UNITARIAN UNIVERSALISTS MERIT PLACE IN LIST OF WORSHIP
JOY OVERSTREET, and her husband Martin are lifelong Unitarian
Universalists and active volunteers for a variety of local
causes
589 words
18 February 1999
The Columbian
a13
English
Copyright (c) 1999 Bell & Howell Information and Learning
Company. All rights reserved.
The Columbian's special Feb. 14 section, "How We Worship,"
gave strong coverage to the many Christian churches in the
community. To the paper's credit, the section also included
articles about the local Muslim, Baha'i and Jewish groups.
One more community of faith, the Michael Servetus Unitarian
Universalist Fellowship, deserves mention as a liberal alternative
to Christianity in Clark County since 1953.
A bit of history might help readers understand us, as both
branches of our denomination have roots in earliest Christianity
and both came to flower in America in the 19th century.
The unitarian view of God (God as one) was common in the earliest
years of Christianity. In the early fourth century Emperor
Constantine wanted to unite his far-flung holdings and felt
that it would be easier if the various different Christian
groups of the time could come up with a common creed. He convened
the Council of Nicaea in 324 for this purpose. The group who
viewed the divine as a trinity (Father, Son and Holy Ghost)
prevailed and the Nicene Creed was the result.
At that point the unitarian view became heretical, although
it never died. In fact, many of our founding fathers including
Thomas Jefferson, Paul Revere and John Adams, finding the
doctrine of the trinity to go against reason, considered themselves
Unitarians.
Universalism, another heresy against the established church,
proclaimed that a worthy God could only be a loving God, and
a loving God would not be so cruel as to send only a select
few to heaven and condemn the rest to hell. If anyone was
to be saved, everyone would be, thus salvation was universal.
If salvation was a non-issue, we could put our spiritual energies
to work making this life better.
Unitarian Universalism (the two denominations merged in 1961)
is a non-creedal faith, meaning one need not subscribe to
a specified set of beliefs to belong. Rather than taking the
Bible as the word of God, we consider it to be only one of
many sources of wisdom to draw upon as we seek deeper meaning
in life and connection to each other.
Our covenant asks three things of us: to love our neighbors
as ourselves, to search for truth with an open mind, and to
make the world a better place. To that end we have always
been actively engaged with the problems of this life: Susan
B. Anthony, Charles Darwin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Charles Dickens,
Florence Nightingale, Horace Mann, Margaret Sanger, and Whitney
Young, are but a few notable Unitarian Universalists from
the past.
Today, although our congregation is home to only 215 adult
members and 100 youth, the extent of our participation in
the greater community makes it seem as though there must be
a thousand of us. Our members play key roles in environmental
groups, neighborhood associations, education, the arts, the
library, local politics, growth management, and issues around
women's, gay, and minority rights.
Although Unitarians are traditionally allergic to evangelizing
or proselytizing, people find their way to Michael Servetus
Fellowship, and attendance at our Sunday services this year
has jumped by 15 percent over last year. A common remark newcomers
make after a few Sundays is, "I've been a Unitarian all
my life, and just didn't know it!"
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