Virginia UU Community

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Have you been attending a church where you feel like “the big pink elephant in the middle of the room?” Where you feel like you just don’t fit in as part of the community? Or worse, you feel as though you aren’t wanted? Tired of feeling you are part of a "Sundays Only Faith", where people are seemingly there for show? Tired of the "get saved or burn in hell" sermons? Tired of a church where asking questions is forbidden? Or have you not attended a church because you can't find one that would feel comfortable attending? Have you been accused of being a "wolf in sheep's clothing?"

There is an answer. There is a church where everyone is welcomed and all beliefs are celebrated through genuine love and sincere community. Where the congregation doesn’t judge you for who you are, but rather celebrates what makes you different.

The Unitarian Universalist church has no subscribed creed or dogma. A frequent quote you may hear is,

“We don’t have to believe alike to love alike…”

This is a large shift from the traditional denominations people have become used to in our conservative state. As you already know, Virginia is no longer a “red state” but rather now, a vivid "purple state” . The Unitarian Universalist Church has very basic and sincere values: Tolerance, Respect, Love, and Compassion. These are the basis of our faith; we believe that God is too big to fit into just one religion and that there is great intrinsic value in all the different religions and even in no religion at all. We are each on our own path of faith, and it is up to each of us to nourish our hearts and souls at our own pace and to our own satisfaction. Where the only challenge you are met with is to find your own Truth.

I lovingly call Unitarian Universalism a “religious buffet” because it is like going to an all you care to eat buffet. You put on your plate as much as you are comfortable with and sample things you have never tried before if you choose to. The beauty of this is you can indulge without being judged by anyone else at the buffet because everyone is there for the same thing, nourishment…

Towards the goal of an inspirational introduction I would like to introduce you to some of the famous Unitarian Universalists in history:

Keith Olbermann (MSNBC Countdown nightly news)

Thomas Jefferson (Third President of the United States)

Benjamin Franklin (Historic Inventor)

Alexander Graham Bell (Famous Inventor of the telephone)

John Adams (Second President of the United States)

John Quincy Adams (Sixth President of the United States)

Charles Dickens (wrote A Christmas Carol & Oliver Twist)

Ralph Waldo Emerson (Famous Poet)

Benjamin Rush (Founding Father, Doctor)

Thomas Paine (intellectual, scholar, revolutionary)

Paul Revere ("the British are coming")

William Howard Taft (Twenty-Seventh President of the United States)

Daniel Webster (Senator)

Frank Lloyd Wright (Famous Architect)

Susan B. Anthony (Women's Suffrage)

Isaac Newton (explained gravity)

Julia Ward Howe (wrote the Battle Hymn of the Republic)

P.T. Barnum (Circus)

Joseph Priestly (discovered Oxygen)

Edward Everett (President of Harvard)

Charles Bulfinch (architect of the US Capital building)

Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin (Famous Astronomer)

Mary White Ovington (co-founder of NAACP)

Roger Baldwin (founder of ACLU)

Clara Barton (founder of American Red Cross)

Surprised? I encourage you to explore the website, the links, and ask questions. We are all curious creatures and we should be encouraged to seek to understand each other better. After all we are all human beings together on this planet. We need to strengthen our community by working together not finding ways to separate us; from a Christian perspective one might say we should learn to “live as Jesus lived, and love as Jesus loved…” Or from a Buddhist perspective one might say we should learn to “live as Buda lived, and love as Buda loved…” There are many different Prophets that have inspired many different religions, which have all taught the same basic principles. At the core of each is a universal basis of love and gratitude, on which we have based our faith.