Hilary Allen

Full name: Hilary Allen (sher/her)

Congregational Life Staff

New England Region in Congregational Life

Email: hallen@uua.org

Telephone: (617) 948-4257

A light skinned woman with short, brown curly hair and red glasses is smiling and wearing a black blazer.

Hilary began her tenure on Congregational Life staff in 2013 and is part of the programmatic team bringing the Practices of Spiritual Leadership to UU congregations. Originally from the Carolinas, Hilary delights in those magical facilitation moments when a group experiences some new insight or possibility. Previously Hilary worked on the Daring Compassion Movement Chaplaincy project with Faith Matters Network. She received an Masters of Divinity from Episcopal Divinity School and currently lives in Roslindale, Massachusetts with her spouse and two young children.

Hilary will be on sabbatical during the 2024-2025 church year: October 7-November 25 and March 17-May 5.

From Hilary Allen

Displaying 1 - 10 of 10

A vibrant landscape of a stream through thick forest with the sun shining through the trees in the distance.

This church year, a small group of leaders and religious professionals from New England congregations gathered together as the Contexts Learning Community. We had a shared interest in exploring more deeply what is happening to church attendance and participation, especially amongst younger people...

By Hilary Allen | August 14, 2024 | From Centering Gifts
From a perspective set above is a red and yellow hot air balloon against a grassy field.

For those of you not embroiled in this particular time of year known as search season, now is when many of your sibling congregations have compiled their “records” to be shared with candidating ministers. It is a busy time of collating months of conversation and inward reflection about the...

By Hilary Allen | December 14, 2023 | From Doing Our Inner Work
A black and white photo from the March on Washington, with a crowd of protesters, the reflecting pool, and the Washington Monument in the background.

A few weeks ago, I joined Joe, Meck, and our Region’s Spiritual Leadership for Culture Change Community of Practice (join anytime!) for a conversation on Tending Our Tradition through Reparations. We were looking at how this practice of Spiritual Leadership invites us to bring forward the gifts...

By Hilary Allen | July 27, 2023 | From Tending to Tradition
Small flat skipping stones arranged in a spiral on top of sand.

Here are the latest insights, ideas, tools, and permission to do the work of the Committee on (Shared) Ministry effectively from Congregational Life Staff.

Book | By Erica Baron, Sana Saeed, Patricia Infante, Hilary Allen, Melissa James | October 29, 2022 | From LeaderLab
Tagged as: Shared Ministry Teams
Green Pine leave

Here I was thinking everything had already been said. That there were no other words to say (again) what we all already know: here we are, still in pandemic life. And yet, a shift has arrived and there are ideas being shared that can bring comfort, illumination, and insight. So, I wanted to share...

By Hilary Allen | September 22, 2021 | From Practice Makes Possible Blog
reflection of hand reaching into a body of water

I don’t doubt that many of us are maybe a little afraid to reflect so soon on something that is still quite close and tender. These fears may be part of the reason for Ken Burns’ five year standard! Yet, let us remember that company is one of the gifts of community, that we will have each other to..

By Hilary Allen | May 21, 2021 | From Doing Our Inner Work
yellow background with text that reads "Exhaustion will not create liberation." by the Nap Ministry

Friends, if you are not already feeling so, please know this: you are going to get tired. Fatigue is real, especially when we are doing the work of dismantling white supremacy. If we don’t take the rest we need, the temptation to act out of white supremacy culture is that much stronger.

By Hilary Allen | April 27, 2021 | From Doing Our Inner Work
a black person facing away from camera holding a sign which reads, "It is a privilege to educate yourself about racism rather than experiencing it!"

We have to assume that if we are engaged in dismantling white supremacy, then we will have to encounter it along the way.

By Hilary Allen | April 12, 2021 | From Doing Our Inner Work
Minister Robin Bartlett and a congregant of First Church in Sterling, MA wearing t-shirts that read “We can do hard things!” participating in Operation Food is Love in May

Earlier this year, just as the reality of the pandemic was unfolding, the New England Region was planning to host a workshop on “Faithful Risking,” one of our Practices of Spiritual Leadership. Ultimately we ended up cancelling the workshop. While we could have adapted to an online format,...

By Hilary Allen | November 11, 2020 | From Faithful Risking

Gracious One: Keep watch on the innovators, the trailblazers, the takers of risk. Invite us to be persons of vision and integrity. Help us to remember the mystery from which possibility is born. Lead us to honor the sacred space where ministries, idealists, and realists meet....

Meditation | By Hilary Allen | January 21, 2015 | From WorshipWeb
Tagged as: 2nd Principle (Justice, Equity, & Compassion), 6th Principle (World Community), Activism, Connections, Doubt, Equity, Hope, Humanism, Imagination, Prophetic Words & Deeds, Purpose, Truth, Unitarian Universalism, Vision, Vulnerability

For more information contact .