Standing on the Side of Love

There Are More of Us Than There Are of Them (sermon)

There are more of us than there are of them. There are more of us walking with the wind. In November 2019, I raised to you these prayerful words from Sikh community activitist and author, Valerie Kaur What if this darkness is not the darkness of the tomb, but the darkness of the womb? For …

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The Impossibility of Universalism

Reverend Karen G. Johnston The Unitarian Society East Brunswick, NJ September 27, 2020 While Buddhism asserts that we all have Buddhanature – that at our core can be found a golden goodness – the roots of Unitarianism or Universalism does not make this claim.  Not quite. Historically, Unitarians claimed that we have within us the …

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White Lies: James Reeb, a Podcast, a Missing Murderer, & Liberatory Memory (sermon)

January 19, 2020 The Unitarian Society, East Brunswick, NJ Reverend Karen G. Johnston [a clip 1:17 minutes from the White Lies podcast, episode, “A Dangerous Kind of Self Delusion”] …Why must good men die for doing good? “O Jerusalem, why did you murder the prophets and persecute those who come to preach your salvation?”[i] These …

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No Hell Below Us: A Sermon for John Murray Day 2018 (sermon)

The Unitarian Society East Brunswick September 30, 2018   (This sermon was preceded by the poem, Monet Refuses the Operation.)     Are there Star Wars fans in the house?   Can I get a sense with a show of hands: how many of you have seen the most recent Star Wars movie, The Last Jedi? …

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What We Lost Fifty Years Ago: Dr. King (sermon)

(A heads up: last Sunday, when I was not here, I was actually attending the 9am service at First Baptist of Lincoln Gardens, in Somerset.  If you are not familiar with First Baptist, it is a Black Baptist church with at least 5,000 members. The worship and theology there are, shall I say, a little …

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There Are No Unsacred Places (sermon)

September 17, 2017 The Unitarian Society, East Brunswick (this sermon was delivered extemporaneously, though written in full ahead of time; the content is substantially the same, though minor changes exist between this text and the one preached) Place is important.  Where we are informs who we are and who we become.  When we are rooted …

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And the Welcome Will Be Wide: It’s Not About the Bathrooms (sermon)

The Unitarian Society, East Brunswick, New Jersey And the table will be wide. And the welcome will be wide. And the arms will open wide to gather us in. We are fortunate that here in New Jersey: more protections for the rights and safety of transgender folks have been enacted. In fact, just a few months ago, …

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