place a large, shallow dish filled with water in front of you, where children can see it. Place a globe or world map within your reach. Phebe and Nika were two girls, both…

From the book Aisha’s Moonlit Walk: Stories and Celebrations for the Pagan Year, by Anika Stafford (Boston: Skinner House, 2005). Tell the children you will signal them with a drumbeat (or another signal) when it is time to join in the refrain. Every year on Lammas, we clamor our way to City Hall…

By Ellen Gold. Based on information in the book, Maglipay Universalist, by Fred Muir (Annapolis, Maryland: Unitarian Universalist Church of Annapolis, 2001) and a 2002 review of Muir’s book by Rosemary Bray McNatt in UU World magazine. I bet some of you love to read. Maybe you have a favorite book.

Have you ever stopped to think about all the different people you love, and all the different people who love you? There are many kinds of love, and many ways to show you love someone. Valentine’s Day is a holiday that celebrates love. People often give each other cards on Valentine’s Day to show…