What We Believe

Our detractors call us "The church that doesn't believe in anything." That is not true. We believe in many things. Our first belief is in the inherent worth and dignity of every person. It gets a little complicated after that, because some of us believe in God and some of us don't. Here is a whole page, with six links for further reading, devoted to our beliefs. You can scroll down, or click to:

• Principles and Purposes of the UUA.
• Sources of our beliefs.
• The heart of our religion by Rev. Laura Horton-Ludwig.
• An Alternate view of the Principles and Purposes, with some historical notes.
• What I Believe in 30 words or less, by some of our members.
• Additional reading; three eloquent statements, one over 110 years old, and four links.

Principles and Purposes

The Principles and Purposes of the Unitarian-Universalist Association (Our national organization) were adopted as bylaws by the 1984, 1985 and 1995 General assemblies.

• The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
  
  
• Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
  
  
• Acceptance of one another and encouragement to 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.

Sources

The living tradition which we share draws from many sources:

• Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life;
  
  
• Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love;
  
  
• Wisdom from the world's religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life;
  
  
• Jewish and Christian teachings which call us to respond to God's love by loving our neighbors as ourselves;
  
  
• Humanist teachings which counsel us to heed the guidance of reason and the results of science, and warn us against idolatries of the mind and spirit;
  
  
• Spiritual teachings of earth-centered traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.
  
  

The Heart of Our Religion

Alternate view of the Principles and Purposes

(Ted Pack wrote this. He is a lay webmaster, not a minister. It is not a statement of belief by the UUF of SC.)

The Unitarians formally organized in the United States in 1825. As the name implies, they didn't believe in the Holy Trinity. The Universalists formally organized in 1793. As the name implies, they didn't believe in salvation by grace for just a few people; they believed in Universal salvation. Time passed. About 1841 Theodore Parker, a Unitarian minister, gave a famous sermon. He said that the things Jesus of Nazareth taught (Love one another, don't cast the first stone, words of hatred than come out of your mouth defile you more than any forbidden food you put into it . . .) made sense, even if Jesus wasn't the only begotten Son of God. This caused a stir in theological circles. Christianity is based on prophets and its savior. We, by contrast, are a non-prophet organization.

More time passed. We got more liberal. In 1961 the Unitarians merged with the Universalists to form the Unitarian-Universalist Association. The Unitarians got first billing because there were more of them, even though the Universalists were older.

At one point after the merge, the membership application for the UUA read "No statement of creed or belief, including this one, shall be a condition for membership." As a result, we got the reputation of being "The church that doesn't believe in anything." We believe in a lot of things, but we are not unanimous about them, the way the Catholics are about the Apostolic Creed. On any given issue we may be split 50-50, 90-10, or 35-35-25-05.

In the early 1980's, tired of being known as the church that didn't believe in anything, the UUA appointed a committee to come up with a statement of beliefs. They created the list of Principles and Purposes (above), plus the list of sources. If you read carefully, you can tell it was written in the early 1980's, by a committee.

• We take "the worth and dignity of every person" seriously. It means people of all shapes, sizes, colors, and ages; rich or homeless, straight, gay, or lesbian. It means a man who stammers because he has an IQ of 140 trapped in an 80-year old body that suffered a stroke, and a woman whose legs don't work. The gay or lesbian part usually upsets conservative people.
  
  (I was once in a workshop where the 80-year old spoke, haltingly. Every other person in the room listened patiently, not trying to finish his sentences for him. The workshop leader, realizing they were living that principle, and in awe of an indomitable spirit, got damp around the eyeballs.)
  
  
• We sing in church; not always well, but we try.
  
  
• We have instrumental music in church. It helps us sing on key.
  
  
• We ordain women.
  
  
• We believe there is some truth in all religions; "different paths to the same goal" is the phrase we use a lot.
  
  
• We believe Jesus of Nazareth was a great religious leader, in the same league as Mohammed, Moses, Buddha, Confucius, Lao Tse and others. Some of us believe he was the greatest, some of us think he was tied for first place, and some of us don't believe religious leaders can be ranked.
  
  
• Two thirds to three fourths of us believe in a supreme Deity.
  
  
• Most of us believe in evolution.
  
  
• We pray; some of us expect answers, some don't.
  
  
• Very few of us believe in original sin, salvation by grace, or transubstantiation.
  
  
• We believe the Bible is a great book, but we don't take all of it literally.
  
  
• We believe children should learn the basic tenets of all major religions and be taught to think for themselves. Our Religious Education Goals go into this in more detail. It is a mission statement, even though the author has been dead for more than 150 years.
  
  

What I believe, in 30 words or less.

We asked our members to answer either "What do you believe?" or "What drew you to our fellowship?" in 30 words or less. We used the 30-word limit to make it a challenge, and because we knew most web visitors would not wade through long paragraphs. Here is what they wrote:

• I believe that many paths lead to the same truth and that the journey is as important as the destination.
  
  
• I believe in the necessity for care and compassion to exist between people. I was attracted to UU because it supports people's search for meaning without constricting them with dogma.
  
  
• I wanted a church with diverse sources of religious inspiration, including Earth-based worship.
  
  
• We came because we could worship with our family together. Since we had some different views on religion we found this was a place that we could come together.
  
  
• I wanted a children's program that guided their developing religious philosophy with respect for differing viewpoints.
  
  
• I'm an agnostic. This was the only church in the county that would have me.
  
  

For more along these lines, we had a service which asked everyone to answer the question What Does Being a Unitarian Universalist mean to You? It is in our Guest Sermon section.

Additional Reading

We have three eloquent statements of belief for you, by
Rev. Marta Flanagan, (contemporary)
Rev. David Rankin (contemporary)
Rev. William Channing Gannett (1887). This one is interesting because it shows we were struggling to tell people what we believed 120 years ago. It is a little dated - it uses "Man" instead of "Humankind" - but it is eloquent.

One of the best ways to see what we believe is to see what we do. Here in Stanislaus County, our members helped start the local chapters of NOW, Friends Outside, and the Sierra Club, for instance. Out of 135 members, we have eight returned Peace Corps Volunteers. We have veterans of the Marine Corps, too. We asked all of our members to list a few things they did that reflect the teachings of our church. Only a few did. Their responses are on the Members Page.

If you'd like to see what UU's have done over the years and across the country,
Famous Unitarians and Universalists is a site devoted to people from one denomination or the other from the 1800's to today. (We were two separate denominations until 1961.) Six presidents of the United States were Unitarians or Universalists. So were Clara Barton, Susan B. Anthony and P. T. Barnum.

If you have more questions after you read this, you can go to 100 Questions. This is a web site the Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashua, New Hampshire has made from the booklet, "100 Questions that Non-members ask about Unitarian-Universalism" by John Sias. It concentrates on the Theist and Humanist sides of UUism. Some people find it conservative. UU's come in many flavors. We have Buddhists and Wiccans as well as Christians and Jews.

If you'd like an outside opinion, Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance has simple, non-judgmental descriptions of 63 different religious faiths. In their words, "We describe dozens of faith groups as accurately as we can, from Asatru to Christianity to Zoroastrianism." Click on "About Other Religions", then scroll past "Introductory thoughts", some ads, "World Religions" and "Neopagan Religious Faiths" until you get to "Other Non-Christian Religions". (OCoRT is a big site.) We UU's are towards the bottom of that list, by virtue of the alphabet.