Be Spiritual

My guest for Episode 24 is Cynthia Schroer.

Cynthia’s spiritual journey started with Catholicism and has evolved to a complementary blend of Unitarian Universalism and Buddhism. Unitarian Universalism provides the space within which to sculpt her beliefs, Buddhist meditation a means for her to be spiritually active.

For show notes and all the Be Spiritual podcasts, visit www.bespiritual.info. We're also on Facebook; look for Be Spiritual.

My guest for Episode 22 is Laura, a relatively new UU whose spirituality is an amalgam of the stops along her religious journey. Raised Episcopalian, Laura has explored yoga, Native American spirituality, and the mysticism of Hinduism blended with Christianity. Laura finds taking the best from each religious tradition helps her to connect with the divine.

Perhaps ironic, her exploration occurs within a Unitarian Universalist community, where she finds acceptance and an encouragement to probe deeper. Read the show notes and access all the podcasts in the Be Spiritual series at www.bespiritual.info. You will also find us on Facebook; just search for Be Spiritual.

This episode I visit with my own minister, the Rev. Steve Edington, minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashua, New Hampshire.

Steve grew up in West Virginia and decided, as a youth, to become a minister just like the one at his Baptist church. That decision began a journey from conservative to liberal Christianity and then over to Unitarian Universalism.

We also talk UU theology -- oxymoron? -- and, arguably, the two most prominent UU theologians of the past 70 years: James Luther Adams and Forrest Church.

Read the show notes and access all the podcasts in the Be Spiritual series at the website: www.bespiritual.info. You will also find us on Facebook; just search for Be Spiritual.

It's a privilege to have the Rev. Dr. Marilyn Sewell as our guest on Episode 20.

For 17 years, Marilyn served as the Senior Minister of the First Unitarian Church of Portland, Oregon, before retiring and being named Minister Emerita.

Listen as Marilyn recounts her spiritual journey to Unitarian Universalism and the ministry. She also explains what it means to be a UU Christian and her spiritual discipline of meditation and prayer.

Read the show notes and access our other podcasts at the Be Spiritual web site. We also have a Be Spiritual Facebook page.

Kim Steele is my guest for Episode 19.

Kim grew up in the Catholic church, which she credits with promoting her sense of racial justice. However the church's restrictive position on women triggered her leaving, and she ended up Unitarian Universalist.

Kim's spiritual journey reflects several themes worth contemplating and incorporating into our own spiritual practices: welcoming the stranger; working for justice, equity, and compassion for those who are different than us -- whether by race, sexual orientation, ethnicity, ability, or ...; and identifying and rooting out our own prejudices, wherever they are smouldering.

Read the show notes and access our other podcasts at the Be Spiritual web site: www.bespiritual.info or visit the Be Spiritual Facebook page.

The Rev. Bruce Taylor is my guest for Episode 18. Bruce is a newly minted Unitarian Universalist minister, ordained last November (2009). Just a few weeks ago, he was called by the congregation of First Parish Church in Billerica, Massachusetts, to be their minister.

Bruce's journey is a story of personal transformation. The devastating death of his wife, from cancer, coupled with the loss of his job, turned life upside down. Juxtaposed with the loss and uncertainty, Bruce was buoyed by the outpouring of support from his church, which rallied around him. Fast forward to a Memorial Day weekend in Bar Harbor, Maine. Daydreaming over a beer, Bruce saw himself as a UU minister, in a position to nourish a community and pay back what he had received. Some five years after that Bar Harbor vision, Bruce was ordained.

My conversation with Bruce was recorded a month before he was called by the Billerica church, which is why you'll hear him refer to that as a possibility.

Read the show notes and access our other podcasts at the Be Spiritual web site or visit the Be Spiritual Facebook page.

Fred Shirley's spiritual journey is captivating. For a young man, Christianity provided much-needed answers following a very difficult childhood. His new-found faith led him to the Baptist and Congregational churches, where he and his wife raised their family. Discovering the UU church, Fred found the freedom to face and explore the religious questions that had appeared in the margins over the years.

When he joined the UU church, Fred retained his membership and participation in the Congregational church, which continues to nurture his Christian faith. Interestingly, it's the UU church that feeds his spirituality. As Fred explains, "I feel the Unitarian Universalist church has been more consistently spiritual than any other church I've ever been in."

Listen to Fred's remarkable and inspiring journey.

For more information, please visit the Be Spiritual website or the Be Spiritual page on Facebook.

Gail Donahue is our guest for Episode 16 of Be Spiritual. Gail was raised Irish Catholic, both religiously and culturally. Ironically, it was the Catholic church that pointed her to Unitarian Universalism. Today Gail considers herself a proud atheist with a church — not at all paradoxical for a UU.

This episode runs a bit over 36 minutes, in case you want to plan when to listen to Gail's and my conversation.

For more information, visit the Be Spiritual website at www.bespiritual.info or look for the Be Spiritual page on Facebook.

Episode 15 of the podcast features Bill Kennedy, a relatively new Unitarian Universalist.

Bill seems driven on his spiritual quest – although he’s not really comfortable using the term spiritual. Bill’s path has taken him from the Congregational and Methodist churches of his youth to Judaism and now Unitarian Universalism, where he identifies with Religious Humanism.

Becoming a UU, Bill has found a church that brings him calmness and peace, freedom to explore his many religious questions, and the inspiration to be "better than I am."

For more information, check out the Be Spiritual website or our Facebook page.

Episode 14 features Burns Fisher and his path from Congregationalist to atheist, Religious Humanist, and Unitarian Universalist.

Our conversation touches on a couple of interesting topics, worthy of further contemplation and discussion: religious faith compared with faith in science, and whether being liberal spiritually requires one to be liberal politically.

Listen and then share your thoughts on our website (www.bespiritual.info) or the Be Spiritual Facebook page.