Kristin Kany wrote this multi-voice poem in 2016 to be read by a group of "diverse moms." I am mother Mother 1: I am Mother Mother 2: I am Mother Mother(s) 3: I am Mother Mother 4: I am Mother Mother(s) 5: I am Mother Mother 6: I am Mother I am Mama, I am Mommy, I am Chinese, Jewish, African,...

Blessed are we who gather with open hearts, together, in this space, today. Blessed are we: the chalice-lighters of resistance, justice, love, and faith. Blessed are we: the heretics, the outcasts, the walkers of our own way. Blessed are we: the border-crossers, the refugees, the immigrants, the...

We're very grateful to Tim Atkins (copy) and Jessica Ferguson (design) for sharing their UU Valentines with WorshipWeb: We go together like a flame and a chalice Let's let our interconnected webs interconnect, baby I love you more than [Henry David] Thoreau loved the woods Will you join the...

There is a glow far off in the distance, a light to which no path leads. We know that each time we help another or join with them to heal the world, each time we stand up for justice and what is right, each time we work and hope and love against all odds, a spark is created that adds to the...

O God, who moves among the stars of the cold clear sky, whose voice whispers in the silence of falling snow, whose silence stills our hearts and leaves us wondering and waiting. Lord, We are seeking Christmas, searching in this season for a hidden door to a forgotten room in the house of our very...

This song by Jake Tidmore is about animal rescue. He's provided WorshipWeb with sheet music in the key of F and the key of E flat. I was kicked out and abandoned On a road from nowhere lost and alone I felt unwanted, my spirit fading How much longer could I keep going on?...

Spirit of Love and Life, may these common things be candles in the darkness, showing a refuge for those in need of safety and support....

God has a fondness for what is fragile. This means us. Advent tells us that God came to us—and comes to us still—with complete vulnerability. Christ is to be found among what is fragile—including us, ourselves, when pain and loss have left us feeling less than whole. In coming to us as a...

November 16, 2016 "Well, the only chains we can stand / Are the chains between hand and hand Keep your eyes on the prize / Hold on" —Adapted lyrics to “Gospel Plow,”* attributed to Alice Wine Holding on does not come easy to me. As a teenager who left home and bounced around, I am talented at...

Please join me in a litany of solidarity. Many of us face oppression, or our loved ones face oppression, and we fear that oppression will worsen....

This reading is an excerpt of the sermon delivered by Rev. Nancy McDonald Ladd on Sunday morning at General Assembly 2016. For as long as two or more have gathered in the name of the spirit, those two or more have fought some fake fights. You remember, perhaps, the classic wedding reading from...

Let’s start with the people we love and those who love us, thankful they are in our lives obliging us to open our hearts. Let open hearts embrace the Earth, the sea and soil and stars, blessed by bold beauty, the bounty of being. Then with hearts open to beauty let us embrace the arts and the...

This has been published with "they" pronouns; please use the most fitting pronoun in your own setting. Minister: I call (intern name) to the pulpit. Congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Church of (name), we have begun a new thing by bringing (intern) into our midst, to learn the practice of...

October 12, 2016 "Blessed are the faithful, for they shall be called dogs." —Rev. Gary Kowalski He was, I am told, just a dog. But who was it that, fresh from the litter, climbed onto my chest, licked my face, and rubbed his pink baby nose against my cheek? Who chewed the edges of my only antique...

Gracious God, Morning rises toward high noon just as our spirits gaze toward your radiant refuge. We remember the days of trial, not so long ago, among the shadows and valleys of wilderness wandering and wondering if we were forever forsaken, outcast, left behind. And just then, as the sun breaks...

All that we have been separately and all that we will become together is stretched out before and behind us like stars scattered across a canvas of sky. We stand at the precipice, arms locked together like tandem skydivers working up the courage to jump. Tell me, friends: What have we got to lose?

October 5, 2016 "The heart was made to be broken." ― Oscar Wilde I'm sitting here broken-hearted. I could try to convince you that it’s about the state of the world with its tragedies, suffering, and seeming lack of compassion, but it’s not. I’m broken-hearted because a relationship that had...

For those we have hurt in any way, whether through words or deed or thoughts. Here is a place to forgive and to be forgiven. For the excuses we have made, just to be right. Here is a place to forgive and to be forgiven. For the blame we have placed on someone else, again and again....

I know sometimes you get cranky, And sometimes your tea gets cold Before you can drink it. Sometimes The news is too much. The resistance Seems too little. That's real. But we are Here. Imperfect and together and reaching. You can hold my hand if you want. I washed It with soap. It's OK. In this...