Sermon delivered by Senior Minister Rev. Alan Taylor on October 29, 2017. Rev. Taylor shares poignant stories of delayed grief, immediate grief, the significance of grief, and the maturity that comes over time in coming to accept the losses that we have incurred.
The theme for October is how to be a people of courage. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Rev. Colin Bossen on October 22, 2017. W. E. B. DuBois posited that the United States faced a choice between abolition democracy and white supremacy. As part of the UUA-wide teach-in on white supremacy, we’ll explore how the quest for abolition democracy is connected to our religious journeys as Unitarian Universalists. A text version of this sermon can be found on Colin's blog at http://colinbossen.com/the-latest-form-of-infidelity/14264965/abolition-democracy-unity-temple.
An award winning preacher, scholar and social justice organizer, Rev. Bossen is currently working on his doctorate at Harvard University where he is studying the relationship between theology and populism. Twice a month he preaches at the First Parish Church Unitarian Universalist, Ashby, Massachusetts, where he serves as the parish minister. His research has been supported by the American Studies program of Harvard University, a Harvard Merit Term-Time Fellowship, a Frederick Kettner Scholarship from the Biosophical Institute, the Fund for Nurturing Unitarian Universalist Scholarship, multiple Joseph Sumner Smith Scholarships, the Joseph Gittler Fund for Religion and Ethics, the Institute for Anarchist Studies, the Unitarian Universalist Association, and the Center for American Political Studies. Prior to returning to academia Rev. Bossen served as a parish minister for six years. He serves on the Board for the Unitarian Universalist History and Heritage Society and is the author of two religious education curriculums and close to two dozen published essays, articles, book chapters and poems. Colin's brother is the painter Jorin Bossen. His oil and crayon painting is the image for this podcast listing.
The theme for October is how to be a people of courage. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Rev. Scott Aaseng on October 15, 2017. The times we live in are difficult, distracting, troubling. Yet our faith is grounded in deep roots which enable us to not only withstand the storms, but to become stronger by living into the solidarity of interdependence. As Clarissa Estes puts it, we are indeed made for these times.
Rev. Aaseng was a musician, a community activist, and a Lutheran pastor (among other things) prior to discovering his call to Unitarian Universalist ministry. Today, he is Executive Director of the Unitarian Universalist Advocacy Network of Illinois (UUANI) and UTUUC's Community Minister.
Scott graduated from the St. Olaf Paracollege with a degree in Peace Studies, and spent a year studying and traveling in South Africa during the apartheid years. He volunteered as a teacher in rural Tanzania, before returning to the U.S. and earning his M.Div. at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago. He interned at the University of Victoria in British Columbia, and served a small Lutheran congregation on the southwest side of Chicago for five years in the early 1990’s.
He left ordained ministry to become primary caregiver for his two daughters, while becoming project director and then grant-writer for the Southwest Youth Collaborative, a community-based youth organization he helped found. He also served as musician for a number of church gospel choirs, and went on to serve as Village Musician at Holden Village, a Lutheran retreat center in the mountains of Washington state. Upon returning to Chicago in 2005, he became a project assistant with American Friends Service Committee, coordinating a nationally touring display of combat boots and civilian shoes showing the human cost of war. He also began attending Third Unitarian Church in Chicago with his family.
Becoming a musician at Third Unitarian in 2009 re-awakened his call to ministry, now more clearly grounded in Unitarian Universalism. He took classes at both Starr King and Meadville Lombard seminaries, completed his internship at Unity Temple, and went on to serve as Unity Temple’s first Assistant Minister for Social Justice. He has since served as part-time Consulting Minister at the Unitarian Church of Quincy, Illinois and at First Unitarian Church of Hobart, Indiana. He now serves as Executive Director of the Unitarian Universalist Advocacy Network of Illinois.
Scott has lived on the west side of Chicago for 20 years with his spouse, Gale Holmlund, and their two teenage daughters, Sunniva and Brita. He enjoys bicycling, playing piano, being outdoors, and traveling with his family.
The theme for October is how to be a people of courage. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Senior Minister Rev. Alan Taylor on October 8, 2017. Rev. Taylor explores what it means to be a people of courage and connects it to how we are called to give of ourselves generously, sometimes even when it feels like a sacrifice.
The theme for October is how to be a people of courage. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray on October 1, 2017. Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray, the newly elected first woman president of the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA), shares her vision for the UUA, of which Unity Temple Unitarian Universalist Congregation is a vibrant part.
Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray was elected as the President of the UUA on June 24, 2017. Previously, she was the Minister of the UU Congregation of Phoenix, where she had served since August 2008. She also served as Minister at the First UU Church of Youngstown from 2003-2008. Community organizing and justice leadership have been key components of Rev. Frederick-Gray’s ministry. In October 2014, when marriage equality came to Arizona, Rev. Susan married 13 same-sex couples on that day outside the downtown Phoenix Clerk’s office. Susan and her congregation have worked closely with the Puente Human Rights Movement to bring national attention to the human rights abuses in Maricopa County and the need for national humane immigration reform. She organized Unitarian Universalists nationally in the campaign against Arizona’s SB 1070, including being arrested in an act of civil disobedience on the Day of Non-compliance against SB 1070. Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray can be reached at sfrederickgray@uua.org.
The theme for October is how to be a community of courage. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Senior Minister Rev. Alan Taylor on September 24, 2017. Exploring the wisdom of the Jewish High Holy Days, Rev. Taylor acknowledges how easy it is to forget who we really are and invites us to reflect on where we need to seek forgiveness and restoration in our relationships.
The theme for September is how to be a community of welcome. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Minister of Faith Development ev. Emily Gage on September 17, 2017. "It makes me think of each of us, walking through the door here, sometimes bearing gifts or our lesson plans or supplies or cookies, but mostly just offering our presence to one another. We don’t always do it as well or as kindly or as smoothly as we would like to (I certainly know this is true of myself), but still we offer up who we are, and hope that that is enough. It is enough."
The sermon references the book Come with Me by Holly McGhee as well as poems from Brian Doyle's book The Kind of Brave You Wanted to Be.
The theme for September is how to be a community of welcome. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Senior Minister Rev. Alan Taylor on September 10, 2017. In this time of hurricane relief and the loss of security for DACA residents, Rev. Taylor reflects on the sacred call of sheltering one another. Would you harbor me? Would I harbor you? How can we protect one another?
The theme for September is how to be a community of welcome. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
Sermon delivered by Intern Minister Kellie C. Kelly on September 3, 2017. On this Labor Day holiday, Kellie shares the stories of 3 Unitarians whose hard work made our religious movement more welcoming and justice-seeking: Rev. Joseph Tuckerman, Dorothea Dix, and Francis Ellen Watkins Harper.
The theme for September is how to be a community of welcome. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.
These reflections were given by Senior Minister Rev. Alan Taylor on August 27, 2017, the official first Sunday of the 2017-18 church year. In a worship for all ages celebrating Homecoming Sunday, Rev. Taylor shares his love of the water communion and his growing awareness of how to live into the question: "Who are you to think that you can change the world?”
The theme for August is how to be a community of connection. To read about our theme-based ministry, please visit http://www.unitytemple.org/faith-development/soul-connections on our website.