Session Eleven

COVENANT GROUP LESSON 11 - Articulating Your Faith #3

Chalice: Unitarian Universalists believe in the integrity of universal wholeness, the value of diversity of the unitary parts and affirming the inherent connections each to the other within all existence.

Lisa Wiggins, UU Community Minister

Reading: Today some of us contemporary UU's have chosen to stay in the movement that raised us, others have chosen to return after a sojurn away, and many others have chosen to enter with fresh voices and stories, bringing the vitality that diversity always produces. We are all at once lucky and cursed: lucky for the liberating freedom of conscience possible in nondogmatic religion, and cursed by the unending possibilities that demand our steady attention. It is no easy task to be unfettered by doctrine; we have to choose for ourselves. Our religion offers strong principles and tools for that task, but ultimately it is our own activity that makes the difference, it is our own choices that set the stage for our growth.

Jaco B. ten Hove from Articulating Your Faith

1. Has the choosing aspect of our religion ever been difficult or problematic for you? What were the circumstances?

2. What are some of the responsibilities that go hand in hand with the freedom to choose?

3. Since our religious community consists of many people who make individual choices about their beliefs, what are some ways we can be in deep relationship with each other when our beliefs might not have anything in common? Is there some common ground across Unitarian Universalism that binds us together?

4. How do we build community when our religious tradition actively encourages us to build independent and individual beliefs?

We extinguish this flame but not the light of truth,

The warmth of community,

Or the fire of commitment.

These we carry in our hearts until we are together again.

Read "The Choosers are Chosen" handout

Write a brief belief statement describing what you believe to share with the group at the next session.