Many of us like to point out our UU connections with well-loved Christmas music and rituals. Charles Follen introduced the first Christmas tree in the United States. Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women sacrifice their own Christmas presents for impoverished neighbor children. Charles Dickens’ A...

The Love Surrounds Us program explores all the Unitarian Universalist Principles in the context of the Beloved Community of family/home, school, and neighborhood. 

Adapted from Jesus, The Carpenter's Son (Boston: Beacon Press, 1945). Jesus was a great teacher long, long ago who preached God's love. Jesus taught that we should care for the poor and forgive people who hurt us. In his lifetime, Jesus influenced many people to love one another as they loved God.

Mark 6: 34-44 from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things. When it grew late, his disciples came to him and said, "This is a...

Adapted from Christian scripture. There once was a father, who had two sons. The younger son wanted to leave home and travel to distant lands. He asked to have his inheritance. So the father divided his wealth and gave each son his half. The older son stayed at home, continuing to work with his...

I was the religious educator at a historically Universalist church. Fifteen years earlier, I had left the Christian faith of my childhood to embrace a Unitarian Universalism that had no room for the traditions and beliefs of my growing up years....

When Joseph Jordan (pronounced Jerden) was born in Virginia in 1842, slavery was still legal. Most people of African descent were treated as property, like horses or dogs. They were bought and sold; they had no rights. Whether enslaved or free, people of color were not treated with respect....

NARRATOR: Martin Luther was born in 1483 in what is now Germany. He was christened in the Roman Catholic Church, like everyone else in the Holy Roman Empire, which stretched through most of Europe at the time. He received his doctorate in theology from Wittenberg University in 1512. Five years...

Thich Nhat Hanh In Southeast Asia, the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, used the principles of compassion and nonviolence to campaign against the war in Vietnam. Hanh believed that people of faith, especially youth, couldn't remain silent in the face of social injustice. They must work together to...

From the Gospel of Luke, Chapter 10, Verses 25-37; New Revised Standard Version. Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he said, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?" He said to him, "What is written in the law?...

An adaptation of Matthew 5:1-11, Christian scripture. Jesus was a teacher. He lived thousands of years ago, in the part of the world we now call the Middle East. Jesus taught people how to use words and actions in a loving manner. There are many different ideas about God....

From Does God Have a Big Toe? Stories About Stories in the Bible (HarperTrophy, 1993). Used with permission. Jacob cried a lot. Jacob cried when he was happy. Jacob cried when he was sad. But mostly Jacob cried when he saw beautiful things....