Holidays and Celebrations
Our congregation celebrates Christian holidays like Christmas as well as days that are unique to Unitarian Universalism. Holy days of other religious traditions are oftened marked in our services with a reading or music. Our holiday services use the stories, myths and traditions creatively to call us to our deeper humanity and our commitment to the good.
Our Earth Based group ERDE (Earth Reverence Dedicants Extraordinaire) holds rituals to honor the ancient commemorations such as Winter Solstice and Beltane.
First Unitarian celebrates Water, Fire and Flower Communions.
Water Communion is usually held on the first Sunday of full services after summer. Congregants bring a small sample of water that they gathered on summer travels or from their own back yard. Each individual water contribution is combined with others, symbolizing the streams of our personal journeys coming together to form a greater body.
Fire Communion is an annual ceremony where we begin the new year by releasing those things holding us back in our hearts and minds.
Flower Communion is similar to the spirit of Water Communion and is held in the spring. Each congregant brings an individual flower which is then combined in a bouquet with all the other flowers. Once again, we recognize the unique individual joining with others to create a larger community. When the service is over, each person takes a flower from the communal bouquet, representing how in community we affect and change one anothers lives.
Christmas Eve is celebrated with Lessons and Carols and is inspired by the words of the late
Sophia Lyon Fahs: Each night a child is born is a holy night—A time for singing, A time for wondering, A time for worshipping. The service concludes with a beautiful spreading of the light/candle lighting ceremony.
Secular holidays like Thanksgiving and Rev. Martin Luther King Day are also a part of the liturgical year.
We celebrate Thanksgiving with a Bread Communion sharing bread made at the church the evening before or contributed by members of the congregation. This service also highlights Indigenous People's Day so that we may honor the wisdom and gifts of the First Nations.
Rev. Martin Luther King Sunday usually involves the interpretation of a King text and how his mighty messages still inform and challenge us today. Music and art always make this a moving and transforming Sunday.
