To whom in your life have you given the key to your home? What about the key to your heart? Come unlock the secret to making this connection last a lifetime.
In this youth-led service, come hear our youth share their thoughts and insights about what they desire – for themselves and our shared world.
Using personal narrative and attention to recent socio-political developments, special guest Dr. Anthony Pinn explores the manner in which the current historical moment speaks to the continued troubling nature of difference in the United States. Through the lens of humanism, and the insights of key commentators on American life, such as W. E. B. Du Bois as well as the sensibilities of the blues, this talk reflects on ways to think about the ethical challenges facing as well as what we might anticipate as the outcome of struggle for change.
Anthony B. Pinn received his BA from Columbia University, Master of Divinity and PhD in the study of religion from Harvard University. He is currently the Agnes Cullen Arnold Professor of Humanities and professor of religion at Rice University. Pinn is the founding director of the Center for Engaged Re-search and Collaborative Learning (CERCL) also at Rice University. Pinn’s research interests include religion and culture, humanism, and hip hop culture. He is the author/editor of over 35 books, including, "The Black Church in the Post-Civil Rights Era" (2002), "Terror and Triumph: The Nature of Black Religion" (2003), "Noise and Spirit: Rap Music’s Religious and Spiritual Sensibilities" (2004), and the novel, "The New Disciples" (2015). Pinn is also director of research for the Institute for Humanist Studies, a Washington DC-based think tank.
In order to clearly articulate our church’s mission, we need to try to discern answers to life’s ultimate questions like: What does it mean to be human? What ideals should I strive for? How can we create a more wholesome future for our children? Rev. Bruce Russell-Jayne will relate a framing of what UUs believe by the Rev. David Bumbaugh, UU Humanist hero.
Rev. Russell-Jayne served UU churches in Ohio, Utah, and Illinois, and as a Chaplain at Cincinnati Children's Hospital. He and his wife Cece live in Carmel near their daughter, son-in-law and three grandchildren. He volunteers as Treasurer for Hoosier Interfaith Power & Light, which helps congregations combat Global Warming by conserving energy and generating solar power.
During this service, led by Rev. Sarah Gettie McNeill, we will honor the transitions and celebrations in the lives of our members through poetry and naming. Help us mark births, transitions into or out of membership at All Souls, and deaths.
Rev. McNeill currently serves as the Director of Children and Family Ministries at St. Mark’s United Methodist Church in Bloomington. She is a graduate of Meadville Lombard Theological School.
Special guest Jeff Rasley will describe the development of the Basa Village Foundation and what he has learned about creating a meaningful life from the Rai people of Basa village, Nepal.
Jeff Rasley is the author of ten books; the most recent is "Polarized! The Case for Civility in the Time of Trump." He is the author of over 80 published articles. Rasley practiced law for thirty years in Indianapolis and was admitted to the US Supreme Court Bar. He is a graduate of the University of Chicago, Indiana University School of Law, and Christian Theological Seminary. Rasley is founder of the Basa Village Foundation and is liaison for the Nepal-based Himalayan expedition company Adventure GeoTreks, Ltd. Rasley serves as an officer or director for six non-profit organizations.
This season is about bringing more hope and justice into a bleak, cold world that so needs light and love. The journey towards the beloved community is long and we must seek sustenance on our way. Join us to celebrate this journey by exploring this season's lessons in word and song. Rev. Elizabeth, our Justice and Outreach Minister, will lead our service.
During the winter holidays, I hear of many lights. Hanukkah flames, the Yule log, solstice rituals that balance light and dark, and lights on trees inside and out, houses, wreathes and Advent candles. Today, that other great light from the Christmas legends, the star which the planetarium might say was a conjunction of planets, but to the Romans and Greeks who originally heard the story, would have appeared to be a rather horrific event. Come hear the wonderful preacher Rev. Dr. Mark Belletini unpack what this message this morning.
Rev. Dr. Belletini is the Minister Emeritus of the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbus OH. He served our congregations in Hayward and San Francisco CA before that. He was in the first wave of open and out GLBTQ ministers in the UUA, ordained in 1979.
Our Unitarian ancestors understood better than we do now how much our early American Republic borrowed from English legal and cultural systems that were fundamentally about classism and resistant to democracy. Come hear Rev. Anastassia share some of Henry Thoreau’s political philosophy, and how this it is still relevant to today.
We so rarely talk about how our bodies die, and the spiritual and personal concerns that accompany this final chapter to life. What are the pressing human and spiritual questions that accompany this stage? How do we accompany someone into death? How can our endings be times of love not eradication?
Women have influenced, women have marched, women advocated, women have voted. Yet, the laws that affect women are written, enacted, and interpreted by men. What does our democracy still require from women?
Rev. Anastassia Zinke, preaching.
Ancient, earth-based traditions speak of our earth as our mother, and all life on earth as our children. Let us learn into this tradition, as we bless animals of this earth.
Rev Zinke preaching.
October is known nationally as domestic violence awareness month. But what does that mean, and what can each of us as individuals and as a community do better to help end domestic violence and other forms of gender-based violence? Anyone can help, and everyone is needed to change the culture of violence against women and girls we live in. Learn how and ask any questions you may have about this important and difficult issue. Our guest speaker is Joe Samalin, an advocate who has been working to end gender based violence for 15 years.
Yum Kipper is probably the most important of Judaism’s high holy days, the culmination of the Days of Awe, that begins with Rosh Hashanah. "Yom Kippur" means "Day of Atonement." It is a day set aside to "afflict the soul," to atone for the sins of the past year when one has acted against one’s understanding of the holy and has transgressed against other people. Atonement can be broken down into: At-one-ment, implying that when we forgive and are forgiven, we are brought back into relationship with one another. Let us come together to reflect on how we can reach for reconnection and forgiveness.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN.
Many who have been hurt or harmed struggle with the question of whether to forgive, and why or why not to do so. The decision is personal, but it can also be ethical. Could forgiving be perceived as condoning? Is the act of forgiveness for the benefit of the other or oneself? Let us explore these questions together, and how forgiveness can also be ethically bounded and liberating.
Rev. Zinke Preaching.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN
Through the lenses of 20th Century theologians, his two decades of work, and living in the long shadow of Von Hippel Lindau disease, David Forsell explores his hopes for the future, and how he is choosing to live.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN
Some of the clearest answers to humanity’s most fundamental questions can be found in art and are born out of an artist’s searching and/or revelations. Let us consider the big questions on the hearts of those in our community, and the way that art reveals answers to our souls.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN
As a faith community, we seek to enlarge, enlighten, and enliven. We do this in multiple ways: we hold up what is true, we name what we place worth in, and we paint that picture big enough so that all see. This work enhances who we are, and enlightens us as to where we should go. Let us celebrate how All Souls seeks to enlarge, enlighten and enliven the vision of the Beloved Community.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN
Bob Dylan experienced a near fatal motorcycle accident, which profoundly affected his outlook, relationships, and music. Such moments can centralize the human experience as one of religious questioning and meaning-making. The late UU minister Forest Church wrote, “religion is our human response to the dual reality of being alive and having to die. Knowing that we must die, we question what life means. The answers we arrive at may not be religious answers, but the questions death forces us to ask are, at heart, religious questions.” Let us contemplate how death amplifies life’s meaning. Rev. Zinke, preaching.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN.
The theme of the journey is a prominent one both in religious stories and in Bob Dylan’s music. Come let’s explore the outlook of the journeyer, and reconnect with ways that we too have been seekers. This is part one of the three part Bob Dylan Suite, join us on the 23rd and 29th to continue the series. Rev. Anastassia Zinke preaching.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN.
Paula Cole Jones, Racial and Social Justice Consultant for the Central East Region will come and speak to us. It has been 20 years since the UUA passed a resolution to undo racism in our institution. Just recently over 700 UU congregations agreed to do teach-ins on white supremacy. Now is the time for UU Principles to guide us, but do they go far and deep enough to result in social change regarding racial inequity? Some think it is time for an 8th Principle.
All Souls Unitarian Church, Indianapolis, IN.