Week #4 -Unitarians Unite

So if you are a Christian conservative with poor reading comprehension skills (the only reason you’d still be reading this blog) you can skip this entry.  Because this Sunday er Saturday we went to a church whose congregation will be at the Fairfax County courthouse on Wednesday to support Marge and Sue as they apply for a marriage license. 

Nope not “Bet Mishpachah, a congregation for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Jews and all who wish to participate in an inclusive, egalitarian, and mutually supportive community.” I didn’t find that place until my 11am web search and the service was at 10, no worries, we're saving that for another week…OK one more clue, there were bongo drums and the sermon was on immigrant rights…

Are you guessing??????

You got it, Unitarian Universalists (UU)!  Obviously this was not a new experience for me, of any religion, UU best reflects my actual spiritual believes.  I know I’m with kin by the fist bumper sticker on the first Volvo in the parking lot.  They promote equality, social justice, the value of nature, the greater connectivity of all people, it is almost surreal to attend a service so in line with my beliefs, and also a little surreal to sit through an entire church service with no mention of Jesus. 

Here is where the UU’s went right:

There are seven principles which Unitarian Universalist congregations affirm and promote:

•          The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
•          Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
•          Acceptance of one another and encouragement of spiritual growth in our congregations;
•          A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
•          The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in     society at large;
•          The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
•          Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.

Here is where the UU’s went wrong:

•        Procreation

Let’s face it, how do modern religious traditions sustain growth? By spreading the truth? By evangelizing? By manipulating the poor and uneducated?  Getting closer, but those are all a lot of work, you need to print bibles, pay for airfare to Micronesia, buy airtime on cable access…sure that will get you recruits, but it is also exhausting.  How can you build a congregation of followers without all of that effort?  Simple, lots and lots of missionary…style between a married husband and wife.   Yup, if you want your congregation to grow, ban birth control, gay marriage, and sex ed. in schools, or just let your men take many wives (ensuring the wives can’t read, vote or work helps too).  Catholics, Muslims, cults, Mormons and just about every religion except the Unitarians seems to have caught on to this.  How and why have the UUs gone so wrong?

It’s simple really, when your congregation is largely socially conscience, over educated  Ph.Ds, I mean the people who literally pay for free public radio, you’re just not going to sustain the generational growth of say a Jackson, Mississippi Pentecostal Church of Christ.  No one in this group is having more than 1.7 children (counting the golden retriever).  It also doesn’t help to be so accepting of the gays…seriously how many new followers do you expect to get out of that, maybe one Vietnamese child per couple or perhaps a minority foster child.   Regardless, they’ll both grow up and want to “reconnect to their heritage” and head straight for Buddhism or Christianity.  Oh and not to mention, you raised them to be open minded and accepting of religious traditions, never once guilting them into following your belief’s…back to recruitment square one. 

I’m not going to lie, I always feel inspired to do more for my community after a Unitarian service.  And they provide no shortage of opportunities to volunteer, but somehow all that Brian took away was “why are we the youngest people here? And why are there only two other men?”  I blamed the fact that we were at a 4:30pm Saturday service, but honestly I think this would be a great spiritual home for a lot of folks who just don’t know about it.  The message needs to be spread!  However, that is never going to happen unless the Unitarians get their heads in the game and start pandering elitism, a bit more close mindedness and some natural family planning brochures* like everyone else.

*Natural family planning is where all of those Catholic babies come from, I’m pretty sure.