February 2026 Monthly Service Offering

by Posted in Uncategorized
 
Planned Parenthood has been serving patients across Texas for over 90 years. In 2025 we expanded our service area to cover four health centers in Houston. Planned Parenthood provides quality, compassionate healthcare from expert clinicians, medically accurate, inclusive sex education from professional educators, and a fierce commitment to a world in which everyone can access quality healthcare and information to live their lives fully, without judgment. Planned Parenthood’s four Austin health centers offer annual exams, the full range of birth control methods (including IUDs and implants), testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections (STIs), screenings for breast and cervical cancer, HPV (human papillomavirus) and flu vaccines, PrEP and PEP HIV prevention medication, UTI and infection treatment, gender-affirming hormone therapy, and more.
 
Two-thirds of Planned Parenthood patients are underinsured or uninsured. For the 20% of Travis County residents ages 18-65 who do not have health insurance, PPGT is a vital sexual and reproductive health resource. Here in Austin, and across the country, lack of access to health insurance overwhelmingly affects our Black and Latine neighbors. Your generosity provides our patients with access to healthcare. In 2025, we served more than 14,000 patients in the Austin area. Despite operating in a hostile political environment and under an extreme abortion ban, our Austin health centers are delivering more care than ever because Texans are counting on us. 
 
To expand access to healthcare appointments for patients juggling work, school, and childcare, at least one of Planned Parenthood’s four Austin health centers feature at least one day a week with extended evening hours, plus virtual visits 7 days a week, and 24/7 asynchronous telemedicine for birth control and uncomplicated UTI needs. Planned Parenthood is a trusted resource for young people seeking health information. Our Teen Advocacy Board (TAB) empowers high school teens to be a knowledgeable resource for their peers about sexual health. TAB members bring essential information about contraception, STI prevention, healthy relationships, and more to their peers in Austin.

Guide to Meg’s Sermons

by Posted in Meg Barnhouse, Sermons, Uncategorized

 

Guide to Meg’s Sermons

2022 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
 Celebrating the Life of Meg Barnhouse  Rev Chris Jimmerson
 and many others
2-28-26
 You’re going to Pray for me?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-24-24
 Flower Ceremony and Farewell  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-29-22
 The Pumpkins Promise  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-22-22
 The fire of anger  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-08-22
 Curiosity and Respect  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-01-22
 Being Present with one another  Rev Meg Barnhouse
04-24-22
 Coming to life again  Rev Meg Barnhouse
04-17-22
 What is the Eighth Principle?  Rev Meg Barnhouse
04-03-22
 Grasshoppers in Indra’s Glittering Net  Rev Meg Barnhouse
03-27-22
 Water Ceremony 2022  Rev Meg Barnhouse
03-20-22
 How to eat a car  Rev Meg Barnhouse
03-06-22
 A Good Goodbye  Rev Meg Barnhouse
02-20-22
 What if you were really loved  Rev Meg Barnhouse
02-13-22
 Connected to All Creation  Rev Meg Barnhouse
02-06-22

2021 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
 2021 Christmas Eve Service  Rev Meg Barnhouse
12-24-21
 2021 Christmas Pageant  Rev Meg Barnhouse
12-19-21
 The Perils of Perfectionism  Rev Meg Barnhouse
12-12-21
 Dealing with difficult people (and trying  not to be one)  Rev Meg Barnhouse
12-05-21
 Right Concentration  Rev Meg Barnhouse
11-28-21
 Using Our Voices  Rev Meg Barnhouse
11-14-21
 Be Present in your Life  Rev Meg Barnhouse
11-07-21
 All Souls and All Saints  Rev Meg Barnhouse
10-31-21
 The Healing Power of Truth  Rev Meg Barnhouse
10-24-21
 Great Big Celebration Sunday  Rev Meg Barnhouse
10-10-21
 The Third Principle  Rev Meg Barnhouse
10-03-21
 So Much Wasted Effort  Rev Meg Barnhouse
09-26-21
 Resilience  Rev Meg Barnhouse & Rev Chris Jimmerson
09-19-21
 Down to the River to Pray  Rev Meg Barnhouse
09-12-21
 Right Livelihood  Rev Meg Barnhouse
09-05-21
 The Inherent Worth and Dignity of every Person  Rev Meg Barnhouse
08-29-21
 One coming out story  Rev Meg Barnhouse
08-15-21
 In the stream of your life  Rev Meg Barnhouse
06-27-21
 What did you just say?  Rev Meg Barnhouse
06-13-21
 Just a Reminder  Rev Meg Barnhouse
06-06-21
 Flower Communion 2021  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-30-21
 Why should I believe that?  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-23-21
 Abandon Hope and Fear  Rev Meg Barnhouse
05-09-21
 Blues Theology (Revisited)  Rev Meg Barnhouse
04-25-21
 History – It’s complicated  Rev Meg Barnhouse
04-11-21
 When Harold Hatcher gave up, He grew  Rev Meg Barnhouse
04-04-21
 Third Lap in a Four Lap Race  Rev Meg Barnhouse
03-14-21
 The Power of Our Words  Rev Meg Barnhouse
03-07-21
 Need a Little Mercy Now  Rev Meg Barnhouse
02-28-21
 To Corinth with Love  Rev Meg Barnhouse
02-14-21
 Blessing the Animals 2021  Rev Meg Barnhouse
02-07-21
 In praise of the dark  Rev Meg Barnhouse
01-24-21
 Wish you were here  Rev Meg Barnhouse
01-10-21
 2021 Burning Bowl  Rev Meg Barnhouse
01-03-21

 

2020 Sermons

 

 

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
 Guidance  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-27-20
 2020 Christmas Pageant  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-20-20
 What’s so Funny ’bout Peace, Love, and Understanding  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-06-20
 Poetry as Meditation  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-29-20
 Falling in love with what is  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-15-20
 Science, Imagination, and Magic  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-08-20
 All Souls  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-01-20
 American Civil Religion  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-25-20
 Lessons from the Garden  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-11-20
 Have smaller fights  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-04-20
 Forgiveness  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-27-20
 Celebration Sunday  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-20-20
 Be a stream and not a swamp  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-06-20
 Chalice Circles: Deepening Connection  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-23-20
 Radicals v Respectables  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-16-20
 Using your Anger, Holding on to your Hope  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-09-20
 Question Box Sermon  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-02-20
 The History of American Policing  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-14-20
 Useful Ignorance and Beginner’s Mind  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-07-20
 Flower Communion  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-31-20
 Living with Brain Trauma  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-17-20
 All will be well – Really?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-10-20
 Punk Theology  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-03-20
 A Trip to the Underworld  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-12-20
 Losing My Religion  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-05-20
 Social Distance, not Spiritual Distance  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-22-20
 Two Parables of the Beloved Community  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-01-20
 Sugar: What is enough?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-16-20
 Milk and Butter: Creativity within constraints  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-09-20
 How not to break a horse  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-02-20
 Salt  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-26-20
 Heat & Transformation  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-12-20
 The Burning Bowl  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-05-20

2019 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
When God was a baby  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-22-19
Perfect Miracles  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-15-19
What happens in families  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-24-19
How to comfort someone who is suffering  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-10-19
Jedidiah Morse and the Battle for Harvard  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-03-19
Room on the Broom  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-27-19
Protected on the Journey  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-13-19
The Concord Genius Cluster  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-06-19
This Apple  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-29-19
Celebration Sunday  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-22-19
How to Change Minds  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-08-19
Many Rivers to Cross  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-01-19
What does that pin on your backpack mean?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-18-19
Walking Toward the Deep End  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-11-19
In My Life  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-04-19
Out from Silence: Writing your Life  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-30-19
Being a blessing to the children  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-16-19
Beautiful ‘Flower Girls’  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-26-19
Playing ball on running water  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-19-19
Fiery and Fearless  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-12-19
How to grow a seed  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-21-19
The power of story  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-14-19
If I needed you  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-07-19
The Kindness Connection  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-24-19
Celtic Christianity  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-17-19
The Promise and the Practice  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-03-19
The Magic of Music  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-17-19
Blues Theology  Rev. Meg Barhouse
02-10-19
Animal Blessing  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-03-19

2018 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
Lessons and Carols Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-24-18
Spray it Gold and post it on Instagram Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-16-18
Live from Pflugerville Rev Meg Barnhouse
12-02-18
Come, ye thankful people, come Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-18-18
Fall down7, Get up 8 Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-11-18
A Little Mercy Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-04-18
Those who have gone before us Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-28-18
Safe Space/Brave Space Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-21-18
Love is the Spirit of this church, and Service is its law Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-07-18
What I Learned from Being a Writer Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-30-18
UU101, UU201, UU301 Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-23-18
Faith Out Loud Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-16-18
Wade in the Water Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-09-18
You are magic Rev. Meg Barnhouse
07-29-18
Let’s talk about depression Rev. Meg Barnhouse
07-22-18
The Genderbread Person Rev. Meg Barnhouse
07-08-18
A feeling for the holy Rev. Meg Barnhouse
07-01-18
ÊUnitarians and Abolition  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-17-18
Question Box Sermon  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-10-18
Does it hurt to Bloom?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-03-18
Things I Learned From My Mother  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-13-18
Seeds  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-22-18
Broken Things  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-08-18
A “Foolish” Easter  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-01-18
Finding our balance  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-25-18
Faith for UUs  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-04-18
Be the Spark  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-25-18
Why do bad things happen?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-11-18
Love, like a carefully loaded ship…  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-04-18
Animal Blessing Service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-28-18
The Power in the #MeToo Movement  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-21-18
How to invite changes in your life  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-07-18

2017 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
Christmas Pageant  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-24-17
Jesus’ Grandmothers Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-17-17
Grace  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-10-17
My Actions are My Only True Belongings  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-03-17
Elijah  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-19-17
Checking out, Falling back, Overwhelmed  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-12-17
Those who have gone before  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-29-17
Doing Justice  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-22-17
Groundbreaking  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-15-17
Transformation through service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-08-17
The Birthday of the World  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-24-17
Gathering in Community  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-17-17
Truth, Crushed to Earth, Shall Rise Again  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-16-17
You have to be carefully taught  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-02-17
Adventures in Hymnody  Kiya Heartwood
03-26-17
Get it to the size of an Oreo  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-05-17
Dealing with difficult people  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-26-17
Right Effort  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-12-17
Animal Blessing Service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-29-17
Trust, The Decor Committee & Citizens United  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-15-17
Right Livelihood  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-08-17

2016 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
Christmas Day Service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-25-16
Christmas Pageant  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-18-16
Star of Truth  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-11-16
A clear mind and an open heart  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-04-16
Acceptance and encouragement  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-13-16
Right speech  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-06-16
Honoring the ancestors  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-30-16
Right intention and the 10-10-10 rule  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-23-16
The final form of love, which is forgiveness  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-09-16
Mom, He started it  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-25-16
Abandon Hope and Fear  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-18-16
Water communion service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-04-16
The deep end of the heart  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-28-16
What holds us together?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-14-16
What I learned on my summer vacation  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-07-16
Talking to the trees  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-05-16
What’s the difference: Venting vs Lamentation  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-22-16
Make New Mistakes  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-08-16
Prayer beads for UUs  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-01-16
What’s the difference: Trinitarian and Unitarian?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-17-16
Punk Theology  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-03-16
Pretty Yellow Flower Day  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-27-16
The man comes around  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-20-16
Bee Yard Etiquette  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-06-16
What’s the difference: Protestants and Catholics?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-21-16
So many songs about love  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-14-16
Respecting the Fire  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-07-16
Forgiveness  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-24-16
What the difference between Sunni & Shiite Islam?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-10-16
Burning Bowl  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-03-16

2015 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
The Christians and the Pagans  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-20-15
Christmas Pageant  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-13-15
An upside-down world: A Hymn of reversal  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-06-15
Family Life as a Spiritual Path  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-22-15
The ugly duckling  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-08-15
At the threshold  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-01-15
Dialogue with Conservatives  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-18-15
Listening to Drag  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-11-15
Oh, Delilah  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-04-15
Good Grief  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-27-15
All beginnings are difficult  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-13-15
Choose to enjoy your life  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-30-15
The first one to try  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-23-15
Which God don’t you believe in?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-16-15
Father Earth, Mother Sky  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-21-15
Juneteenth  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-14-15
The boy who drew cats  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-07-15
Goldilocks and Elijah  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-24-15
Choosing to Bless the World  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-03-15
The Impossible Task  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-26-15
How many plagues will it take?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-12-15
The Cellist of Sarajevo  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-05-15
Palm Sunday  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-29-15
Question Box Sermon  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-08-15
The Red Shoes Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-01-15
The Book of Love Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-15-15
Want what you have Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-08-15
Blessing and being blessed: Animal Blessing Service Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-01-15

 

2014 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
Christmas History  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-21-14
Dirty Water  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
12-07-14
Gratitude  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-23-14
The Problem of Evil  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-16-14
Keep the home fires burning  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-09-14
The Ancestors’ Ways  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
11-02-14
Circle Round – Women’s Spirituality Tradition  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-26-14
Trust and Welcome  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-19-14
Now THIS is church  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-12-14
Forgiveness and Repentance  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
10-05-14
Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-28-14
Give them Hope, not Hell  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-21-14
Water Communion Service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
09-07-14
Playing ball on running water  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-31-14
Sacred Spaces  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
08-24-14
My faith is in science, but I try to keep an open mind  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
07-20-14
The death penalty, reluctant soldiers & Edward O. Wilson  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
07-13-14
Spiritual Growth  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-29-14
Honor Your Father  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-15-14
The Cherokee Removal  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-08-14
Rilke’s Swan  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
06-01-14
A Juicy slice of UU history – Michael Servetus  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-11-14
May the force be with you  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-04-14
Jesus’ Grandmothers  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-20-14
Depression  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-13-14
God wants you to be rich!  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
04-06-14
Balance/Equinox  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-23-14
Celtic Christianity/Redemption  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-16-14
The Second Commandment  Rev. Meg Barhnouse
03-09-14
Heard it through the grapevine  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
03-02-14
Failure is impossible  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-16-14
What we are worshiping, we are becoming  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-09-14
Animal Blessing Service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
02-02-14
The Magic of Music  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-19-14
Architecture and spirit  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-12-14
Burning Bowl  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
01-05-14

2013 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
A Sudden Flame, an Extraordinary Journey  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-22-13
Christmas Pageant  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-15-13
A UU Faith Story: John Murray  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-08-13
How did we get the bible?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-01-13
A Juicy Slice of UU History: The Iowa Sisterhood  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-17-13
Dismantling Racism  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-10-13
Creating Community  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-03-13
Mystery, Spookiness, Magic and Wonder  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-27-13
Walking between the raindrops Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-20-13
I’m a believer  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-13-13
Bedrock Values at the heart of humanism  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-29-13
Not so good at mindfullness  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-22-13
What if you can’t keep your promise  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-15-13
Water Communion  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-08-13
Margaret Sanger  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 08-25-13
Life of Pi  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 08-18-13
The Oversoul  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 08-11-13
Defense against the dark arts  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 08-04-13
Like Slow-Growing Trees in a Ruined Place  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-30-13
Amazing Grace  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-16-13
The Rose  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-09-13
Tales of the tribe  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-02-13
The right thing to do  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 05-05-13
Fiery and Fearless: Olympia Brown  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-28-13
The Gaia Psalms  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-21-13
Lies, gossip and fighting words  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-14-13
Will you harbor me?  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-07-13
Only life and death  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 03-31-13
Afri-kin  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 03-24-13
Good question  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 03-17-13
As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 03-03-13
Recovery from Fundamentalism Rev. Meg Barnhouse 02-17-13
A Juicy Slice of UU History: Theodore Parker Rev. Meg Barnhouse 02-10-13
God the huntress Rev. Meg Barnhouse 02-03-13
Abandon Hope and Fear Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-27-13
The delicate art of forgiveness Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-13-13
Burning Bowl Service  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-06-13

2012 Sermons

Sermon Topic
Author
Date
Blue Christmas Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-23-12
Christmas Pageant Rev. Meg Barnhouse and Marisol Caballero 12-16-12
Rekindled Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-09-12
Sweet Honey from old failures Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-02-12
Thank you, I’m going downhill Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-18-12
Equilibrium with Elegance: Jazz and UU Theology  Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-11-12
Kicking the Statue of Shiva Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-21-12
A Safe Place Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-14-12
Land of Hope and Dreams Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-07-12
American Civil Religion Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-23-12
A Relationship of Promises Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-16-12
ÊSetting Sail Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-09-12
Water Ceremony and Ingathering Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-02-12
Bee Yard Etiquette Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-17-12
The Real Ten Commandments Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-10-12
Gold in the Shadow Rev. Meg Barnhouse 06-03-12
ÊWhat I learned from my mother Rev. Meg Barnhouse 05-13-12
Gaia Psalms Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-22-12
Grasshoppers in the Glittering Net Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-15-12
Quartet for the end of time Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-08-12
How many UUs does it take to change a lightbulb? Rev. Meg Barnhouse 04-01-12
What is enough? Rev. Meg Barnhouse 03-18-12
When to take the leap Rev. Meg Barnhouse 03-04-12
She stirs up the world Rev. Meg Barnhouse 02-19-12
The man who ate a car Rev. Meg Barnhouse 02-12-12
Everybody’s got a Hungry Heart Rev. Meg Barnhouse 02-05-12
Afri-Kin Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-29-12
Installation Service of Rev. Meg Barnhouse Rev. Peter Morales 01-15-12
A Stone of Hope Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-15-12
The Democratic Process Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-08-12
Burning Bowl Rev. Meg Barnhouse 01-01-12

 

2011 Sermons

 

Sermon Topic Author Date
Christmas Eve Lessons and Carols Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-24-11
How to disagree passionately and peacefully Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-18-11
Wisdom Tree Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-11-11
A Juicy Slice of Unitarian History Rev. Meg Barnhouse 12-04-11
The devil and Martha Stewart Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-20-11
Digging a good, deep well Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-13-11
There’s a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in. Rev. Meg Barnhouse 11-06-11
Honoring the Ancestors Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-30-11
Be a stream, not a swamp Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-16-11
We are gay and straight together Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-09-11
Repentance, Forgiveness, Reconciliation Rev. Meg Barnhouse 10-02-11
All the gossip from Concord Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-18-11
Where are the strong? Who are the trusted? Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-11-11
Water Communion Rev. Meg Barnhouse 09-04-11
A Spiritual Stretch Rev. Meg Barnhouse 08-28-11
Keeping an Eye on the Demolition Twins Rev. Meg Barnhouse 08-21-11
Liberty, Healing, Good News Rev. Meg Barnhouse 05-22-11
Where I come from is like this Rev. Meg Barnhouse 05-15-11
 Rapture in America  Rev. Meg Barnhouse
05-04-08

January Senior Lunch

by Posted in Uncategorized

Gigs Hodges has spent two regular and six special sessions working as a legislative staffer for Representatives Plesa and Davis. During the 89th Legislative Session, she helped get 11 bills signed into law, the third most of any Democrat, and played a meaningful role in the 2025 quorum break to defend democracy. Gigs believes the government should guarantee the basics people need to survive, and she is determined to change how Democrats use their power in the Texas House to deliver for Texans. After too many sleepless nights wishing she could do more, Gigs is now running to represent HD 49 in Austin, encouraged by Representative Davis and equipped with a clear plan and a deep sense of purpose. As she says, Texans deserve more than crumbs. We deserve the whole pie.

The Speaker’s Race: How Democrats Gave Away Their Power on Day One

On the first day of the 89th Legislative Session, Democrats elected a notoriously bad MAGA Republican as Speaker of the House, with little to show for it. This discussion will cover what happened behind the scenes leading up to the race, how the vote played out on the House floor, what Democrats gained, and whether it was worth it, and the lessons learned for how Democrats can better deliver for Texans.

2026 Burning Bowl

by Posted in Audio available, Carrie Holley-Hurt, Sermons, Uncategorized

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Listen to the sermon by clicking the play button above.

Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt
January 4, 2026
First UU Church of Austin
4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756
www.austinuu.org

Annual Burning Bowl Service – As we enter a new year, we enter a liminal space. A time in which we are between the known and the unknown. All the joys and sorrows that we faced in 2025 have changed us. Sometimes those changes have been good or enriching, and sometimes they have not. During our burning bowl service, we contemplate what we would like to let go of so that we may more easily find our center as we move into the new year.

Chalice Lighting

This is the flame we hold in our hearts as we strive for justice for everyone. This is the light we shine upon systems of oppression until they are no more. This is the warmth that we share with one another as our struggle becomes our salvation.

Call to Worship

My friend talked to me today about liminal spaces. She told me they are the in-between stages, when one era of your life is over, but the next hasn’t yet begun.

It’s a place of change, of uncertainty, of questions, of waiting. I thought of God for some reason. Maybe the absence of God is actually the presence of them.

Maybe it’s the spaces between words that matter the most. Maybe it’s the way the piano sounds when it’s not being played. Maybe truth only makes itself known in the absence of answers.

After all, plants do grow in sidewalk cracks.

– from a poet that goes by NB.

Affirming Our Mission

Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community.

Reading

NEW YEAR’S DAY
by Kathleen McTigue

The first of January is another day dawning, the sun rising as the sun always rises, the earth moving in its rhythms. With or without our calendars, to name a certain day as the day of new beginning, separating the old from the new.

So, it is, everything is the same, bound into its history as we ourselves are bound. Yet also, we stand at a threshold. The new year is something truly new, still unformed, leaving a stunning power in our hands.

What shall we do with this great gift of time this year? Let us begin by remembering that whatever justice, whatever peace and wholeness might bloom in our world this year, we are the hearts and minds, the hands and feet, the embodiment of all the best visions of our people. The new year can be new ground for the seeds of our dreams.

Let us take the step forward together onto new ground, planting our dreams well, faithfully, and in joy.

Sermon

NOTE: This is an edited ai generated transcript.
Please forgive any omissions or errors.

Today is our annual Burning Bull service. It’s a ritual of contemplation, of intention, of release. And if you are doing this from home with your piece of paper, you can use fire. If you’d like to, I’d like to encourage you to do that with safety. You can also dissolve your water in water or you can bury it. The point is to let the elements take from us what no longer serves us.

This ritual feels particularly important this year, because 2025, what a year. Am I right? Started out pretty awful.

And then, but like any old year, there were probably a mix of joys, personal joys too. It might have even been a pretty good year for you personally. That’s how I experienced it. I had some amazing experiences.

I get to be y’all’s minister. That was an amazing experience.

And I had challenging experiences. I had to learn how to live with long COVID. And I bet just like you, it came in the good and the bad.

But whatever we were experiencing it, our personal life could not be divorced from what we were experiencing out there in the world. We were doing all of that with the backdrop of some of the most awful atrocities. It’s been a lot.

I saw a bumper sticker the other day and it captured exactly how I was feeling. It says, “It is what it is. And it ain’t great.”

It ain’t great. It wasn’t great. I feel like I slid into 2026 all bruised up with a real raw heart.

And now we’re entering another year. And one that’s already started out pretty bumpy. If you’re feeling hesitation, if you are feeling trepidation, me too.

We are in a liminal space. We are right in the doorway of what was and what we do not know yet – and what we cannot predict. Liminal spaces are uncomfortable for that very reason.

We don’t know what will happen. Sometimes it’s easier to just start predicting what might happen, to project into the future by dragging along the past. But the truth is that not a word of the future has been written.

We write it. All of us, billions and billions of all of us on this planet, for better or worse, we’re co-creating the future. And that co-creation can be beautiful and it can be powerful.

I’ve seen that here. I’ve seen beautiful, powerful co-creation here in this community, especially with the last legislative session. But the thing about co-creation is that it reminds us that we actually don’t have that much control.

In fact, the control we have is pretty minuscule in the big scheme of things.

And so here we are, in a new unwritten chapter, stuck in what might feel like a lifetime group project. And who likes group projects? But here we are.

It is what it is. And our control is limited. But it’s not nothing.

We are limited to the actions we take, to how we spend our energy, to where we put our focus. It’s limited to how we want to show up in the world, in spite of the chaos and the storms around us. We get to choose how we will show up.

And we can choose to show up grounded. We can choose to slow down to the speed of our wisdom. That’s the control we have.

And so many things can get in the way and make us feel like we don’t have control to even do that. Making it so that instead of coming from a centered place, we move at the pace of our stress and our fear. Feeling pulled around from stressful situation to stressful situation, or from one awful headline to the next.

So as we enter this Burning Bowl Ritual, I want to take some time to think about what gets in our way. What makes it hard for you to choose to move through the world the way you like” What are those things that you have control over?

The habits or the thoughts that prevent you from showing up as you want to show up? What do you want to make a break from?What no longer serves you? What would be good to ritually release?

Maybe it’s old resentments or old hurts. Maybe it’s a pattern of self-sabotage, old stories that get in our way. Maybe it’s people who have hurt us over and over again without any hope of forgiveness or accountability.

Maybe it’s chronic and constant worry, outdated beliefs, lack of self-care. Maybe it’s something else entirely. Whatever it is, let’s take some deep breaths together and contemplate that.

You may wish to hold your flash paper to your heart, or you may whisper into it if you feel comfortable doing so.

In a moment, I will light the burning bowl, and I’ll invite you to please come down one line. This is my first year in Parish ministry, please don’t make me have a memorable burning bowl. And then if you will, please exit to your left.

And now, with deep breaths, with the ground underneath us, with the air above us. Let’s move with intention, as we whisper with what we no longer want into our paper, so that we can release it to the fire.

That was so beautiful. So liminal space. The time between what was and what we don’t know yet.

It’s uncomfortable. It’s uncomfortable because we don’t know what we’re headed for. But that’s every day, not just when the calendar tells us that 365 days have gone by.

Every day we face the unknown.

The only thing that we have is how we show up. I hope that what you released has made you feel lighter. I hope that it’s made you feel more grounded and more prepared for whatever it is that will come.

As we wind down our service today, I want us to pull to our mind that image or word or memory from our time in meditation, the one that made us feel strong or connected or grounded. Let’s take just two deep breaths together to fix that in our mind.

But what strengthens you may light a flame in the center of you, a flame to hold you, a flame to motivate you, and a flame to bring you to your deeper and higher self, even in the storm.

Extinguishing the Chalice

We extinguish this flame, but not the light of truth, the warmth of community, or the fire of commitment. These we hold in our hearts until we are together again.

Benediction

As we leave this sacred time, as what is no longer yours has been transformed by the fire, as what strength in you is held in your heart, may you feel lighter and more grounded, and most importantly, may you feel held by this community and by love.

Go in peace.

SERMON INDEX

Most sermons during the past 26 years are available online through this website. Click on the index link above to find tables of all sermons for each year listed by date (newest to oldest) with topic and speaker. Click on a topic to go to that sermon.

PODCASTS

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them by clicking on the podcast link above or copying and pasting this link. https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

Congregational Meeting

by Posted in Uncategorized

This is your Official Notice for our December Congregational Meeting on Sunday, December 21st  at 1:00  p.m., to be held in the Sanctuary and on Zoom (Passcode 512452). Click on the link below for materials for the meeting.

Congregational Meeting Materials

The church bylaws specify the following regarding voting eligibility: “Individuals who have been members of the church for 30 days or more and who have (as an individual or part of a family unit) made a recorded financial contribution during the last 12 months and at least 30 days prior to the meeting, have the right to vote at all official church meetings.”

The list of eligible voters may be found by clicking here

Any questions about voter eligibility, including if you feel that you were mistakenly not listed on the list of eligible voters, please contact Shannon Posern, info@austinuu.org.

We look forward to seeing you at the meeting!

Congregational Meeting Packet.

Women & Fair Trade Festival

by Posted in Uncategorized Tagged

 

Shop Annual Women and Fair Trade Festival 

Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 22-23, from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.

We’re thrilled to invite you to the Women and Fair Trade Festival hosted by Austin Tan Cerca de la Frontera, where you may shop with conscience at First UU, Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 22-23, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. The Therapy Sisters will start the music on Saturday at 10 a.m. 

For over two decades, ATCF’s Fair Trade Festival has brought together women’s cooperatives from around the world to Austin, creating a marketplace rooted in economic justice, cultural exchange, and community gathering, hosting women-led artisan cooperatives from Mexico, Palestine, Guatemala, Ecuador, India, and the U.S., including Jolom Mayaetik, Palestine Online Store, Fuerza Unida, Colores del Pueblo, Marigold Gateway to India, UPAVIM, Warmipa Huasy, and Las Racheritas/Rug Hook Project.

For more info, visit atcf.org.

Conversation on Mutual with Dean Spade

by Posted in Uncategorized Tagged , , ,

Please join us this Sunday afternoon to learn about mutual aid and do asset mapping. Child care will be available. 

Dean Spade writes that “mutual aid is the radical act of caring for each other while working to change the world,” and that is exactly what this presentation and the work we will do together are about.

We’ll learn about what mutual aid can do, what it looks like, and how we can use our creativity to participate in it. We’ll also learn about what values can ground us spiritually in this kind of community-based work. Then we will work together to identify the assets we have as a community so we can take an inventory. This will allow us, as a community, to respond quickly to the needs of our members and the community.


When: November 23rd at 2 pm

Where: First UU Church of Austin’s Sanctuary

Itinerary:

  • 1:45 pm – Begin gathering in the Sanctuary
  • 2:00 pm –  Watch Dean Spade’s presentation together
  • 3:00 pm – Short break
  • 3:15 pm – Presentation by Sasha Rose of Austin Mutual Aid
  • 3:30 pm – Asset Mapping
  • 4:15 pm – Closing

Owning Your Religious Past

by Posted in Uncategorized

Many of us carry wounds from the religion we were raised in or just growing up in a Christocentric society. Owning Your Religious Past is a series of five classes designed to help us heal from our religious wounds and grow in our Unitarian Universalist faith. 

From the authors of the program, “We can be most fully and completely present in our religious identity when we see our path as a continuum rather than a series of unrelated episodes. People who feel whole in this identity are more likely to make solid, healthy commitments to religious communities. Because we are usually more certain of what we left in another religion than what we bring forward from it, some tools are needed by which people may establish connections, bridges, and resonances between past and present.” 

Please join Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt and Rev. Dr. Leona Stucky-Abbott for this five-week series of learning, healing, and growth starting on Sunday, January 18th. Maximum participation is 15 people, so Make Sure to Sign Up! 

Nominations for 2026 Monthly Special Offering

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Nominations for 2026 Monthly Special Offering

Due by Thursday, December 4th

One important way First UU lives its mission to do justice is through our Monthly Special Offerings.  These offerings are collected during service(s) on the second Sunday of the month. Each member of First UU may nominate one nonprofit social justice organization that promotes our UU values in the larger community. 

To nominate an organization, please complete the 2026 Monthly Service Offering Nominations form.

The congregation will be asked to rank their top 10 recipients on Sunday, December 21, 2025, after the worship service and at the congregational meeting that afternoon. Two additional special offerings are reserved for  Spring into Action (First UU’s church-wide social justice outreach project) and the Texas UU Justice Ministry.

After the vote, the Social Action Chairs and Co-Ministers will determine the schedule of selected recipients. All money collected will be held until the end of the year and distributed equally among the 12 recipients in January 2027. For 2024, the amount donated to each recipient was $1,662.09.

Please fill out the Nomination form here. 


If you need further information, please contact David Overton at info@austinuu.org.

You’re Invited!  HB 7 House Party

by Posted in Uncategorized
Please join us for a HB7 Educational House Party at First UU, hosted by the Reproductive Justice Team on Sunday, November 9th from 9:30 – 10:45 a.m. in Room 15.
 
Information Included: 
What IS a medical abortion? How safe is it? How do women+ seeking reproductive care protect themselves in an age of digital surveillance? Learn your rights under HB7, and understand strategies of harm reduction.
 
 
*Note: Please RSVP via the Church Center link, to help us plan for room setup for your comfort. Also, if you are planning to bring a trusted friend with you, it’s ok to just register for yourself in Church Center-as there is no way to officially add those not already in Church Center. 

Living Love

by Posted in Uncategorized

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Listen to the sermon by clicking the play button above.

Rev. Chris Jimmerson
September 21, 2025
First UU Church of Austin
4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756
www.austinuu.org

Unitarian Universalism has centered our faith in love. In this church, we often speak of an ocean of love that flows through our universe. Our stewardship campaign’s theme this year is “Living Love”. What might these beautiful abstractions look like in the concrete world of our daily lives? What if love is not just a feeling but is also something we do? How might we make love a verb?

Chalice Lighting

This is the flame we hold in our hearts as we strive for justice for everyone. This is the light we shine upon systems of oppression until they are no more. This is the warmth that we share with one another as our struggle becomes our salvation.

Call to Worship

from THE FIRE NEXT TIME
by James Baldwin

Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word love here, not merely in the personal sense, but as a state of being or a state of grace, not in the infantile American sense of being made happy, but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring growth.

Affirming Our Mission

Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community.

Reading

Adapted from the “LOVE AS A BUSINESS IMPERATIVE”
episode of the Coach’s Rising Podcast
featuring Amy Elizabeth Fox and Jennifer Garvey Burger

I love “love” as a verb because it implies a state of rigor. That love is not a Hallmark sentimentality. It’s really well I stand in the trenches with you when things get hard. It’s also a practice, right?

It is like other verbs. Love is a developmental practice. It’s a practice of actually reaching outside of ourselves, opening ourselves up enough to let in another person.

I believe that pretty much everybody who walks on the planet is worthy of love if you can let them in. And they have something in them that if you were to see it would change you in some way.

Well, that’s a practice and it’s not always a fun practice and it’s not always a practice that works, right? Sometimes it’s hard and sometimes it’s grunting and sometimes we fail, but it is a thing we could be trying to do every day.

Sermon

NOTE: This is an edited ai generated transcript.
Please forgive any omissions or errors.

A little over a year ago, Unitarian Universalists adopted a set of religious values that centered our faith in love.

Now, well before our denominations centered our religion in love, First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin, so often at the forefront of things, had begun weaving love into the fabric of the shared, though multifaceted and pluralistic theological tapestry of this religious community.

Back in those “Before Times”, before a global pandemic altered our lives in ways we’re still struggling to understand, before the coming of ever escalating fascism to America, our lead prophet for those before times, then Senior Minister Reverend Meg Barnhouse, began speaking with us about a religious perspective rooted in this vision of a divine river of love that flows through our universe and beckons us to become its channels and tributaries, making that love manifest in our world while also adding to it. We added building the beloved community to our mission.

And after Meg retired, we continued swimming in those divine waters until at some point I began to feel that a river was not really enough to adequately contain the sheer magnitude of that divine love. And so we began speaking of an ocean of love that flows through our universe, or maybe I am just more melodramatic than Meg.

And then, even that began to seem inadequate to capture the true power of that love. This was not just any kind of love, after all. This was no nambi pambi syrupy sentimental Hallmark greeting card sort of love, no.

And so, borrowing from the work of others, especially BIPOC women such as Reverend Dr. Jackie Lewis and activist Valerie Kaur, we began embracing a fierce love, a revolutionary love, a love ferocious enough to bring about beneficial change and demand justice in our world. A love that does not just provide comfort to us but also demands something of us in our relationships with one another and our world.

And this year I was so delighted when our terrific stewardship team continued that spiritual progression and chose “Living Love” as the theme for our pledge campaign this time because, because all of that language is so very beautiful and it all provides such a wonderful and inspirational aspirational centering for this religious community and it is all such magnificent theological and spiritual abstraction and how the heck do we go about living all of that beautiful inspirational aspirational abstraction in our daily lives?

What are we actually called to do in our personal lives, in our religious lives, in our communities, in our world. As we heard in our reading, how do we make love a verb, a practice? That’s why I was so glad that they chose Living Love as our theme, because that implies there are things we must do to make the beautiful theology a reality.

Now, given the fact that they are the stewardship team and it is the theme for the pledge campaign, I suspect you can imagine what they’re thinking we might do. And given that Mary here is our stewardship chair, I might get in trouble if I fail to mention pledging as a way of living love for your religious community. Beyond that, let’s explore for a few minutes how we might go about making fierce love a verb in our everyday lives.

Well I think one of the ways we do that is to make our commitment to that love and the ways we will go about living it explicit with one another. In this church we do that through a covenant of healthy relations. A covenant is a set of promises we make to one another about how we will dwell together in the ways of love. We’ve provided copies out in the foyer and have a link to it online in the comments, much of it is pretty straightforward, stuff like, “If I am upset with you, I will discuss it directly with you and not with 27 of our closest dearest friends first.” Things like disagreeing from a place of curiosity and respect, practicing forgiveness, these are just examples. And, What if we were to bring this idea of covenant into our relationships with our spouses, partners, family members, friends, and other loved ones?

How often do we express our love explicitly in both word and deed? How often do we simply tell our loved ones how much we love them? How often do we check in with how they are doing and how we are doing with them? Have we picked up their favorite ice cream on the way home lately? Or planned a fun family outing just to show them how deeply we love them. Some of you have already heard me talk about how me and my fiance Woodrow text each other goof morning every day and night night each evening. Well now we’ve gotten to the point where even if we’re actually together one of us will still text good morning or good night from right there in the same room. I know that’s a little silly and kooky and yet when we do even these small things to explicitly express our love the doing causes me to feel that love deep inside even more deeply. That’s the lovely paradox about love. The doing and the feeling both enhance one another and require one another.

Another way we make love a verb is by allowing ourselves to be vulnerable. We let other folks in. We reach out to them for support when we can’t go it alone or when we would just be better off if we didn’t.

And my beloveds, remember to experience and cherish the love even in the seemingly mundane. This widower so often misses the spouse he lost not so much on the big anniversary dates and the like. But just when I’m doing yard work and remember when we used to do that together and see a tree in the yard that he planted. Last week I finally managed to load up all of his old photography equipment and take it to this wonderful non-profit that will help make sure it goes to people who really will appreciate it, it filled up my entire pickup truck.

Afterwards I was just running some errands and suddenly this thought jumped into my head. I just gave all that stuff he loved away. And all of a sudden I felt the biggest wave of grief, I felt in quite a while over these relatively mundane things that I would never use anyway. I realized I’m never going to stop grieving.

The thing is, though, grieving is also part of how we live love. It keeps the love alive in us. Grieving makes love almost infinite, and we need it to be able to continue loving even more fiercely. I am so lucky to have fallen in love again with someone who intrinsically understands this.

Well, so much of what I’ve been talking about with our closest loved ones in our lives is also very similar to how we live love out in our communities, in our church, even in the workplace.

What if we made a covenant with ourselves about how we want to be in the world. About how we will treat our co-workers, the strangers we encounter, the checkout clerk, the waiter at the restaurant with that same presence, compassion, and kindness. What if we were to check in with them about how they’re doing, remembering that we can never know what is going on in someone elses life. I want to show you a video that was a powerful reminder of this for me.

Video

“Look at everything they have.”

“Look at him. They’re so young.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Excuse us.”

“Oh, let’s get you a treat.”

“Throw a tantrum and why not offer him a treat? That’s the trouble with kids today. Parents don’t parent anymore.”

“You’ll be his third foster family. So we’ll give him some time to feel safe with you. He’s been through a lot of abuse. Gosh, but if you have any questions, please let me know.”

“Thank you.”

Hey, buddy Do you want to go get something to eat? Do you want to go see your new home and we can eat there or we can go eat at a restaurant? You pick.”

“That’s a nice car.”

“Yeah, it is.”

“You take food stamps, right?”

“Unbelievable. Lunching off the government at your driver’s sports car. Nice.”

“Thank you so much for letting me borrow your car again and watching him.”

“No problem. You’ve been through a lot and I’m so happy to help, anything to help while you’re trying to get back on your feet.”

“Thank you, I appreciate it.”

“Bye! Bye!”

Video ends

Well this brings me to the question of how do we live love in the current social and political environment in which we find ourselves? Certainly it involves doing what so many of you already have, showing up, joining the marches, the protests, the vigils, making the phone calls, writing the letters and email messages, doing the visits with government officials.

Now though, now I think making love a verb involves even more. It means offering shelter and support to those who have less privilege and are under assault by our own government. It means doing so, even knowing it could place ourselves and our own privilege at great risk. It means continuing to speak out, even knowing that we may be attacked and harmed for doing so as we’ve witnessed in the aftermath of the appalling murder of Charlie Kirk.

I have been horrified by the efforts of so many to deified this man who I consider my oppressor. He has said such cruel things about gay people and so many others. He advocated policies that would cause us great harm. I have been horrified by the attacks on people who have simply labeled his words and actions for what they were even while condemning his murder. And the whole thing has brought up this question for me.

Does fierce love require me to love even my oppressors despite the outrage I feel at the same time?

I returned recently to a video from activist Valerie Kaur. In the aftermath of the terrorist attack of 9 /11, her friend and Sikh spiritual mentor, Bobir Singh Sodhi, had been killed during a series of hate crimes. His killer must took him for a Muslim because of the headdress that he wore. Here is how Kaur describes returning to the site of his murder accompanied by his brother Rana and how they discovered that finding a way to love even our enemies is rooted in loving ourselves first.

Video

So, I returned to the gas station where Balbir Singh Sodhi was killed, 15 years to the day. I sat down a candle in the spot where he bled to death. His brother Rana turned to me and said, “Nothing has changed.”

And I asked, “Who have we not yet tried to love?”

We decided to call the murderer in prison. The phone rings. My heart is beating in my ears. I hear the voice of Frank Roke, a man who once said, “I’m going to go out and shoot some towel heads. We should kill their children too.”

And every emotional impulse in me says I can’t. It becomes an act of will to wonder why. I ask, “Why did you agree to speak with us?”

Frank says, “I’m sorry for what happened, but I’m also sorry for all the people killed on 9/11.”

He fails to take responsibility. I become angry to protect Rana.

But Rana is still wondering about Frank, Listening, responds, “Frank, this is the first time I’m hearing you say that you feel sorry.”

And Frank, Frank says, “Yes, I am sorry for what I did to your brother. One day, when I go to heaven to be judged by God, I will ask to see your brother, and I will hug him, and I will ask him for forgiveness.”

And Rana says, “We already forgave you.”

Video ends

I don’t know if I could do that. I don’t know if I’m strong enough yet. Maybe though, maybe I can turn it over to that fierce love that flows through our universe and through me. Maybe I can know that Charlie Kirk was loved, and maybe I can forgive even my oppressors because I do that for myself, and to be a channel and a tributary for that greater ocean of love.

Perhaps Living Love, when it comes to those with whom I disagree, even those who would be my oppressors simply means making myself recognize their humanity even when they are refusing to recognize mine.

Perhaps love and outrage are not mutually exclusive. And as womanist theologians such as Reverend Dr. Jackie Lewis remind us, it starts by truly embracing our own humanity, loving ourselves ferociously. As she writes, “Loving yourself unconditionally is a tall order, but as a daily practice, it’s essential.”

And so I actually returned to our stewardship campaign and its theme this year. My beloveds, we don’t support this church with our time, treasure, and talent to build a social club. We don’t even do it entirely because it feels good and gives us a sense of belonging though community is a part of it. We commit ourselves because this is where we come to learn and practice how to live love fiercely, ferociously, fearlessly in our lives, in our world, in our very souls. Because it starts with love for ourselves. It starts with us.

Amen.

Extinguishing the Chalice

We extinguish this flame, but not the light of truth, the warmth of community, or the fire of commitment. These we hold in our hearts until we are together again.

Benediction

For our benediction today I offer you the words from Muslim scholar and spiritual teacher Omid Safi

Go be your best self,
be your most beautiful self,
be your luminous self,
be your most generous self,
be your most radically loving self.
And when you fall short of that,
as we all do, as we all have,
bounce back and return.
And return again.
There is a grace in this returning
to your luminous, loving self.

May the congregation say amen and blessed be.
Go forth and live love.

SERMON INDEX

Most sermons during the past 25 years are available online through this website. Click on the index link above to find tables of all sermons for each year listed by date (newest to oldest) with topic and speaker. Click on a topic to go to that sermon.

PODCASTS

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them by clicking on the podcast link above or copying and pasting this link. https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

‘Health Care at Risk’ panel at Live Oak UU in Cedar Park

by Posted in Uncategorized

‘Health Care at Risk’ panel, on Sunday, October 12th at Live Oak UU in Cedar Park, features panel steeped in medicine and advocacy.

A four-member panel steeped in medicine and advocacy will discuss “Health Care at Risk,” convening at 2 pm Sunday, October 12, 2025, at Live Oak Unitarian Universalist (LOUU) Church in Cedar Park (3315 El Salido Pkwy, Cedar Park, TX 78613). The event is hosted by Indivisible 1431 and the LOUU Church Social Justice Team.  
 
Our distinguished panel comprises two physicians, a Texas state Representative and former critical-care nurse, and, for the moderator, the president of the Austin Chapter of Texas Alliance of Retired Americans (TARA): 
 
  • Lynn Cowles, Director of Health and Food Justice from Every Texas
  • Dr Christine Eady Mann, family practice doctor, political activist, former Congressional candidate 
  • Dr Karen Van Matre Smith, award-winning family medicine specialist with published research 
  • Jan Lance, President, Austin Chapter of Texas Alliance of Retired Americans (moderator) 
 
The panel will consider whether American healthcare is at risk under the Trump Administration.  
 
 
Topics of interest for the panel include: 
 
  • National or state healthcare policy and administration  
  • RFK Jr’s qualifications to be HHS Secretary and the policies that he has enacted since taking office 
  • The attack on vaccines 
  • The potential impact of cuts to Medicaid and ACA via the congressional bill recently passed and signed by the White House 
  • Drastic cuts to medical research, including mRNA vaccine development 
  • How medical and mental health practices have and will change because of the above 
 
The event will be about 1.5 hours in total, including time for Q&A. The event will be non-partisan. The facts speak for themselves. 
 
Live Oak Unitarian Universalist Church (Live Oak) is a diverse and welcoming community based on liberal religious values. We gather together to explore our spiritual journeys, make connections, transform lives, and work to heal our world. 
 

Register Here!

 

2025 Water Communion

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Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Listen to the sermon by clicking the play button above.

Rev. Chris Jimmerson & Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt
September 7,2025
First UU Church of Austin
4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756
www.austinuu.org

We come together to begin our new church year with the annual Water Communion Ritual. We share with one another water that symbolizes something meaningful to us as we blend and mingle the waters that remind us of our shared faith.

Chalice Lighting

This is the flame we hold in our hearts as we strive for justice for everyone. This is the light we shine upon systems of oppression until they are no more. This is the warmth that we share with one another as our struggle becomes our salvation.

Call to Worship

You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in drops.

– Rumi

Affirming Our Mission

Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community.

Reading

from PAINTED OXEN
by Thomas Lloyd Qualls

Water knows no boundary. Though we may draw it on a map, say, “This is where the water starts and where it ends.” It is not true. Water knows the way into the great mystery. It is not afraid of going underground. Water is not afraid of dams or dry creeks, bridges or brick walls. It is patient. Water understands time. It will find a way.

Sermon

NOTE: This is an edited ai generated transcript.
Please forgive any omissions or errors.

Carrie

As we just learned from Sol, the water communion is a recent addition to our faith. It was created by a group of women who had a desire and intention to be reflected in their own religion. You see at the time the principles used only masculine language.

They symbolize their desire by pouring water into a vessel, a show of pouring into each other, and into their faith with the intention of creating a more just and equitable religion and world.

Our water communion is a beautiful ritual that symbolizes our desires and our intention. And it uses the ancient and rich symbolism of water. Over 2,000 years ago, a Chinese philosopher named Lao Tzu wrote a book called The Tao Te Ching. He wrote:

 

“There is nothing in the world more soft and weak than water. And yet for attacking things that are firm and strong, there is nothing that can take precedence of it.”

 

In other words, water is both gentle and strong. It gives life to all living things on this planet. And when it meets rock, it will wear it down to a deep canyon. To me that sounds a lot like love and the desires and intentions that flow from that love.

The water communion is a tangible symbol then of what we endeavor to do as a religious community. We pull from our own personal well of love and bring it here to one another, to the collective and that collective love creates a desire for a more loving and just world, a desire for liberation.

Through the power of our collective love we move with intention toward our desires. And just like love and just like water this love combined is powerful. It’s more powerful than hate. It’s more powerful than oppression. It’s more powerful than marginalization or even the violence that seems so firm and immovable right now. For I believe, then when it comes to love, for attacking things that are firm and strong, there is nothing that can take precedence of it.

And so today, as we think about the way the waters we will pour into the vessel nourish us, think also about the ways that the love we bring together creates something that can overcome all that seems immovable.

Chris

Thank you, Carrie.

Now we are going to consider in what way or ways the water you have brought to share and intermingle with that of your fellow members of the religious community, what that water represents, how it represents your intentions, your love, that which you value most deeply.

Perhaps you have brought water from a place where you gather with your family or loved ones each year and so it represents love and relationship and perhaps in the case of an annual family reunion the role that ancestors continue to play in your life. Maybe you simply brought water from a faucet in your yard somewhere from which you water that which you garden and grow. And so your water might represent interconnectedness with the natural world or the wonder you find in the cycles of life or the value of nourishing and tending other life. These are just examples.

In just a moment, I will invite you to find someone nearby, preferably someone whom you did not come with today, and then share with that person the story of your water, and most importantly, its meaning for you. How does it represent your values, your intent, your place within that divine ocean of fierce love?

If you didn’t actually bring water today, that’s okay. We have placed some extra containers of water that you can bring and you can bring into your hearts and thoughts a source of water that is significant to you and what it represents to you. And if you’re not comfortable sharing verbally, that is absolutely okay too.

It’s fine to let folks know that you would prefer to contemplate this to yourself in a kind of personal meditation. We invite our children and youth who are with us this morning to also share with one another by finding someone close in age nearby with whom you might share.

If you’ve joined us virtually and have access to the comments, please feel free to share in that way. Or if you’re watching with others, to talk about the meaning of the water you have brought to mind with someone with whom you’re watching. Here in the sanctuary we will give you a couple of minutes each to share.

Now I’ll invite you to come forward with your water and to intermingle it with the water that others have brought in one of our large vases up front here. As I mentioned earlier, we have provided extra water in case you need it.

You will notice that we have two tables. One table holds our communal vessels, a symbol of our collective love and power. The second table holds five small vessels. These are symbols of our solidarity with the two million in Gaza who are being intentionally starved and cut off from access to water. If you feel so moved you can place some of your water in the communal vessel as well as one of the smaller vessels as a sign of solidarity.

So now as our music begins to play, let our annual water communion begin.

Music

All blessings on these waters. All blessings on each of you who have shared them. May the oean of divine love bless all of us.

Extinguishing the Chalice

We extinguish this flame, but not the light of truth, the warmth of community, or the fire of commitment. These we hold in our hearts until we are together again.

Benediction

As you leave this sacred time, may you remember the ocean of divine love flows through each of us.

May you see that divine love in others and may you carry it with you throughout the week.

Go in peace.

SERMON INDEX

Most sermons during the past 25 years are available online through this website. Click on the index link above to find tables of all sermons for each year listed by date (newest to oldest) with topic and speaker. Click on a topic to go to that sermon.

PODCASTS

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them by clicking on the podcast link above or copying and pasting this link. https://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

Sun-Day Austin

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SUN-DAY Austin, a Celebration, Education, and Rally Event at Texas State Capitol

Please come to SUN-DAY Austin on September 21 because:
   1. A large attendance at SUN-DAY will send a message to policy makers.
   2. You will learn things about solar you don’t know.
   3. You’ll help build momentum to advance solar energy and battery storage, something we need.
   4. You’ll have fun. We’ll have music, speakers, and more.
   5. You can take a small action to advocate for solar energy.
   6. You can learn about nearly two dozen organizations tabling.

What: SUN-DAY Austin
When: Sunday, September 21st from 4-6 p.m.
Where: Texas Capitol, South Lawn
Save the date – you won’t want to miss it!

We, the people, know that solar energy is cheap and clean.
We know more solar will reduce increases in our electricity bills
We know that more solar will greatly improve our health, especially for our more vulnerable, children, and seniors.
We know that solar energy has rapidly become less costly each year and the trend is likely to continue.
We know that solar energy, being cheaper, will eventually beat out fossil fuel energy in the marketplace because our system works that way.
We know that climate change already is creating harm through extreme weather events that will only get worse.
We know that fossil fuel companies will try to slow the adoption of solar to protect their huge profits.
We know “eventually” is too late.

SUN-DAY is a nationwide mobilization to celebrate the benefits of solar and wind energy. We will rally, teach, inspire and chart a cleaner future together. Solar power isn’t “alternative” anymore; it’s the cheapest, most obvious path forward. The Austin event will be a solar energy festivaI about solar energy, music, fun activities for kids (solar race cars, arts and crafts, etc.), and advocacy for clean energy.

Monthly Service Offering for September – Drive a Senior

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Drive a Senior ATX
Building Relationships One Ride at a Time

Drive a Senior ATX enables older adults to live independently, avoid social isolation and age in place by providing free, volunteer-based transportation and other support services to senior adults in Austin since 1985, including

  • Daily rides to medical appointments and errands,
  • Weekly rides to HEB for groceries,
  • Monthly rides for social outings and events,
  • As needed handyman services, tech assistance, and social visits.

Our mission is transportation, but our impact is relationships. Our volunteer-based rides come with care, empathy, and inclusion. Our clients are treated like family and build meaningful relationships with our staff and volunteers.

First UU is a founding congregation of Drive a Senior, originally called North Central Caregivers. Our congregation formerly contributed annually to its work and has provided many volunteers since its inception in 1985.