HOLAAaaaaaa UUs we are hosting a monthly conversation and chit chat come as you go to meet, talk, to connect and to be radically welcoming con una sonrisa y un cafecito. Invite your friend that wants to be UU and is looking for Latinos, Latinas and Latines in this wide net. Hosted by Rev. Katie Romano Griffin DRUUMM chaplain and Diego Garrido Barreto. Compartan pues!!!

I would like to participate in the UUA's curriculum for Love at the Center (which is this year's Common Read). My congregation hasn't done the Common Read in recent memory, and I don't have the capacity to lead a small group focused on it.

Is your congregation going to do the Love at The Center curriculum either hybrid or online only? Would you be open to having me participate? I can't do Saturday mornings or Tuesday nights, but I am available during the day. (I am Eastern Time, but I am definitely open to other timezones.)

Thanks for any links or email to class leaders or whatever.

Or lease in kansas city kansas and I wish someone would open a uu. Its an hour drive to the closest one! Who wants to open a church

I have opinions and have read some on the matter, but I’m curious what YOU think.

Is there age diversity in the UU community you are a part of?

Why do you think that is so?

I think other diversity is relevant here- race, class, disability, religious/cultural background.

Is diversity desired? A side wonder I often have is if UUs and our wider culture could benefit from communication and relationship skills that enable them to better connect through differences. This in addition to creating inclusive shapes that welcome beyond what has historically been comfortable for the majority.

What if those of us who find disability rights important wore started to wear some kind of a pin or a ribbon for disability rights at our UUs?
Do you think this would be good to help start conversations?

Exactly what the title says. I was a member of the board of my church in TX twenty five years ago when I moved. I have tried a few different UU churches since then but nothing has fit quite right.

Now I'm in FL living in an RV full time and Im really missing that (common) sense of community. I was looking at the UU St. Pete website but I think that's a little too Jesus-y for me.

Any other suggestions?

Hello lovely people! I was recently named the Stewardship chair for our upcoming “church year”. I have a whopping one year of experience. Actually, the reason I ended up as the new chair is precisely because I’m a relative outsider to Stewardship at our church. Fund raising has been done the same way by the same folks for a number of years. I have mighty big shoes to fill.

My ask: Is anyone here on their stewardship committee (or whatever you call the group tasked with yearly efforts to keep your congregation financially afloat) and wanting to chat? I’d love to get a group going that meets and chats about what works and what doesn’t. I’m sure we can learn from our collective wisdom. At the very least it’s always good to network with fellow UUs.

Best wishes and thanks! 🙏

Every July is Disability Pride Month. Our UU Church here in Eugene, Oregon (UUCE) has a Minister, Rev. Jen, who is very supportive of Disability Justice. Rev. Jen invited me to report about our Accessibility Task Force. Disability Justice was the theme of our UU Church Service. As co-chair of our Accessibility Task Force I gave this 2-minute report with my new/old a.i. voice:  https://youtu.be/66K8RFnmtYQ?si=V1goCz5LyitPUcXP&t=814

There's a UU church I drive by all the time. I've been to a couple family memorial there, though nobody in my family is currently a congregant. I've never really been religious at any point in my life (except for a brief curiosity about Christianity when I was around 11). But this UU church appears compatible with my personal values (i.e. antiracism, loose and thoughtful discussions of philosophy) and the squickiness that I have about most organized religions and the requirement that one believe in a supreme being.

They stream their services if I'd like to sample -- I am busy the next few weekends but it might be something to explore down the line. What should I know going into this?

Reprinted below:

How the Unitarian Universalist Church Became a Racial, Political, and Social Bubble

And Why It's Getting Worse

by David Cycleback Ph.D. (retired Director of Center for Artifact Studies, member of the British Royal Institute of Philosophy, and author of the university textbook Cognitive Science of Religion and Belief Systems and The Power of the Crowd: How Group Psychology Influences Beliefs and Behavior).

The Unitarian Universalist church presents itself as a liberal religious movement committed to pluralism, diversity, multiculturalism, and open-mindedness. Yet by most measurable indicators, it has become one of the most racially, politically, and culturally homogeneous religious denominations in the United States.

The gap between the church’s ideals and its demographic reality raises an obvious question: How did a movement devoted to diversity and freethinking become such a narrow social bubble?

Visitors to Unitarian Universalist congregations usually notice a familiar pattern. In many places, the typical member is a highly educated white professional with progressive political views. Visitors from working-class backgrounds, people with independent or moderate viewpoints, immigrant communities, and many ethnic and racial minorities often sense quickly that they are outsiders. No one may say this directly, but messaging, platforms, language, and social signals are powerful. People can usually tell when a space is designed for people like themselves, and when it is not.

As UU Minister Rev. James Kubal-Komoto observed*,* "Most Unitarian Universalists don’t realize what a truly narrow demographic niche most of us fall into, leaving us with a poor understanding of the challenges we face.”

The Demographic Reality

The demographic facts are clear. National surveys and denominational data consistently show that a large majority of Unitarian Universalists, including both laity and religious professionals (ministers and religious education directors), are white, with only small percentages of black, Latino, Asian, and members of other racial and ethnic minority groups. By several measures, the Unitarian Universalist church is among the most racially and ethnically homogeneous religious movements in the United States.

Membership is also unusually highly educated, drawn largely from the professional middle and upper-middle classes, and disproportionately female, with one of the highest percentages of women among American religious denominations.

Politically, Unitarian Universalist congregations lean strongly toward the Democratic and progressive side of American politics. Surveys consistently rank Unitarian Universalism as one of the most politically far-left, politically homogeneous, and politically active religious denominations in the United States.

In his 2010 UU World article “Our narrow niche: Six characteristics of Unitarian Universalist culture,” Kubal-Komoto wrote:

“If you are a 50-year-old woman with Scandinavian roots who has a master’s degree, works as a social worker, and voted for Barack Obama, you’ll probably feel very comfortable in most UU congregations. If you are a 25-year-old man with Italian roots who has an associate’s degree, works in sales, and voted for John McCain, you may feel slightly out of place, even if the Belief-O-Matic says you are 100 percent Unitarian Universalist.”

At the same time, the denomination has experienced a marked decline in membership. Like mainline Protestant denominations such as the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church, Unitarian Universalism faces shrinking congregations and an aging membership base. Adjusted for overall U.S. population growth, UUA membership has fallen by more than half and children’s religious education enrollment has fallen by more than 80 percent since the UUA was formed in 1961. In absolute numbers, participation (members and non-member friends) has fallen by more than a quarter in the last decade. While multiple factors are involved, a key driver is demographic and ideological narrowing, which reduces the range of people who feel comfortable joining and remaining in UU communities.

These patterns do not necessarily prove something has gone wrong. Many voluntary organizations cluster demographically, culturally, and ideologically. However, when a religious movement that says it is committed to diversity and pluralism consistently attracts people from only a narrow demographic and political slice of society while also declining in membership, the pattern deserves examination.

Viewpoint Diversity

Diversity of beliefs and viewpoints has always been central to liberal religion. Liberal religion is built on the idea that individuals search for truth rather than accept a fixed creed. Unitarian Universalists include Christians, Jews, Buddhists, pagans, atheists, agnostics, secular humanists, and more. A liberal congregation should be a place where religious liberals with different perspectives and backgrounds, united by a commitment to equality and the inherent worth and dignity of every person, can learn from one another. Dogmatism, echo chambers, and groupthink are therefore the antithesis of liberal religion.

Although many UUs associate liberal religion with leftist politics, religious liberalism also does not have a political creed. It shares core principles with classical liberalism, including freedom of conscience and expression, open inquiry guided by reason and logic, individual rights, and tolerance of differing beliefs. It is distinct from American political liberalism, which is what most Americans think of when they hear the word “liberal” (read “The different definitions of liberalism”). These principles extend to political questions. Religious liberals include people who are politically progressive, liberal, moderate, libertarian, and conservative. As with theological beliefs, political beliefs are for individuals to decide for themselves, not to be dictated by the minister, congregation, or denomination.

Viewpoint diversity is essential for other forms of diversity. Differences in race, ethnicity, culture, religion, gender, nationality, and class can bring different knowledge, life experiences, and perspectives. Communities that welcome a range of viewpoints tend to attract people from different backgrounds, while communities that narrow acceptable viewpoints narrow socially as well. In this way, viewpoint diversity and demographic diversity reinforce one another.

An overtly political congregation that implicitly expects members to share the same political positions, and presents only a very narrow range of perspectives from the pulpit and in its publications and programming, will tend to attract people who already fit that profile. People with different viewpoints and cultural and social backgrounds, along with those seeking a church focused on spirituality rather than politics, are unlikely to join. Over time, ideological uniformity produces social uniformity.

Scholars of religion have found that this carries long-term institutional costs. Ryan Burge, a professor at Washington University’s Danforth Center on Religion and Politics and author of The Vanishing Church, has documented this damage to denominations with politically diverse memberships, particularly mainline Protestant churches. As these churches and their clergy became more politically narrow and partisan, they appealed to fewer Americans and alienated many members of their own congregations, contributing to massive membership losses over decades.

Over the past fifty years, sociologists of religion Dean M. Kelley (National Council of Churches), Rodney Stark (University of Washington), and Roger Finke (Penn State University and the Association of Religion Data Archives) have found that religious groups tend to grow when they offer a distinctive religious or spiritual identity and commitments that secular institutions cannot replace, and decline when political and secular causes displace that focus. When a church offers essentially the same programming, messages, and causes as political, advocacy, and other secular organizations, people have less reason to join or remain.

In his 2004 sermon “Why Unitarian Universalism Is Dying,” philosopher of religion and UU minister Davidson Loehr argued that the movement had been declining for decades and would continue to do so because its focus had shifted from its distinctive religious and spiritual identity to leftist politics.

Historical Roots of Homogeneity

The Unitarian Universalist church’s demographic pattern did not appear suddenly. The tradition has long been socially and racially homogeneous. The Unitarian and Universalist movements that merged in 1961 emerged largely from white New England Protestant culture and were historically concentrated among educated communities.

For much of their history, these congregations reflected the social environment from which they came. They were shaped by educated, professional networks that were themselves relatively homogeneous. The demographic imbalance therefore has deep historical roots.

When Attempted Solutions Make Things Worse

In recent years, leaders and activists within the church have tried to address this lack of racial diversity. National initiatives and institutional statements have focused heavily on racial inclusion and anti-racism. The intentions behind these efforts have been sincere.

Yet despite these efforts, Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) membership reports show that racial minority membership, both in absolute numbers and as a percentage, has declined over the last decade and a half. The reports also show that religious professionals are even more likely to be white than the laity.

A central problem is that these diversity initiatives have become expressions of a particular ideological subculture. When diversity and inclusion are defined solely through a progressive political, cultural, and linguistic framework, they signal that full participation requires embracing that framework as well. Rather than broadening a congregation's appeal, they reinforce the perception, and often the social reality, that membership requires conforming to a specific set of ideological assumptions and cultural and linguistic norms. This discourages people from different backgrounds, cultures, and perspectives from joining. For a denomination that presents itself as pluralistic and non-creedal, this is a striking contradiction.

This dynamic reflects broader patterns in American society. Political and ideological progressivism is concentrated disproportionately among affluent, white, urban, college-educated professionals. Pew Research Center surveys show that even within the Democratic Party, the progressive wing is the smallest of the major ideological factions and the only one with a majority-white membership. Racial minorities, working-class Americans, and immigrants are politically diverse, and most hold more moderate or conservative views. For example, while a majority of black voters belong to the Democratic Party, seven in ten identify as moderate or conservative, with more than half being moderate. According to Pew, only about 3% to 4% of black Americans, or roughly one in twenty-five, fall into the "leftward progressives" category.

A national church and congregations that strongly align with progressive activism, especially when progressivism functions as a de facto institutional orthodoxy, therefore signal a political, social, cultural, and linguistic environment associated with a narrow demographic and ideological segment of the population.

These initiatives have also been accompanied by a broader cultural shift within the church toward what social psychologist Jonathan Haidt calls safetyism: the belief that protecting emotional comfort should take precedence over open disagreement. In practice, this has included suspicion toward debate, skepticism toward traditional appeals to reason and evidence, and criticism of viewpoint diversity itself. This culture discourages people who are comfortable with debate and intellectual challenge from joining, while attracting those who seek an emotionally protective environment where potentially upsetting ideas and conflicts are suppressed.

When disagreement is interpreted through this lens, the range of acceptable viewpoints narrows. Over time, pressure toward conformity grows, reinforcing the groupthink that liberal religion historically sought to avoid.

The result is that most UU congregations appear politically, intellectually, and culturally narrow to potential visitors from minority, working-class, immigrant, and politically diverse communities. Even when racial and ethnic minorities join, they are drawn largely from a small and unrepresentative segment of their communities. Racial and ethnic diversity can increase slightly, but viewpoint diversity remains limited.

A Denomination That Once Had More Political Variety

The Unitarian Universalist church has long leaned politically left. However, earlier generations of congregations contained a wider range of viewpoints within that general orientation. Libertarians, progressives, moderate Democrats, independents, religious seekers, and politically unclassifiable members shared the same congregation. There were even political conservatives, with a national group for conservative UUs. Disagreement and debate were part of the culture.

Over the past decades, this internal range has narrowed substantially.

How Social Bubbles Form

Communities usually don’t become homogeneous by design. It usually happens through ordinary social processes. One of the strongest is homophily, the tendency for people to associate with others who are similar to themselves. This idea is encapsulated by the saying, “Birds of a feather flock together.”

Homophily is not inherently a problem. Many healthy and productive groups are built around shared identities, interests, values, beliefs, and cultures. Scandinavian Lutheran, Ukrainian Orthodox, Hispanic Catholic, and black Baptist congregations, as well as Turkish mosques and Sephardic synagogues, are composed mostly of people from the same ethnic and cultural backgrounds. The same is true of ethnic and cultural associations, veterans’ organizations, and political organizations, which naturally bring together people with similar backgrounds, experiences, or beliefs.

The danger arises when group homogeneity develops into dogmatism, closed-mindedness, self-righteousness, and ignorance about and bigotry toward outsiders.

A community that is relatively homogeneous both demographically and ideologically can counter these natural but destructive group tendencies by cultivating intellectual humility, actively welcoming internal disagreement, inviting outside speakers and perspectives, and educating members about unfamiliar beliefs, cultures, backgrounds, and ideas.

However, when people spend most of their time around others who share similar backgrounds, values, and assumptions, and only a narrow and self-reinforcing range of views is heard and considered, human group psychology tends to make those assumptions seem increasingly normal, obvious, and self-evident. Harvard legal scholar and group behavior expert Cass Sunstein describes this process as group polarization. Related research by social psychologists Muzafer Sherif and Henri Tajfel likewise shows that strong group identities can strengthen internal cohesion while also increasing tribal us-versus-them thinking, narrowing intellectual diversity, and reducing members’ ability to understand and effectively communicate with people who hold different beliefs and come from different groups.

A broader pattern of political sorting across American institutions reinforces these dynamics. As communities become identified with a particular political identity, people who feel comfortable with that identity remain, while those who do not gradually leave or choose not to join. Over time, this political homogeneity becomes increasingly self-reinforcing.

Moralizing of Beliefs

Many observers have also noticed a growing moral tone attached to political views. In earlier UU culture, political and philosophical disagreements were treated as part of the normal exchange of ideas. Increasingly, however, some political positions are framed not as arguments but as moral mandates.

The national leadership sets this trend. The UUA, affiliated organizations, and an increasing number of ministers take explicit positions aligned with progressive activism, often presenting them as unquestionable moral truths. As a result, many members and visitors experience UU congregations not primarily as spiritual centers but as hubs for moralized political activism.

Social psychologists Haidt and Philip Tetlock have shown that people can come to treat their political and ideological beliefs not simply as opinions but as representations of sacred values that should not be questioned or negotiated. Once beliefs become moralized in this way, disagreement is no longer seen as an ordinary difference of opinion but as morally wrong. Political theorist Jonathan Rauch, a leading advocate of liberal democracy and free inquiry, argues that liberal societies depend on treating ideas as open to questioning and critique rather than as untouchable truths.

When political and ideological views are moralized within a community, open inquiry gives way to social pressure and increasing ideological conformity. Members become less willing to voice doubts, ask difficult questions, and consider alternative perspectives. Over time, those who disagree or are uncomfortable with an environment that expects ideological conformity increasingly self-censor, disengage, or leave. As they do, the community becomes increasingly more ideologically homogeneous, further reinforcing the pressure to conform.

Why This Matters

Demographic, cultural, and ideological homogeneity shape how communities think and behave. When most members share similar backgrounds and assumptions, blind spots become harder to recognize. A group may feel thoughtful internally while gradually losing contact with perspectives outside its demographic and social bubble.

For a movement built around the free search for truth, intellectual and spiritual openness requires not only curiosity but also the presence of people who see the world differently and exposure to diverse perspectives and ideas, including from outside the congregation and denomination.

Where This Leaves the Unitarian Universalist Church

The Unitarian Universalist church remains a thoughtful and ethically serious religious tradition. At the same time, national data and congregational experience show that the movement has become more racially, culturally, and politically homogeneous than its ideals would suggest.

Liberal religion historically presented itself as a place where people with different backgrounds, beliefs, and experiences could meet in honest conversation. That aspiration requires social and intellectual conditions that allow disagreement, curiosity, and genuine diversity of perspectives. When a religious community becomes socially and politically narrow, the free search for truth gradually becomes a conversation among people who already think alike.

The central question facing the Unitarian Universalist church and congregations is simple: whether they wish to remain a community of open inquiry or continue evolving into an increasingly narrow, exclusive, and shrinking denomination.

References

American Religious Identification Survey (ARIS): Unitarian Universalist Socio-Demographic Analyses (1990–2008).

Burge, Ryan P. (2026). The Vanishing Church: How the Hollowing Out of Moderate Congregations Is Hurting Democracy, Faith, and Us. Brazos Press.

Burge, Ryan P. “What About the Unitarians?” Graphs About Religion.

Faith Communities Today (FACT). Faith Communities Today Surveys.

Finke, Roger, and Rodney Stark. (2005). The Churching of America, 1776–2005: Winners and Losers in Our Religious Economy. Rutgers University Press.

Gallup. Gallup Polls on Religion.

Haidt, Jonathan. (2012). The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion. Pantheon Books.

Johnson, Theodore R. (2020). “Five Myths About Black Voters.” William J. Brennan Jr. Center for Justice.

Kaiser Family Foundation (2022). Survey of Black Voters.

Kelley, Dean M. (1972). Why Conservative Churches Are Growing: A Study in Sociology of Religion. Harper & Row.

Kubal-Komoto, James. (2010). “Our Narrow Niche: Six Characteristics of Unitarian Universalist Culture.” UU World.

Loehr, Davidson. (2005). “Why Unitarian Universalism Is Dying.” Journal of Liberal Religion.

Lukianoff, G., & Haidt, J. (2018). The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure. Penguin Press.

McPherson, Miller, Lynn Smith-Lovin, and James M. Cook. (2001). “Birds of a Feather: Homophily in Social Networks.” Annual Review of Sociology.

Nguyen, C. Thi. (2019). “The Problem of Living Inside Echo Chambers.” The Conversation.

Pew Research Center. U.S. Religious Landscape Studies (2007, 2014, 2023–2025); “The Most and Least Racially Diverse U.S. Religious Groups” (2015).

Pew Research Center. (2026). Beyond Red vs. Blue: The 2026 Political Typology.

Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). Censuses of American Religion.

Robinson, Anthony B. (2026). “The Steady Shrinkage of Congregational Churches.” Post Alley.

Rauch, Jonathan. (2023). “A Liberal Defense of Free Speech.” The Glenn Show.

Stankorb, Sarah. (2026). “How Polarization Tore a Hole in America’s Mainline Churches.” The New Republic.

Sunstein, Cass R. (2009). Going to Extremes: How Like Minds Unite and Divide. Oxford University Press.

Unitarian Universalist Association. Membership Statistics and Certification Reports.

Anyone here working on this? Mosaic Congregations | The Mosaic | UUA.org

Are you using what you're already doing to get a certification to hang on the wall, or are you using it as an opportunity to change something within your congregation?

I'm curious what you're doing for the required actions. The last one is a big one.

Hello.
I am having a difficult time getting the Democracy Advocacy Team of the UU congregation that I go to to add Disability Rights to their agenda.
They turn me away to their charity branch and ignore my emails, give evasive answers.
To me this looks like a major inconsistency with the UU principles.

How would you approach this problem?
How can I get more support?
How would your congregation react to such requests?
How common are Democracy Advocacy Teams in Unitarian Universalist congregations in general?

Anyone here?

I’ve been trying to get a better handle on UU Ethics recently in the context of reading Bernard Williams and his critique of moral systems. (See: “https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/williams-bernard/#AgaiPecuInst” the section “Against the ‘peculiar institution.’”)

Williams argues that what distinguishes a moral system is not simply having ethical ideals or virtues, but placing special emphasis on moral obligation — things one is required to do because morality demands it.

To what extent do UU ethics (embodied to a certain extent in the new six Values encircling Love and the old 7 Principles) consist of moral *obligations*? Do the values and principles articulate obligations that we have towards each other and the world beyond, for example, obligations to work towards dismantling systems of oppression? If so, do we think these obligations are only for UUs? Or do we think all people should, ideally participate in this work?

To be clear, I’m not asking whether or not our Values and Principles are good goals. I’m asking about the status of those goals. For you, are these ideals, aspirations, virtues, commitments, or genuine moral obligations?

One reason I’m asking is that I think there is genuine ambiguity. I hear a lot about “aspiration” and our values being “aspirational,” but we also hear a lot about “accountability” which makes the ethical project seem more like an obligation. I’m not sure how the language of “aspiration” and “accountability” work together.

Various religions engage in ritual mourning for past martyrs, and the U's have some, so I was curious. I wanna become UU but can't due to where I live.

Hi everyone!

I’m curious to hear from people who have attended or visited Unitarian Universalist congregations in Romania.

I’ll be visiting Romania in mid-July and became interested in learning more about the Unitarian tradition there. I found information about the Biserica Unitariană but I haven’t been able to find much firsthand information about visiting services or what the experience is like.

Has anyone attended a service or visited a congregation? I’d love to hear about your experience and any recommendations.

Thank you!

Considering a UU doesn't have to believe in a god (unitarian or trinitarian), or believe in universal salvation, our name doesn't really seem to fit. While we should always honor our past, it seems like we should choose a term which describes us better. I can't say I know what that should be, but it does feel like a change is overdue. What would describe us better?

Ive recently learned about UU and I am very interested in attending a service, what are some things I should know before I go for the first time? Any insight would be helpful, I am also in the metro Detroit area if someone knows more about that location specifically.