{"id":141847,"date":"2026-09-30T08:54:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-30T14:54:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/?p=141847"},"modified":"2026-09-30T08:56:30","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T14:56:30","slug":"2026-question-box","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/2026-question-box\/","title":{"rendered":"2026 Question Box"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"powerpress_player\" id=\"powerpress_player_5591\"><audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-141847-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"http:\/\/www.austinuuav.org\/audio\/2026-09-27_Question_Box.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.austinuuav.org\/audio\/2026-09-27_Question_Box.mp3\">http:\/\/www.austinuuav.org\/audio\/2026-09-27_Question_Box.mp3<\/a><\/audio><\/div><p class=\"powerpress_links powerpress_links_mp3\" style=\"margin-bottom: 1px !important;\">Podcast: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.austinuuav.org\/audio\/2026-09-27_Question_Box.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_pinw\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Play in new window\" onclick=\"return powerpress_pinw('https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/?powerpress_pinw=141847-podcast');\" rel=\"nofollow\">Play in new window<\/a> | <a href=\"http:\/\/www.austinuuav.org\/audio\/2026-09-27_Question_Box.mp3\" class=\"powerpress_link_d\" title=\"Download\" rel=\"nofollow\" download=\"2026-09-27_Question_Box.mp3\">Download<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Listen to the sermon by clicking the play button above.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Rev. Chris Jimmerson and Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt<br>September 27, 2026<br>First UU Church of Austin<br>4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756<br>www.austinuu.org<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Rev. Chris and Rev. Carrie will answer your questions about the church, our UU faith, life, the universe, and everything (though neither will pretend to have the answers to all that).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Welcome<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Etude No 5&#8221; (Kachaturian) &#8211; Valeria Diaz, piano<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Chalice Lighting<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">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 we share with one another as our struggle becomes our salvation.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Call to Worship<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Sitting with our questions and allowing them to exist as they are is a way to promote greater self-kindness and self-compassion. The unique ability to question is part of what makes us human&#8230; we can trust that our questioning is there for a reason, and we owe it to ourselves to find the beauty in that.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8211; Dr. Maureen Sessa<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Affirming Our Mission&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Anthem<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Music for 18 Musicians: Pulses&#8221; (Steve Reich) &#8211; Brent Baldwin, guitar<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Time for All Ages<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>NOTE: This is a AI generated (edited) transcript.<br>Please forgive any omissions or errors.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sol<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hello, hello, everybody. If you are curious, if you have questions, or if you would like to hang out on stage with me and the ministers for a few minutes, come and join us all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So, wanted to give some of our younger members, thank you, a special opportunity to ask any questions that you might have about church to the ministers directly.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Okay. So I have a starting question just for us to kind of get the idea of what a question about church might sound like. I know you have all sorts of very, very awesome and creative questions, but right now we&#8217;re just going to ask questions about church.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So I&#8217;m going to start, give you some time to think if you have any percolating in your mind. Okay. So, ministers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHY DO WE ALL STAY IN THE SANCTUARY TOGETHER FOR SPECIAL SERVICES?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So when we do our special services like water communion or fire communion or flower communion, we&#8217;re doing a ritual about our community and about what we believe. And we don&#8217;t want to just do that with some of the people in our community, right? So we want you all to be with us because you are just as part of this community as anybody else. in the church. So we want you all here with us to do that ritual because it&#8217;s really important that everybody participates in it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thank you, Carrie. That&#8217;s perfect. The only thing I would add is you all aren&#8217;t here all the time, but you may have noticed when you did stay that at the end of the service we say that we, the ministers, love you fiercely, and that includes all of you. We love you fiercely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHY IS CHURCH A LONG WAY?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sol<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Why do services take so long, maybe? Ministers, why are our services the length that they are?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I&#8217;m so tempted to say you didn&#8217;t have my childhood. We have a lot to do in an hour. We pack a service. We do a whole bunch in an hour. And I know when you&#8217;re a kid, an hour seems like so long. But when you get&#8230; Further from the ground, it&#8217;s not so long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHAT IS ONE IMPORTANT IMPACT YOU THINK YOU&#8217;VE MADE ON THE CHURCH SINCE YOU&#8217;VE BEEN A MINISTER?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We&#8217;re asking the hard hitters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I&#8217;m going to answer for Carrie and she&#8217;s going to answer for me. How about that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So I think that one of the things we&#8217;ve seen from Carrie is just we have really upped our game and raised our profile in terms of social justice, in terms of mutual aid, in terms of actually having a national presence for that. And I am just so proud of the work Reverend Carrie has done with that.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thank you. That was very kind. So the fact that this church exists and it&#8217;s such a well-oiled machine that we have a mission, that we have these beautiful ends, and not only that we have these beautiful ends, that we are meeting those ends, that&#8217;s all Reverend Chris. This is Reverend Chris is, yeah, I love getting to learn from you, especially on the board, because the unexciting things that keep the church healthy and growing, that&#8217;s all Reverend Chris. And Shannon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sol<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">All right. I have time for one more question, okay?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHAT IMPACT DO WE THINK THE CHURCH ITSELF HAS MADE?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">First of all, your hat&#8217;s really cool. I just wanted to say that. That&#8217;s really hard to know. I can only speak from my perspective, but when I found this church, It gave me a community where I could feel really safe. And by safe, I mean it allowed me to ask questions without fear. And so I hope that people sitting here today come here and the impact is that they feel held and that they feel loved and they feel safe to sit with questions, even if they don&#8217;t know the answer to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Yeah, I mentioned this in the sermon last week, but I can&#8217;t tell you how often someone in this church says to me, my group or my caring companion or Carrie reached out to me or my meditation folks that I get with some aspect of this church has helped me make it through the last few months and I think in the environment socially and politically in which we find ourselves I think this church is serving as an anchor for a lot of us as we try to make it through this time and do something to change what&#8217;s happening for the better.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Reading<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The ancients told stories and wrote parables to explain what they had found when exploring the mystery. That is all religion is: people wondering about where we came from, why we are here, and where we go after we die. The Bible, the Eightfold Path of Buddhism, the Seven Principles of my own Unitarian Universalist tradition &#8211; all are just ideas people had about what made life meaningful. What you think about holiness is just as valid and just as true. So what do you think about holiness? What do you think about God? There is nothing to be afraid of. Your spiritual quest begins now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8211; Rev. Kate Landis<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Centering<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Music for Meditation: &#8220;Within My Garden Rides A Bird&#8221; (Baldwin) &#8211; Brent Baldwin, harp<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Sermon<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">QUESTION BOX<br>&#8211; Rev. Chris Jimmerson and Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>So thank you all for your questions. The way that we&#8217;re going to do this is we&#8217;ll start with Carrie picking a question to ask me. I will answer that, and then Carrie will add to it if she would like, and then I will pick the next question to ask Carrie. Okay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">IF YOUR PERSONALITY HAD A WARNING LABEL, WHAT WOULD IT SAY?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cris<br>Do not push too hard here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>I would say she looks pretty normal, but she&#8217;s a human can opener. You will be telling her your deepest, darkest secrets within seconds. There you go.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHAT IS YOUR MOST USELESS BUT IMPRESSIVE SKILL?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>I can hear a voice actor, but I&#8217;m awful with names, but I can remember other actors. I can do an IMDb search within like 45 seconds. and find out who it was and what movies they were in. It&#8217;s totally useless, but the people around me now have that information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>I can flip myself upside down and stand on my hands for a few seconds before falling down. Or at least I used to be able to do that. I&#8217;m not sure I still could. Is this mine?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">HOW DO YOU CHOOSE THE THEOLOGICAL BASIS OF YOUR SERMONS, GIVEN THE MYRIAD OF BELIEFS IN THE CONGREGATION?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>Yeah. Oh, that&#8217;s a big one. Yeah, I think that, and I&#8217;ve seen this with you too, Reverend Carey, that I have a personal theology that almost always anchors my sermon and shows up, and it has to do with fierce love and sort of process relational theology, which I won&#8217;t go into right now, but basically that we&#8217;re all still evolving and we help each other do that spiritually, especially. And that&#8217;s the anchor, and it shows up without me even realizing, and I&#8217;ll read the sermon later and go, oh, that&#8217;s what that is. But I think all of the other theologies that people hold in this church, whether it&#8217;s humanism or Buddhism or whatever it might be, can tie into that. And so I don&#8217;t normally go in saying, I&#8217;m going to preach about this theology and this theology and this theology. I draw from the wonderful pluralism that we embrace. to inform whatever the topic of the sermon might be. And so one sermon might be informed by four or five different theologies.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>Yeah, I would agree with that. I would also say my highest call is liberation. And so there are so many ways to get to liberation and we have such a wealth of wisdom and beauty that we can pull from. And I always try to be cognizant of the people that&#8230; we&#8217;re ministering to because it is for y&#8217;all. Yeah.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>And I think I would also add, Carrie and I have talked about, Reverend Carrie and I have talked about, if there is a particular theology that&#8217;s interesting to some of you that you&#8217;re really fascinated with or a world faith or whatever it might be, talk to us about maybe doing an adult religious education class because I think the more we let each other&#8217;s beliefs and theologies interact with each other, the more we all grow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I GENUINELY DO NOT GET THE END GAME. IF THE PLAN ENDS WITH A RUINED PLANET, COLLAPSED ECONOMIES, AND NO WORKING CLASS LEFT TO SPEND MONEY, WHAT ARE THE BILLIONAIRES ACTUALLY HOARDING WEALTH FOR? TO SIT IN A BUNKER WITH NUMBERS ON A SCREEN THAT DON&#8217;T MEAN ANYTHING ANYMORE? LIKE, WHAT IS THE ACTUAL POINT?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>So some of this, I&#8217;m just going to give credit to my husband because he and I were talking about this one. Thank you for sending your questions in early, by the way. so greed right that&#8217;s like the motivating factor but i think sometimes we think that if you&#8217;re wealthy you&#8217;re smart right if you&#8217;re wealthy you&#8217;re intelligent i don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s true y&#8217;all i think you inherit wealth and maybe you&#8217;re really good at um i don&#8217;t know taking risks in business because you can because you have billions of dollars or being cutthroat that&#8217;s not smart that&#8217;s greedy so i think the end game is i don&#8217;t think they have an end game i hope not if not it&#8217;s pretty bleak but i just think that the end game is money first and foremost and everything else is not even a thought because why would it be&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>I couldn&#8217;t agree more Reverend Carrie i think i would only add and i whoever submitted this thank you i love this question i think that The problem is there is no end game and there is no point because people have gotten themselves so attached to money and the power that goes with it that they can&#8217;t see past that. And so they are living for that in every moment. to tell you that from what I can see at least on my television and the few people I have known that have that kind of wealth and power they seem to me to be some of the most unhappy people I have ever met in my life because they&#8217;ve lost track of the fact that it&#8217;s our relationships with one another that matters and that brings us contentment and happiness and spiritual growth in life. And when we let power over others become our entire focus, that damages us beyond belief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHEN WE TALK TO OUR NON-UU FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS, IS THERE AN ALTERNATIVE TO THE WORD CHURCH THAT WE CAN USE TO DESCRIBE OUR SPIRITUAL HOME? For many people, this carries heavy baggage, and it doesn&#8217;t seem to really capture the true diversity of our community. How can we accurately explain who we are without getting tripped up by the words?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>Yeah, thank you for that question. Having grown up a very fundamentalist Southern Baptist church, I can relate to the question, and I guess I can only speak for myself. I am reclaiming that word church. It doesn&#8217;t belong to them. It can belong to us. And I think what we are doing here is church in the best sense of that word because it&#8217;s based again on fierce love and building relationships and then going out in the world and building more relationships for justice. And if that isn&#8217;t church, I don&#8217;t know what church is and I don&#8217;t want to be a part of it. So I&#8217;m reclaiming that word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>Agreed. Yes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">IS THE ANSWER TO THE UNIVERSE REALLY 42?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Yes, but if you&#8217;ll remember from the Hitchhiker&#8217;s Guide to the Galaxy, it&#8217;s only 42 because they didn&#8217;t actually state a question.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>Yeah, that&#8217;s true. And I think&#8230; science has debunked that, and it&#8217;s actually an irrational number that stretches on to infinity. And as Fred says, raises more questions than answers. And isn&#8217;t it wonderful, though, that in our mysterious universe, so often when we get a new answer, it raises four other questions. And I don&#8217;t find that frustrating. I find that spiritual. I think that&#8217;s lovely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So religion. IS UU A RELIGION?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>So one definition of religion, and this was submitted early, so I went and looked up like, what do we actually mean when we say the word religion? And one definition that I loved is:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">a set of values. priorities and or beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially involving superhuman factors, usually involving devotional and ritual observances and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">So by that definition, I would say we actually are. religion because superhuman factors can be the environment it can be our relationships with each other it doesn&#8217;t have to be something supernatural superhuman doesn&#8217;t have to mean supernatural and again kind of like I was talking about with the word church I want to reclaim that word because I think what we are doing is true religion because it&#8217;s about relationship building and love and that&#8217;s what religion ought to be all about I also think we do have faith. I think we have faith in the inherent worthiness and dignity of every person. I think we have faith in the fact that it is our inter&#8230; connectedness, our interrelatedness that will save us. I think we have faith that we can make a better world and that we can build that beloved community that we talk about every Sunday. So yeah, I do think we have faith, and I have faith that we can make real differences in our own lives and in lives out there in the world, and that&#8217;s what a religion should really be about.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">HOW CAN WE KEEP HOPE AND KEEP THE FAITH IN A WORLD THAT FEELS MORE AND MORE DIRE ALL THE TIME?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>Well, hope is a practice. Hope is not something that you can wait for. It&#8217;s something that you cultivate in your own life. Kind of to answer the last question, we come here because we see something in humanity, right? The beautiful, the diverse, the something to save, something to protect. And so we already know that we can, right? We already have a faith that there can be something better than what we&#8217;ve been given. So that&#8217;s our faith. But you have to run, faith runs on hope. And hope is something you get out there every day and you do. And I will say that we are at a time where I feel like their number one job is to quash our hope. Y&#8217;all get petty. Don&#8217;t let them. Do not let them quash your hope. Your job is to stoke your hope. And you can do it because you know the outcome. Yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>I don&#8217;t think I have anything to add to that. I think that&#8217;s wonderful. Okay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHAT DOES THE PHRASE, OUR STRUGGLE IS OUR SALVATION MEAN?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>I should know the answer to this because I actually wrote the chalice lighting that we say every Sunday. I think what it means is we can&#8217;t put our hope since we were just talking about hope in an ultimate outcome because we don&#8217;t know what the outcome&#8217;s going to be and we can become very discouraged very quickly if we&#8217;re not getting there and not getting there as fast as we think that we should be and so for ages upon ages i mean i think about the struggle for civil rights in this country People have had to find their hope in the struggle itself because we know that the struggle itself is worth it because we are working to build that world that we dream about. We&#8217;re working to build those loving relationships. and we don&#8217;t need to always be looking at what&#8217;s the outcome when we don&#8217;t know what that&#8217;s going to be when there is so much value in the struggle itself, the doing. What Carrie was just talking about, one of the ways that we stay hopeful in this environment is we stay in the struggle. We actually get engaged. We do things so we&#8217;re not sitting at home on the couch with our, you know, pad open and doom scrolling through the news. because that&#8217;s a great way to lose hope. Let&#8217;s go out and change the damn news. How about that? Oh, I&#8217;m supposed to ask a question. I got all whipped up there. Let&#8217;s see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">DOES THE CHURCH STILL HAVE A MORTGAGE? IF SO, WHAT IS THE BALANCE?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>It does not because of you good people in a capital campaign. So the balance is zero. Okay.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">HOW CAN I NAVIGATE TALKING TO MY STAUNCHY CONSERVATIVE CHRISTIAN FAMILY ABOUT THE UU FAITH AND TRADITION WHEN THEY DON&#8217;T CONSIDER US A FAITH, A TRADITION, OR A CHURCH?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>If you figure that out, tell me so I can talk to my mom. Yeah, I think that the best that we can do is to say this. these are the values of my church. This is our mission. This is what we do. And again, it&#8217;s all about relationship. And then demonstrate that in the way that we live our life. I have to tell you, I joked about my mom, but let me tell you something humorous. She&#8217;s been to this church a few times now, and she&#8217;s still very conservative Christian. And she goes, those are just the nicest people I think I&#8217;ve ever met, especially in a church. That&#8217;s funny, but I think it also means we&#8217;re living what we&#8217;re saying we believe, and we&#8217;re living the values that we say we hold, and she picked up on that. So I think one of the ways we talk to folks in these difficult conversations is to talk about, again, our values and our mission, and then demonstrate those, live them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>Yeah, I agree. And I&#8217;ll just say that the way that I&#8217;ve done it in my own life is that I realized that the reason they can even challenge me with that is because they&#8217;re so confident in their faith, right? But I&#8217;m confident in my faith too. So I stopped defending myself because there was no reason to. I&#8217;m supposed to live out my faith. And as I&#8217;ve done that, it&#8217;s become less and less of an issue because they see the fruits, right? If you&#8217;re raised with those fruits of the Spirit, they see the fruits.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>And I bring pepper spray. Only kidding. I don&#8217;t do that. I think we have time maybe for one more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">WHEN DID YOU FIRST GET INVOLVED IN SOCIAL JUSTICE ADVOCACY?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Carrie<br>It&#8217;s been a long time. I&#8217;ll talk about the most transformative social justice work that I did that I think is the reason that I&#8217;m here. I was the president of the PTA a long time ago. Yeah, PTA is forever. And this was during the first Trump administration. It was a Title I school, and many of our parents were terrified, as you can imagine. And so that was the first act of mutual aid. We figured out what our&#8230; fellow parents needed and we started we got in lawyers and notaries so that we could fill out paperwork so that if those parents were taken their kids would go to the people they wanted to go to which was awful it was awful work and at least it created some sense of peace and i think that was the first time that that i really connected it to the individual as opposed to just like a platform or a politic And I&#8217;ve tried to center myself in that ever since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Chris<br>I got involved at a very young age. So speaking of those conservative religions that we were just talking about, the very conservative religion in which I grew up, although they were terrible on LGBTQ issues and things like that. They also did social advocacy. They went out and took care of people that really needed it, and they went out and advocated for better housing for folks that were living in deplorable conditions. And so my church, when I was five, seven years old, was out doing this stuff. So I think it&#8217;s a good reminder to me that sometimes we can stereotype and demonize people when actually they may, as much harm as we may think they&#8217;re doing, they may be doing some real good also. So I think we have to remember that.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thank you all for excellent questions. There are many more that we couldn&#8217;t get to, so thank you for those too. Hopefully we&#8217;ll have an opportunity to answer some of those sometime very soon. Thanks. Thank you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Extinguishing the Chalice<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">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.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Benediction&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Let us go forth now, finding divine mystery in questions more profound than answers. Knowing uncertainty may contain our path to transcendence.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Experiencing a sense of love and interconnectedness beyond words and past reductive understanding.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">May the congregation say, &#8220;Amen&#8221; and &#8220;blessed be&#8221;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We love you fiercely. Go in peace.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"http:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/category\/sermons\/indexes\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>SERMON INDEX<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"http:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/podcast\/first-unitarian-universalist\/id372427776\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>PODCASTS<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">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&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Listen to the sermon by clicking the play button above. Rev. Chris Jimmerson and Rev. Carrie Holley-HurtSeptember 27, 2026First UU Church of Austin4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756www.austinuu.org Rev. Chris and Rev. Carrie will answer your questions about the church, our UU faith, life, the universe, and everything (though neither will pretend to have the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[19,194,27,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-141847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audio-available","category-carrie-holley-hurt","category-chris-jimmerson","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141847"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":141848,"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141847\/revisions\/141848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/austinuu.org\/wp2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}