The world is too beautiful to be praised by only one voice. May you have the courage to sing your part. The world is too broken to be healed by only one set of hands. May you have the courage to use your gifts. May you go in peace.

Call to sing joyfully to fulfill our role as part of creation Let us sing a song to the Eternal. Let the earth and her children break forth in song. Let the sky and its creatures in chorus reply. Let the sea and all that is within it sound out praise. Let the storms raise their voices, the river...

Love is the Spirit of this church [or: congregation]. May the songs we sing celebrate this Love. May the lives we lead embody this Spirit. May you all go forth in peace.

What does it mean to bless? To bless does not mean Saying magical words Changing the mind of God Or altering the course of the cosmos. To bless does mean Reminding each other of our gifts Remembering the wisdom that is within us And recalling our common purpose....

In the beginning There was light Infinite and expansive Flowing out from an unseen center. Throughout Creation There is light From the steady Sun The glowing Moon The flashing Meteor The twinkling Stars And the auroras dancing in the northern skies....

My friends, may the Spirit of Love be A living flame before you, A guiding star above you, A firm path below you, And a gentle presence behind you.

May the firmness of the earth be yours. May the flow of the water be yours. May the freedom of the air be yours. May the fierceness of the fire be yours. May all of the gifts of this life, The Below and the Above, Be with you now and remain with you always.

May you be filled with the blessings of this covenanted community. May you carry them with you as you depart from here. May you discover the places in the world where these blessings are needed. May you have the courage to share them....

With faithful progress, The Great Sun has traveled, From north to south again, And on this day pauses. So we also stand still, With the whole Earth, In quiet thankfulness, To the Source of Blessing, The Giver of All Light.

The strength of the Earth is the stones And the same is the source of our bones. The Water flows across the ground And within our blood. The Air blows around the world And brings us our breath. The Fire streams forth from the Sun without ceasing And sustains our lives. By these elements We are...

The question for us today is: What does it mean for us to live steadfast in our faith, for us to risk faithfully as a congregation?

Why Christmas? Especially to one who doubts? Are you not being hypocritical? Unitarian Universalists, with their penchant for secular humanism are fond of arguing the validity of Christmas: Is it a Christian holiday? A pagan holiday? A secular holiday?...

On a foggy Christmas Eve, Santa realized Rudolph could make the difference in guiding the sleigh.

Advent, adventus, means waiting. And the holiday season is nothing if not waiting—to get done the chores; to find the right gift; to find time for quiet moments; to accept that our loved ones will not be as we wish them to be....

Now is the moment of magic, when the whole, round earth turns again toward the sun....

"Whatsoever you wish that others do unto you, do so to them; for this is the Law of the Prophets."—Matthew 7:12 I should probably get one thing clear at the outset: I don’t claim to know much about stability, much less to possess it. In fact, when I think about what I’ve experienced in life,...

"When we seek wisdom," says one Native American spiritual leader, "we go up on the hill and talk to the Great Spirit, Wakan Tanka. Four days and four nights, without food and water. And we listen. And God speaks." Roy Phillips, minister of the Unitarian Church in St. Paul, Minnesota, writes about...

I have a story to tell you, about the less-than-triumphal first appearance I made in a pulpit. I was a first-year seminarian, doing my field work at the old First Parish in Lexington, Massachusetts. When they invited me to preach my first sermon on such an important day as Palm Sunday, I was...

When we remember those whom we have loved and lost, help us to remember also, O God, how great a privilege is human loving, and that not to have loved at all would have been loss far greater still. Amen. “What’s a soul?” Not a question Unitarian Universalists ask very often. We are more likely...

"If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is 'Thank You,' it will be enough" — Meister Eckhart Today we have set aside time to publicly say thank you to our siblings who have served in the Air Force, Army, Coast Guard, Navy and Marines; to say 'Thank You' to all who served, whatev...