Unitarian Universalist Church of Birmingham April 10, 2022 Reverend Karen G. Johnston, Guest Minister If I can’t save us then let me feel you happy and safe under my chin. If this will drown or burn then let us drink starlight nap under trees sing on beaches— the morning rush to sit indoors what, again? …
I have safely arrived in New Orleans. I took the requisite photo of my feet at the airport, a strange ritual I began doing about a decade ago. I don’t remember how I started it. I am thinking it must have been after I acquired my first smart phone, these miraculous machines with their built-in …
Part I I have some challenging questions for us, which I pose with love for you, for us, and for this aching world. I cannot promise you hope in this sermon, but as a good modern Universalist, I can promise you love. If this morning is a morning when you just cannot bear a heavy …
As all kinds of folx move into re-opening space that was closed during the pandemic, it can help to bring intentionality, and even ritual, to this process. We have all been exposed to trauma in the form of a global pandemic. This trauma has different manifestations depending on one’s social location and context, but no …
September 15, 2019 The Unitarian Society, East Brunswick, NJ Reverend Karen G. Johnston We refuse to bequeath a dying planet to future generations by failing to act now. We act in peace, with ferocious love of these lands in our hearts. We act on behalf of life. Powerful words in the midst of a topic …
This is Not a Drill: A Global Call to Strike for the Climate (sermon) Read More »
The Unitarian Society, East Brunswick, NJ August 11, 2019 Perhaps you know in your body. Perhaps you know in your head. Perhaps you know in what Buddhists call your heartmind, that deep place of coherence beyond the binary, beyond the either/or, beyond the one or the other. We have moved past climate change… …to climate …
When it comes to climate change, climate changeD, climate chaos, climate constriction, climate collapse…whatever you call it — preaching hope is not a straight-forward thing.
The Unitarian Society, East Brunswick, NJ March 19, 2017 A compass, rather than a map. Last week I told you that I have been reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Its subtitle is “Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants.” Kimmerer is a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation, a …
In my church we sing a hymn, All Creatures of the Earth and Sky, calling them “kindred.” Family. All part of the interdependent web of existence of which we are a part. This fall we have shared our new home with a variety of creatures. A veritable living example of the interdependent web of all …
All Creatures of the Earth and Sky: Does that mean spiders, too? Read More »
The Unitarian Society, A Unitarian Universalist Congregation East Brunswick, NJ Audio version here. Not that long ago, a journalist suggested a parlor game to a group of historians. It was mid-summer: after the massacre in Orlando, after the attacks in Nice, after the shootings in Baton Rouge (and before the floods), after Brexit and Zika, …