Here’s the deal: I’m an agnostic; a secular humanist. A hard agnostic, maybe. I’m not “spiritual, not religious”, I’m not “seeking”, I don’t “believe in an undefined force of goodness”. But I kinda miss the community aspect of church - I grew up Presbyterian.
There’s a pretty big Unitarian church near me - the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship. Would I maybe enjoy it, or is it full of fuzzy thinking? I know the reality is probably a lot of “depends on the people” and “YMMV”, but by and large, what have your experiences been? I poked around on their website but still couldn’t really decide what their mission is - everything seems a little intentionally vauge. Would there be other people like me? Would there be a whole lot of “Your aura is very muddy today” people? Folks who had kids and didn’t want to take them to church so took them to some sort of church stand-in?
I’d really like a church supper with no church, frankly. Would the Unitarians fit my bill (or a section of the Unitarians within the Unitarian congregation)? Or would it all just make me uncomfortable and afraid to answer the phone because I don’t want to be rude?
As you said, it really depends on the congregation. In my experience UU churches tend towards general humanism, with a little talk about the ‘divine’, leaving what specifically ‘divine’ is out of the discussion.
But, for an agnostic secular humanist, I can’t think of another church-like experience that could fit.
I am not a Unitarian but I know some and I there are some well-respected Unitarians on this board. My understanding is that you would fit right in. They are quite the eclectic bunch and take the church idea and extend it very liberally.
(Riddle:
Q: Why is the singing so bad in the UU church?
A: 'Cause everyone’s reading a line ahead to see if they agree!)
Seriously, I like UUs a lot. The several churches I’ve been to have been warm and welcoming and not at all judgemental. There’s a lot of folks exactly where you are: not sure of The Truth or if there even is A Truth, but who want to be around folks and share good things that have happened recently, recieve emotional support for bad things, and like a little Light Ritual once a week.
They’ve always been open to guests, with no pressure to join. They do pass a basket for donations during services, but at least once I had no cash, and wasn’t made to feel pressured or bad for not pitching in.
They’re not perfect, of course. Get really involved, and you may find all sorts of drama and politics and mayhem on the board. My mother’s a neopagan minister with a lot of involment at her local CUUPS (Covenant of UU Pagans) chapter, and has experienced the drama, but I haven’t become drawn into it. I’ve never found it to interfere with a casual involvement.
My uncle and his paramour belonged to the UU church. I find it funny that they call it a church…it’s more like a club (theirs is, anyway). He was a hard-core atheist, but was active with the members and supported the music programs, art restoration stuff, and enjoyed the intellectual stimulation.
But my guess is that you’ll get a different “congregation” with different goals at each one.
My dad went through a phase where he insisted we attend UU church every week (for about 2 years). I certainly can’t speak for all UU Churches, but this “church” was nothing more than a place for people to have intellectual pissing contests.
No aspect of faith/God/gods/etc. was ever discussed (they said they didn’t want to offend anyone). Songs were song from a hymnal, yet any reference to anything remotely religious was edited to something non offensive. This wouldn’t be inherently bad if it was what you were looking for, but I assumed that a UU Church is there to embrace all religions (and those that are non religious).
I figured there would be open discussion about what various religions believe, why people don’t believe, the pros and cons of both, etc. etc. This never happened.
Instead, the church members (which consisted of the richest, most well-educated folks in town) would sit in a circle for 3 hours on Sundays and bitch and moan about local politics. Oh no! “They’re building a dairy across town, whatever shall we do? Well, we wont actually do anything, but we’re going to sit here and bitch about it so we can figure out which of us is smartest.”
The whole experience was completely devoid of anything resembling religion in any form. I might not be a hardcore fanatic in either direction (religious and non), but I am a spiritual person. If nothing else, I wanted to be able to learn about other religions (particularly the more obscure ones-- which are many in my heavily Baptist and Catholic town).
Needless to say, the experience left a bad taste in my mouth. Church is church; if I want to see an intellectual pissing contest, I’ll just come here :).
That said, there’s nothing wrong with going once or twice to see if it is your thing. It might be right for you, it just wasn’t for me.
I joined a UU Congregation for much the same reasons as the OP, when my children were young and I was newly divorced. Our congregation is small and intimate and a warm home to me when I make the time to attend.
We have two UU congregations in this town. One has a traditional “church” building and is “high church”. Our sanctuary is a converted farmhouse and our gatherings have a more relaxed feel. Every congregation has its own culture; perhaps this is more true of UU’s because we encourage diversity of belief and thought.
You are more likely to find members to be politically liberal and social justice to be a prevalent theme. My biggest surprise has been the older members: men and women in their 80’s and 90’s still teaching and attending classes, organizing social action, young in mind and spirit. I’ve been quite amazed at the degree to which most members really “live their values”, paying not only lip-service, but consciously modeling UU Principles by the way they lead their public and private lives.
Members will be independent thinkers, and because of the democratic principles there will sometimes be conflict when decisions need to be made. But I’d rather have that than be told what to do and think.
I forgot to respond to the fact that you consider yourself to be non-spiritual agnostic. That is very common among UU’s, and there are even atheists among us.
Well, I’ve been thinking about popping in for a service or something ever since the last time I went by the place on my way to the grocery store, and some sort of evening event was taking place - smelled something tasty cooking, saw a young lesbian couple hauling a grill out of their car, thought “hmm, I wonder if they have deviled eggs in a little egg dish?”
Many UU congregations undergo a two-year exploration and training program to create a Welcoming Congregation for LGBT people, who often don’t have a place in their original family faith. We have LGBT singles and couples just as we have hetero singles and couples.
Yeah, goodness, couldn’t possibly be any cheerful smiling grilling lesbians in the UU, huh? I kind of assumed that was one of their selling points - they’re socially progressive.
You mean fuzzier thinking than any other religion?
Actually, I’ve always thought Unitarian’s are way cool. I’m not religious myself, but in one of my past careers I found myself doing a lot of work with different faith groups. Lots of programs at churches and synogogues of all types. And I must say, the Unitarians were ALWAYS welcoming and fun. Can’t say that for many of the others.
BTW, how do you know if Unitarians want you out of the neighborhood?
There’s a question mark burning in your front lawn
Seriously, I’ve been to three UU churches and found them each to have a distinctive culture. One I really didn’t care for, and one was too far to drive regularly. In my experience, you can hear about spiritual matters a lot, and they’ll even use the G-word sometimes. It’s more about inquiry, though, rather than doctrine. It can be a little intimidating the first couple of times. It gets easier.
I’m a very dedicated Sikh, but I go to a local UU fellowship because they’re GLBT-friendly, promote free inquiry and do solid community service. I’d say 80-90% of my congregation aren’t really attached to one religion or another; they’re their for the fellowship, learning and the solid feeling of community. Usually it takes me a good year or two to feel like part of any group, but I had that feeling in a matter of six months. The really good UU congregations take care of their people.
UUs vary from congregation to congregation. If you’ve got a couple or more in your area, check them all out. I picked mine because it’s small and eclectic, and I can sit down and have a cup of coffee with one of the senior members and spend hours just listening to some really fascinating life stories.
Plus, I promise they won’t be pushy with the phone. A polite “thanks but no thanks” if you don’t like the experience is all they’ll need.
We tried a Unitarian Church a year or so ago for about three months. This congregation was too political for me and my wife. Although we agreed with most of the politics, it just felt wrong.
And as for the church service, it was so watered down that we (my wife and I) wondered why we (the congregation) bothered to gather.
I was raised Presbyterian too. I don’t pretend to know if there’s a God, or what form that God may take, but we’re more comfortable with the local Methodist church - this particular one is LBGT (did I spell that right) friendly - the Methodist pastor who was removed for being openly lesbian spoke at the church last week about tolerance. But it’s not political. I believe very politically conservative and politically liberal people can feel at home there. I like the opportunities to do charity work, and feel connected to the community, and if there is a God, and we’re worshiping Ips wrong, I can’t believe that God is going to get too worked up about it. If God is a big worship-Me-the-correct-way freak, I don’t want much to do with God anyway.
Especially with all the contradictory divinely inspired documentation that’s been allowed to pile up.
In short, I think it depends much more on the congregation than whether it’s Unitarian.
