The following sermon was shared at the December 7, 2014 worship service at Chalice Unitarian Universalist Congregation. In Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1921, an angry mob of white people numbering in the thousands burned down the Greenwood District, the African American part of town. More than one thousand homes and businesses …
Beloved community, The week before Thanksgiving was certainly tumultuous. First, President Obama announced he would use his executive powers to protect up to 5 million undocumented immigrants from being deported. Many of us who have been hoping for immigration reform were glad for some action to finally be taken, imperfect …
Beloved community, I have just arrived home from a 5-day trip to Tucson, where I studied immigration issues with 20 other Unitarian Universalist ministers through a program offered by BorderLinks and the UU College of Social Justice. BorderLinks is a nonprofit educational organization in Tucson that offers experiential learning in …
Beloved community, Because we are such a community of readers, I thought some of you might be interested in knowing what’s on my reading list for the coming year. Reclaiming Prophetic Witness: Liberal Religion in the Public Square by Paul Rasor. This is the UUA’s “Common Read” title for 2014-15. …
My sermon this morning is inspired by a movie I’ve seen recently. It’s still out in theatres: the movie is called “42,” and it’s based on the story of Jackie Robinson, the first African-American to play for a major league baseball team in the United States. His jersey number was …
When a man walks into a movie theater, kills 12 people, and injures over 50 more, it is easy to imagine him a monster, a “crazed madman,” a demon who must himself be destroyed in an effort to keep the rest of us safe. Indeed, he may face the death …
Representatives of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations met in Phoenix last week for our annual gathering, called General Assembly (G.A.). Unlike previous years, our gathering this year had a focus on learning about and participating in social justice work (particularly on immigration issues) in partnership with local activist groups. …
When you go to college, people start asking you, “What’s your major?” When you enter the ministry, people start saying, “Tell me about your call.” The idea of having a “calling” or receiving a “call” comes from the Hebrew and Christian Bibles and is described pretty thoroughly here, beginning with this …
October 2-8 is Mental Illness Awareness Week (sponsored by the National Alliance on Mental Illness), and today is National Depression Screening Day. You can screen yourself or a loved one online here.
I’ve spent the last year reading the 68 books and documents on the required reading list for the Ministerial Fellowship Committee. This is the list of readings everyone preparing for the UU ministry must read before interviewing with the committee. Although the required readings have provided me a powerful grounding …
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