Growing a Unitarian Universalist Identity in people of all ages through UU congregations and communities is a high priority as we answer the call of Love.
Whole Church RE gives both a pedagogical foundation and practical tools to connect and practice UU identity, community, and faith development—especially our shared values in community. The goal of Whole Church RE is to create vibrant and thriving UU congregations and communities with love — and Faith Development – at the center.
In the activities, resources, and other curricular activities in the Whole Church collection below, you will find one or more of these six embodied faith development practices/goals:
Sacred Stories
Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going? We develop individual and shared UU Identity and a sense of belonging in our faith community when we tell each other the story of who we are, and what we are for, as UUs. Religious Education has often centered the powerful practice of storytelling to teach about our history, theology, principles, sources, and now our shared values. But our Sacred Stories also include community ceremonies and rituals that collectively affirm our belonging and growth in a UU congregation. What are the Sacred Stories in your church?
Faithful Conversations
Our congregational theology has always depended on small groups discussing and discerning together. Conversations become religious education when we intentionally connect individuals and communities who aren’t already in dialogue — and equip those who are for deeper connection. Faithful Conversations put love at the center, developing opportunities for co-learning, especially across generations. There, we practice using a “language of reverence” to engage our shared values: strengthening UU identity and community, and deepening our capacity for faithful living every day.
Creative Contemplation
Contemplative practices quiet our minds, open our hearts, and connect us more deeply to our spiritual needs — and each other. The benefits of meditation and knitting are well-known. Whole Church RE offers Creative Contemplation resources with similar benefits, curated for congregational faith development — in worship, class, or common spaces. These solo and shared hands-on activities are for all ages, but are especially supportive for neurodivergent people and families. Public display of completed creations add beauty and depth to a congregation’s story of collective creativity and meaning-making.
Community Making
Making and crafting at church is a common RE activity, where learners align ideas with shared values, build something together, and then repair as needed. That sounds like another way to describe church, doesn’t it? Anytime humans work to create together, the practice forges and strengthens the bonds of relationship and trust — an essential requirement for UU covenant. Community Making resources build on the RE practice, inviting people of all ages to roll up their sleeves and build something real together — while making shared meaning, too. How is your congregation connecting for shared making in community — and how is it making your community stronger, in turn?
Public Witness
Prophetic witness of our UU values in the public square requires two things: a shared theological grounding, and shared accountability to it. Whole Church RE builds this capacity through community faith formation practices to include UUs of all ages. Public Witness activities and resources help UUs name, claim and proclaim their values together, to deepen shared identity and theology. And they offer new ways to learn and share about UUism as a living faith: practicing justice-making and making meaningful connections within and beyond the congregational community, with love at the center.
Joyful Connections
Joy and play create space for vulnerability, creativity, belonging — and transformation! UUs often speak of building the Beloved Community; where better to begin than in our congregations? In RE, we have fun, feast, sing, laugh, move, and play together not because children need that to learn and grow, but because humans do. Joyful Connections are serious faith development: they connect, heal and galvanize us for faithful work within, among, and beyond the congregation. They naturally engage multicultural values — powerful antidotes to all forms of oppression. Joy builds collective capacity for resilience and resistance, and the kind of authentic community people want to belong to.
More on Using Whole Church RE
Do you want to learn more about Whole Church RE? Check out videos and articles about how to use a Whole Church approach in your congregation!