I began my ministry in the United Methodist Church. Three things happened in one year which together prompted my move to Unitarian Universalism.
I was working with three boys on the religious scouting awards. The program for these awards is developed by each denomination for their own boys. The curriculum for the younger of the three boys included a section on the Trinity. He said that it made no sense to him and asked me to explain it to him. I do not remember what I said to him, but I do remember that as I opened her mouth Irealized I no longer believed in the Trinity. I thought it unbiblical.
The second thing that happened was that two clergywomen and a layman in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference of the United Methodist Church in that year published a book called Wisdom Feast, which was about using feminine imagery for Christ. This book caused a big uproar in the conference and, while it did not happen, there was talk of charging the clergywomen with heresy and defrocking them. I read the book. It made sense to me. I found nothing in it to be upsetting, and much of it to be inspiring.
The third thing that happened is that I was constantly caught between the congregation I was serving and my senior minister. He had an authoritarian style, and I was frequently asked by congregants when they would get to vote on this issue or that. The answer was that they would not get to vote. The senior minister could make the decision without their input.
At this point, considering myslef a Unitarian and Universalist Christian who wanted to serve in a denominational with congregational polity I called the Unitarian Universalist headquarters in Boston. I was told I needed to belong to a Unitarian Universalist congregation for at least one year.
I did a residency year of Clinical Pastoral Education at St. Luke’s Hospital in Bethlehem, PA and joined the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Lehigh Valley (1990-1991). At the hospital I concentrated on the orthopedic/neurological unit and the psychiatric unit. I learned to be a pastoral presence to a wide variety of people. At the church I became involved with a women’s group influenced by neo-pagan spirituality, met a man who studied Buddhism, and began to work through a reading list for those considering the UU ministry under the tutelage of the pastor. By the end of this year I was calling myself a humanist with a respect for the Christian tradition in which I was raised. This is still how I identify myself spiritually.
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How I Became a Unitarian Universalist Minister |