Come ye into this house of worship! Come in and find peace and rest, inspiration and aspiration, fellowship and love. Come in and find light for your darkness, a friend's touch for your loneliness, and music for your soul. Come in and let your heart sing for all the blessings that are yours this...

Come, let us worship together. Let us open our minds to the challenge of reason, open our hearts to the healing of love, open our lives to the calling of conscience, open our souls to the comfort of joy....

Come into this house of worship. Come in bringing all of who you are. Rest and quiet your week-worn spirit, for you are here to touch again eternal springs of hope and renewal. Calm your hurried pace. For this hour let the cares, the fretfulness and worry be set aside. Forgive yourself—you are so...

Come into this circle of community. Come into this sacred space. Be not tentative. Bring your whole self! Bring the joy that makes your heart sing. Bring your kindness and your compassion. Bring also your sorrow, your pain. Bring your brokenness and your disappointments....

Come in. Come into this place which we make holy by our presence. Come in with all your vulnerabilities and strengths, fears and anxieties, loves and hopes. For here you need not hide, nor pretend, nor be anything other than who you are and are called to be....

Who can be certain where the self stops and the universe begins? When we breathe, it is the air from the passing wind that fills our lungs. To our nostrils drifts the fragrance of the woodland flower. When we taste, it is of the earth's flavors and its saltiness. When we eat, it is of the field's...

When my mind is still and alone with the beating of my heart, I remember many things too easily forgotten: the purity of early love; the maturity of unselfish love that seeks nothing but another's good; the idealism that has persisted through all the tempest of life.

When I was a child, the day after Thanksgiving was steeped in ritual. Every year my family would travel to Chicago for the holiday festivities. Our tour was always the same: We'd tromp up and down Michigan Ave., admiring store windows with animated mechanical dolls that served as actors for the...

O Deep Mystery of our lives -- voice in our hearts and light in our minds -- in the joyful freedom of our fellowship, we are here together as adventurers called forth in spirit, men and women moving, yearning, questing, pushing the limits of our lives outwards to what is more loving and just, mor...

After the words, a quiet; after the songs, a silence; after the crowd only the memory recalls the gathering. Peace and justice have need of you after the words, the music, and the gathering. God grant you the depth for dedication to justice. God grant you the will to be an apostle of peace. Amen.

We join together now in a time of meditation or prayer, spoken at first and then for a time in the peace that silence brings.

My friend Marcy and her boyfriend Brian recently ate dinner at a local Chinese restaurant. As they enjoyed a plate of lo mein, engrossed in conversation, a hand reached down and ushered away their platter of noodles....

Spirit of life and love, we have gathered here in search of answers to hard questions. We have come in search of understanding, in search of community. We have come in search of hope and healing.Let this be a place not only of searching, but of discovery. Let this be a place of learning, but of...

I pledge allegiance to the earth and all life: the fields and streams, the mountains and seas, the forests and deserts, the air and soil, all species and reserves, habitats and environments; one world, one creation, one home, indivisible for all, affected by pollution anywhere, depleted by any...

Blessed be the flower that triumphs at last Over the snows, over the centuries, over the heavy feet of cattle and of soldiers treading down the fragile places of the earth....

Spirit of life and hope, we turn our minds and hearts again toward thee. Awaken us again to the mysteries that humble us, the realities that orient us, the truths that judge and guide us, the beauty that informs and ravishes us, the love that nurtures us, the fellowship that sustains us, the...

Out of the earth Rises light, Rises life, Rises spring. May we join with the miracle that is springtime, and enter into life with lightness and joy. Out of the spirit Rises faith, Rises hope, Rises love. May we join with the miracle that is Easter time, and enter into life with hope and love....

One of the old ones stood up into the morning light and spoke to those who had come back to the river: "Now we have come again to this place; it is a good thing. My life apart from you is not as strong. "Yes, I have danced and I have told the stories at my own fire and I have sung to all the six...

May we come into this building hallowed by generations of thoughtful worship. May we come into the company of this congregation, enlightened by reason and moved by concern. May we come with open minds and warm hearts....