Unitarian faith growing stronger in Middle TNFor Nathan De Lee, going to church as a kid was an ordeal.
De Lee, a Unitarian Universalist, grew up in rural Kansas, where members of his faith were few and far between. Attending services meant an overnight trip to Kansas City, where the nearest Unitarian Universalist congregation was.
Today, getting to church is easy for De Lee, an astronomer at Vanderbilt. He’s a regular in the choir on Sundays at First Unitarian Universalist Church in Nashville, a congregation of about 500.
“It’s just a 10-minute drive away,” he said.
De Lee is one of a growing number of local Unitarian Universalists, a faith that’s found growing appeal in recent years. From 2000 to 2010, the denomination grew by 15.8 percent in Middle Tennessee and by 20.8 percent statewide, according to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies.
While they remain rare in Tennessee — with about 3,000 adherents statewide — Unitarian Universalists believe their open-minded faith has a bright future as an alternative to more exclusive brands of religion.
They might be right, said Diana Butler Bass, author of “Christianity After Religion: The End of Church and the Birth of a New Spiritual Awakening.”
Bass, who has studied thriving progressive churches, said Unitarian Universalists can fill a niche in conservative religious cultures such as the Bible Belt.
“I think there is a role for these kinds of more open and liberal spiritual groups,” Bass said. “They provide a nice counter-cultural community.”
The denomination, which started in New England, has been growing more in the South than in other parts of the country, said Rachel Walden, a public witness specialist from the Boston-based Unitarian Universalist Association.
The church hopes to appeal to the rising number of “nones” — those with no specific religious identity. A recent poll from the Pew Center for the People and the Press showed that about one in five Americans falls into that category.
“Because we are so flexible, we think we are well placed to serve those people,” Walden said.
'Church of the open mind'
The Rev. Gail Seavey, the minister at First Unitarian Universalist, said some of her more conservative neighbors aren’t sure what to make of her faith.
Some think that inclusive means anything goes — but that’s not the case, she said.
Instead of a common theology, Unitarian Universalists have a set of common values. They believe in the worth and dignity of every human being. Conscience, rather than a creed, guides their spiritual life. Ethical living matters more than correct theology.
“We are the church of the open mind, the loving heart and the helping hand,” Seavey said. “We always try to pull those things together.”
That belief in the individual choice in faith can been seen in a practice known as water communion. In most churches, communion bread and wine start in a common vessel and then are passed out to church members.
In water communion, everyone starts with a cup of water and pours it in a common bowl.
“We are bunch of individuals finding our own path — but we are doing it as a group,” said De Lee.
Respecting differences
Other key values of the faith include searching for truth by learning about different faiths, respecting the differences between those faiths and making decisions by a democratic process.
“It’s a vision for our time,” said the Rev. Dan Rosemergy, minister at the Greater Nashville Unitarian Universalist Congregation at 364 Hicks Road.
The congregation started in the mid-1990s with about 40 people. Today it has about 160, he said.
He feels the church has a much-needed message.
“I think it makes so much sense in this world where there is so much conflict and division based on theology or doctrine and dogma,” he said.
A spiritual home
Some of the growth among local Unitarian Universalists has come from transplants like De Lee, who moved to Nashville last year from Florida. Others have joined because they dropped out of more exclusive churches or because they are in interfaith marriages.
Elaine Bailey-Fryd, who joined First Unitarian Universalist in 2008, grew up Baptist and had attended a United Methodist church.
Her husband is Jewish, and Bailey-Fryd wanted to find a faith community where they could worship together. Still, she said, she was skeptical at first.
“I had some idea that there would be some guy with an off-key guitar and bad singing and that the preacher may be preaching on some vague topic like love,” she said.
Instead, Bailey-Fryd said she found beautiful music and people who could talk about spiritual issues without insisting their point of view was the right one.
She said she’d always had some doubts about the claim that Jesus was the only way to heaven.
“I felt like I’ve been looking for this church all my life,” she said.
Inclusive appeal
Unitarian Universalists aren’t the only inclusive religious group that’s growing in Middle Tennessee. Baha’is, who believe that all major religions contain truth, grew by 11 percent from 2000 to 2010.
Aram Ferdowski, who works on spiritual development programs for local Baha’is, said one reason is immigration. About 200 Iranian Baha’is moved to Nashville over the last decade, fleeing persecution, she said. Several outreach programs have also attracted people to the faith.
Baha’is believe that all people are spiritual beings and that truth is found in many faiths, Ferdowski said.
“We believe that all these great prophets of God have been preparing mankind for this day where we can be united,” she said.
Ferdowski said Baha’is believe they were created to spread the word about God’s love for humanity and the unity of humankind. That belief has sustained them during times of great persecution in Iran, where the faith began.
“Baha’is are convinced we are here for a purpose,” she said.
Sense of community
For De Lee, the flexible beliefs of Unitarian Universalists are only part of the story.
The other main draw is a sense of community. The faith draws people who want to figure out spirituality on their own terms — but even independent thinkers need a spiritual family, he said.
That’s one reason he’s joined the choir as well as a covenant group — a small discussion group that meets during the week.
“If the idea of Unitarian Universalism is to be on a spiritual journey, it’s hard to do that where you are sitting in a crowd,” he said.
One of the strengths of Unitarian Universalism is its ability to bind people from different faiths into a tightly woven community, said the Rev. Kate Braestrup, a Unitarian minister from Maine and author of the New York Times bestseller “Here if You Need Me.”
Braestrup, a chaplain for the Maine Warden Service, is a second-career minister. She went to seminary after her husband, a Knoxville native and Maine state trooper, was killed in a car crash.
She said Unitarians show their belief that God is love by showing up when tragedy strikes.
“We don’t have an answer for death — we just show up and love you,” she said. “When you need love that badly and you are given it — it changes how you see everything.”
http://www.tennessean.com/article/20120923/NEWS06/309230062/Unitarian-faith-growing-stronger-Middle-TN?utm
