The Faith of Social Justice: History & Conversations about Unitarian Universalism
by Aleksei Kuzmich Sokolov
I’ve been going to Second Unitarian of Chicago church for about half a year. It started on December first, with a service called “Our Evolved Values: Justice and Equity”. I wasn’t raised Christian so the only times I’ve stepped foot in any church was occasionally for Christmas because my parents liked the choir. I did spend some time for a few Summers at a Buddhist temple a few hours from Moscow, but I never was a huge fan of that, either. So my first service at Second Unitarian felt like going through the motions of something I’d only seen in movies.
Whenever I discuss my faith or church attendance, after the mandatory “It’s not a Christian church, it’s actually non-theistic and pluralist”, where most casual conversations end, I want to point out why I do go. It has little to do with theology. Much less with some feeling of obligation to attend a religious service. The community aspect is hugely appealing. So is being required to get out of bed on the weekend, because sleeping in till noon does mess up my sleep schedule.
But my pride as a Unitarian Universalist comes mainly from the faith’s drive for social justice. Unlike organized religion, social justice and political advocacy have played a major role in my life since I was a toddler. Before I could read, my dad held me up as I marked a ballot on his behalf to cast a vote against Putin. Long before I learned any hymns, I learned protest chants. An intergenerational, interfaith community that rallied around the value of liberation was exactly what I was looking for following the 2024 presidential election.
I’ve gotten the chance to speak to a few people, most members of Second Unitarian, all Unitarian Universalists, about their stories with faith and social justice. I hope this gives you some insight into the community and the people who make this faith possible.
The Faith of Social Justice: A Historical Introduction
Unitarian Universalism is a relatively new faith that emerged from two Christian denominations during the 20th century. With an emphasis on social justice and acceptance, the faith has become a welcoming place for the LGTBQ community, which has historically been turned away and shunned in many religious circles.
To understand Unitarian Universalism, it is first important to understand the two Christian denominations that were its predecessors, The Unitarian Church and Christian Universalism. The Unitarian church diverges from most Christian churches in their rejection of the Trinity. They hold the beliefs that God is a singular entity, and while Jesus Chirst was a savior and encouraged by God, he himself was not divine. While Unitarian beliefs can be traced back to the origins of Christianity, the first Unitarian Church was established in Transylvania during the 16th century and 300 years later made its way to America. Many Unitarians believe their views align closest with that of the early Christians and trace their faith back to the Apostolic Age of the first century.
The Unitarian Church does affirm that while Jesus Christ was not a manifestation of God, he was a prophet and inspired by God’s word to a certain extent. It additionally believes that Jesus Christ is a moral beacon and sets an example for how Christians should lead their lives. While in Unitarianism the Bible is considered a holy text and inspired by God, the Church also acknowledges that it was written by man and hence is subject to human error. In another divergence from most Christian doctrine, Unitarians do not believe in Hell as eternal punishment, because they believe that such a belief goes against the love God represents. Additionally, the Unitarian Church refuses to accept any one religion to be the ultimate truth, a belief that later on goes on to fundamentally shape Unitarian Universalism.
Similar to Unitarianism, Christian Universalism can be traced back to the days of the early Church. Until the 4th century, it is believed that most churches were Universalist, preaching that all people will be saved. Only later did the concept of eternal damnation for sinners emerge. Even as alternatives to universal salvation became more and more accepted by the Church, Universalist beliefs were still held by many significant figures in Christianity. Blessed
Julian of Norwich, a mystic from the Middle Ages, provides a good example of later Universalist thought. While severely ill and on the brink of death, Julian believed she was visions from God that inspired her to write two books and preach of what she learned from God. Her vision revealed Jesus as a joyful and forgiving figure who, amongst other things, told her “God made it, God loves it, God keeps it”.
Christian Universalism is a denomination of Christianity which focuses on a belief in universal and unconditional salvation. This denomination emerged as its own church during the 18th and 19th centuries. According to Chrisitan Universalism, God is all loving, all forgiving, and reached out to humanity through Jesus Christ. They, similarly to Unitarians, fundamentally reject the idea of eternal punishment. They affirm that while people who cause harm or do not follow the word of God do face consequences either during their lifetime or in the afterlife, they are ultimately welcomed into the Kingdom (or Kindom as suggested by later feminist philosophers) of God because God’s love and grace must triumph above all. Universalists preach the importance of compassion and service to humanity in accordance with the teachings of Christ. Universalists believe that their faith is deeply rooted in the Bible and the early Church despite not aligning closely with most modern interpretations of Christianity.
The formation of Unitarian Universalism, at least as an official and separate faith, took nearly 100 years. Unitarians and Universalists had established organizations separate from each other. For Universalists, there was the Universalist Church of America (UCA) which was founded in 1793. For Unitarians, the American Unitarian Association (AUA) was founded in 1825. These organizations and belief systems existed separately, though many believers subscribed to both theologies. Due to the significant overlap in theology, there had been interest in combining the religions on both sides. One of the obstacles that stood in their way were the demographic and geographic differences in members. Unitarians mostly resided in New England, while Universalists had spread into the West. There, too, was a difference in economic status of the two churches, with Unitarians coming from a far wealthier background.
Despite these differences, efforts to consolidate the two faiths were being made. Resolutions for a merger were proposed as early as 1865, though failed through a vote. But that was not the end of the efforts. The two faiths continued to have close ties to each other, and in 1908 both became part of the National Federation of
Religious Liberals along with the Religious Society of Friends and the Central Conference of American Rabbis.
Theological disagreements like the degree to which Christianity should be embraced by the religion continued causing efforts to consolidate the Churches to fail as well as differences in structure of their organizations. Finally, in 1959, plans to consolidate were presented at the General Assemblies of the UCA and AUA. The resolution to consolidate was passed, followed by the creation of bylaws and a constitution for what came to be the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA), officially formed two years later. This merger came with lots of debates, totaling to 23 amendments to the original resolution.
Despite having its formative roots in Christian denominations, Unitarian Universalism became a multi-faith community. The Unitarian Universalist Association, after great debate, decided against embracing Chrsitian theology and Jesus as a uniquely divine figure, instead opting to state their affirmation of "the universal truths taught by the great prophets and teachers of humanity in every age and tradition."
Based on six core values, interdependence, pluralism, justice, transformation, generosity, and equity, Unitarian Universalism rejects dogmatic or prescriptive theological beliefs, instead encouraging an independent search for individual truth. Similar to both of its predecessors, it rejects the notion of the existence of an ultimate truth, embracing a variety of world views. With over 800,000 members all over the world, Unitarian Universalism has affirmed that it is compatible with other faiths, so some members may choose to identify as Christian UU or Jewish UU. However it is also a faith that can stand alone. Many Unitarian Universalists also identify as atheist, as the belief in any God is not compelled.
Unitarian Universalism draws on both Unitarian and Universalists schools of thought for many of its theological stances. It rejects the idea of sin, and similar to Universalists, reject the idea of Hell, though their interpretation is less spiritual, believing that Heaven and Hell are both states of experience on Earth. Jesus Christ is viewed as a martyr and revolutionary, but not necessarily divine. Along with its ties to Christianity, Unitarian Universalism welcomes some pagan practices, and many congregations celebrate a variety of religious and cultural holidays.
One aspect that joined Unitarians and Universalists was the emphasis on the importance of doing service. Many abolitionists and suffragettes subscribed to one of the two faiths, like Susan B. Anthony and Henry David Thoreau. This was only amplified as the two consolidated, with the UUA having a great focus on social justice work. Having built their faith on social justice work, Unitarian Universalism since its beginning has attracted many LGTQ members. The General Assembly spent decades combating anti-LGBTQ sentiment, both within the faith and in the country.
The fight for acceptance of LGBTQ people was not an easy one. Only a few years after the founding in 1961, a poll done within the UUA showed that four in five members believed that homosexuality should be discouraged. With that began the work of fostering acceptance and understanding within the new faith.
In 1970, the General Assembly (GA) passed a resolution to end discrimination against homosexual and bisexual people and to update sex education to include healthy attitudes towards diverse human sexuality. The following year, the UUA published About Your Sexuality, a sex-ed curriculum that affirmed that diversity in human sexuality is natural and beautiful. A year later, the Association published The Invisible Minority, literature advocating for the rights of gay people. Knowing more active work needs to be done, the Association created the Office of Gay Affairs in 1974, which was later renamed to Office of Bisexual, Gay, Lesbian and Transgender Affairs twenty years later.
At this historical point in America, the fight for LGBTQ rights was intensifying, but still facing significant pushback. Only a year before the GA passed its resolution to end discrimination, a riot broke out at the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar, in response to a police raid that became the catalyst for the Gay Liberation movement. Marsha P Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, both transgender women, were fighting to help unhoused queer youth after facing homelessness themselves. A moral panic about gay teachers swept the nation in the 1970’s and elected officials like Harvey Milk, the first gay man elected to public office in California, combated the homophobic rhetoric around the influence of gay people on children. Milk was later assassinated.
Despite the Gay Liberation movement gaining more and more attention, the public was not positively disposed. In 1977, the majority of people did not believe homosexuality should be legal, and barely more than 1 in 10 believed people were born gay.
Nevertheless, the efforts made by the Association had clearly paid off, because only twelve years after the vast majority of
Unitarian Universalists stating they thought homosexuality should be discouraged, Douglas Morgan became the first openly gay UU minister in 1979. Following him taking on the call to ministry, the Association passed a resolution to lend full assistance to lesbian, gay, and bisexual Unitarian Universalists to become ministers in 1980.
To continue their efforts, the General Assembly founded the Welcoming Congregation Program in 1989 to help their congregations become more accepting of the LGBTQ community. The program did have a slow start, with only a quarter of all congregations being registered as welcoming congregations 11 years later, though the number doubled in the following six year
By 1993, the Association had endorsed the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Equal Rights and Liberation, followed by passing a resolution in support of LGB people’s service in the military.
After the first mention of trangender people by the UUA in 1996, the UUA sponsored an affirming training on transgender issues in 1997.
Now, Unitarian Universalism is considered one of the most welcoming faiths for LGTBQ people. Zr. Alex Kapitan (ze/zim , a queer Unitarian Universalist community minister, described zis experience in the faith as such: “I was born outside the closet, thanks to generations of fierce ancestors who paved the way and made this possible for me. And thanks to Unitarian Universalism. Thanks to my queer UU faith.” The fight for acceptance of LGBTQ people, especially transgender and gender nonconforming people, is far from over. But Unitarian Universalism is paving the way for how religious communities could incorporate queer acceptance into their theology.
Judy Corbeille
On a recent Sunday, I sat down with Judy Corbeille to have a chat about the history of Second Unitarian. Judy, who uses she/her pronouns, has been coming to the church for four decades. I doubt I could find somebody more knowledgeable about the story of our congregation. Our conversation took place after the new member orientation, the first two-hour long session for those looking to join the Church, educating them on how 2U came to be, dating all the way back to 1857.
Sitting on the second floor of the church in the Loft we spoke of the LGBT ministers our church has seen, the search for new ministers, and the election. I’ll let her tell it.
[Comments and historical context for clarification appear in brackets like this throughout this document.]
ALEKSEI SOKOLOV: What was your faith growing up?
JUDY CORBEILLE: I didn’t have one. I was unchurched. My father would have been Catholic when he married my mother in 1938. And my mother was, I don’t know, maybe Methodist. But back in those days, you just decided not to be Catholic anymore. So, when I was growing up we always had fish on Fridays. I didn’t go to Church unless I went to Sunday School with a girlfriend. It wasn’t until I was in my forties that I found this Church.
ALEKSEI: And how did you find this Church?
JUDY: I was seeing a therapist and she was recommending a church as a place for community, because I’m single. And I kept saying no, and finally she wore me down and I decided, I made a list of three churches that I thought were liberal. And I didn’t know anything about the Unitarians, but this one was number one on my list, mainly because it was about a mile from home and I could walk. There was a Presbyterian church down on Fullerton and there was a Methodist Church down in Evanston. I never went to either one of those. I just stayed right here.
ALEKSEI: And how long have you been coming here?
JUDY: Since 1985. Joined the church in 1986.
ALEKSEI: Could you tell me a little bit more about the queer ministers we’ve had at our church?
JUDY: Sure. Charlie Kast was first. It was so unusual that there was a neighborhood newspaper called the Booster that wrote a big article about the fact that this church had chosen a gay minister.
[Charlie Kast was many things. He was an anti-war Civil rights activist, a veteran, a gay man, and eventually a Unitarian Universalist minister. Charlie, who did not capitalize his name in writing, was a minister at Second Unitarian during the peak of the AIDS crisis, and a foster parent to 125 children in the span of 25 years. In an article titled “Diverse church hails minister” written by the Booster, a local newspaper, he was quoted as saying “I want to be known as a minister who is gay, not a gay minister”. The congregation voted 110-4 to elect him as the new reverend. Charlie passed away in 2022.]
[The article Judy refers to here is “Diverse Church Hails New Minister”, published on 10/16/1985.]
JUDY: So it was a big deal. Following that, [insert name]. She was a lesbian, she and her partner were here for, I think, four years, and then, let’s see. Adam [insert 2.10] was also gay. Jason is gay... None of the interim ministers that we’ve had were gay as far as I know, but during the times of the AIDS crisis, this church became rather well known as a place where you could have a funeral. Many churches wouldn’t allow people who’ve died of AIDS to have a funeral in their church. And this church was especially known. There was a novel by Rebecca MakKai.I can’t remember the name of it, but if you look up her name, she actually mentions Second Unitarian in her novel about us having those funerals for gay people.
[Rebecca MakKai is the author of the novel The Great Believers. The novel follows a group of gay men during the AIDS crisis in the 1980’s and 1990’s in Chicago. The novel has won numerous awards since its publication in 2018.]
The other thing is, during Charlie’s time, there was a world AIDS quilt that was making a tour around the country and this church actually had one square on display. I can’t remember the actual date, but I know for sure that Charlie had arranged for one of the squares to be on display. And during his time we probably had a gay caucus, a group of people who were supporting gay and lesbian causes. And then, it just kind of drifted away, and when we began to wonder why that
happened, we kind of came to the conclusion that gay were finding other safe places where they could be themselves and they didn’t necessarily need an identifiable church. So, we don’t have a particular group that identifies as gay.
ALEKSEI: With the first gay minister, what was the reaction of the community to that? Was it receptive?
JUDY: Oh yeah, yeah. He was called by a large margin. The way that ministers are elected, the search committee submits a name to the Board of Trustees. The minister is then invited to come to Chicago and preach one Sunday, meet with people all week long, and preach the second Sunday. And at the end of the second Sunday service, he or she leaves the building. The congregation then votes on accepting that minister. I think it’s an unwritten rule, I don’t think it’s written anywhere, but sort of an unwritten rule that a minister wants at least a 95 percent vote in order to agree to come.
ALEKSEI: 95 percent? That’s a huge margin.
JUDY: Well, keep in mind that the search committee has weeded out people that they think wouldn’t be appropriate. So by the time they’re actually giving a name to the Board, they’re pretty confident that that person is going to be a good fit. And the congregation I think trusts the process well enough to say that if the search committee is saying that this person is okay, then they’re okay.
ALEKSEI: And by the time that the vote took place, did the congregation know that the minister was gay? Was he open about that? JUDY: Oh sure, yeah.
ALEKSEI: Was there any backlash at all?
JUDY: I’m not aware of any, keep in mind I started the Sunday after Charlie had been called, so I wasn’t there during the process. So I’m not aware. I’m sure there were people in the church who thought “mmm”.
ALEKSE: Right.
JUDY: Well, I mean, even today. A couple weeks ago, the story that was read to the children had to do with trans kids, and I heard second hand, there was somebody in the congregation who thought it was totally inappropriate. I don’t think it’s a lot of people. But it’s probably somebody old who just doesn’t understand very much about what
it means to be trans and what’s involved and thought it was just not appropriate.
[Here, Judy is talking about a recent service, titled a Gender Revolution, that honored Trans Day of Visibility. During service, Brittany Moore, who leads faith education, read the book “It Feels Good to Be Yourself”. The book was about gender, and an introduction to transgender people for younger kids. The book includes quotes like “When Ruthie was born, everyone thought she was a boy. Until she grew a little older- old enough to tell everyone she was actually a girl”. The simple explanations are accompanied by colorful pages full of art depicting a diverse cast of young kids.]
ALEKSEI: We come into Second Unitarian now and I can’t imagine a more welcoming environment. But I can’t imagine it’s always been this accepting?
JUDY: Well I think that’s true. But I think part of it is what Unitarian Universalism stands for, which is the inherent dignity and worth of every person. So, when I was telling you about the Way Cool Sunday School, they were all Black kids and there were clearly people who were uncomfortable with having all those Black kids, especially poor Black kids, coming into our building every single Sunday. But that was a very small minority and they didn’t raise a ruckus and didn’t draw a lot of attention to it. I mean, clearly, there’s still people who need a lot of educating, I would say.
ALEKSEI: Would you say that you’ve watched the progress of acceptance of LGBTQ people at the church? Has it been noticeable to you?
JUDY: It hasn’t been noticeable, maybe because I wasn’t aware it was going on.
ALEKSEI: Interesting, okay. Reverend Jason said you might be one of the people to know about this. On the first floor, on the bathrooms, there are the signs that indicate them to be gender inclusive. Do you know when that happened? When those were put up?
[Here, I’m referring to the signs that read “This is a trans friendly community. Please use the bathroom that is most comfortable for you. Gender neutral bathrooms are also available downstairs”.]
JUDY: Not very long ago. Those bathrooms were remodeled... it was before COVID. I think the signs went up after the remodel. Most everything is done by a committee.
ALEKSEI: Do you think there’s still work to be done at the church for LGBTQ acceptance?
JUDY: I think there’s always work to be done. I think there’s always work to be done. I can’t think of anybody who would make a fuss. I think we are an extremely welcoming community. I mean, I know a couple of trans people because it’s one of the few places where they feel safe. That always makes me feel good. But there’s probably people who are uncomfortable. But I think they are smart enough to realize that they just need to be quiet about whatever they’re feeling. And my feeling is that you have to get to know people. And that’s the only way. I will give you a really interesting example.
ALEKSEI: Okay.
JUDY: Yesterday, I was with a friend who is a member of Fourth Presbyterian Church. Do you know that church?
ALEKSEI: Yes.
JUDY: It’s big, three thousand members. And there’s a program down there called Center for Learning, and it’s classes for seniors. It’s not a church sponsored class or program. Anyway, I take classes down there and there is a church group that’s for people who are 55 and older, which meets once a month on a Friday night and they have dinner and they bring in some speaker. It’s open to anybody, but it’s for members at the church. A few weeks ago, they had Beth Brown, the minister that’s been helping this church with the migrant family, come and speak to them about migrant issues in the city. And apparently, they asked her to come back for another meeting, probably in the Fall, to talk about what it means to be trans. And Beth is unable to do it, her schedule just doesn’t permit it. So she gave the chair of the group the name of a trans person who would be willing to come. And I was with that person, she's a friend of mine, a new friend, and she said to me, “Can I ask you something? Can I show you a pacitrue?” And she wanted to show me a picture of the trans person who’s been invited to speak. And she said, “Do you think it would be alright for them to come and speak or do you think it’s going to be off putting?” And I said “Absolutely they have to come and speak!” She thought it might be uncomfortable for these white people. For these Fourth Presbyterian members to be made uncomfortable because of this person showing up who
is trans. Now, I don’t know whether this person identifies more as female or male or how they present themselves, but she was concerned that this would make them feel uncomfortable. And I thought “Good. That’s what they need to do. They need to be made uncomfortable”.
ALEKSEI: Well, I guess the last question I had, and I know we talked a bit about it during the orientation, have you seen an influx of people coming in since the election?
JUDY: Oh, absolutely! Oh, yes.
ALEKSEI: Significant numbers?
JUDY: Absolutely significant numbers. Absolutely. I think people are scared. They need to know that not everybody is a Trumper, and they need to be in an environment where people feel the same way they’re feeling. And they’re probably looking for some answers and what to do and a church might be a good start.
ALEKSEI: Did this also happen in 2016?
JUDY: Yes.
ALEKSEI: To the same extent?
JUDY: Not to the same extent. Not to the same extent. Because, I think, he was pretty awful in 2016, but there were people in the administration who were providing some guardrails. Now, everybody around him is as awful as he is. He’s getting his ideas from somebody. It’s a lot worse now and I think, my own personal feeling is that the only thing that’s keeping us from totally becoming a dictatorship is the courts.
ALEKSEI: I also, I started going in November, so I haven’t seen the influx because I think I was part of it, but it has been so nice to see all this. Do you think it's driven up the engagement outside of Sunday service?
JUDY: I think so, I think so. I think when Joe was talking about some of the social actions that they do, I know there’s people who come and participate in those sorts of activities and aren’t necessarily members of the church.
I’d like to finish this story with a part of the sermon led by the current minister, Reverend Jason, that Judy mentioned, titled Gender Revolution.
“You must not believe the lie that you do not matter. That whatever change you can organize is so insufficient as to not be worth your time, your energy, your lifeforce. You must be willing to dream a dream that carries forward your community. This is how we rise. This day is polluted with a mistrust of truth, fertile and warm medium of unchecked cruelty and power, you must choose to scream the truth until every leaf and stone bears unrepented witness to what happens when you try to cage and snatch, to pin and frame a butterfly.”
Skye Warner
I’ve known Skye Warner since we were fifteen. We met in an English class and bonded over writing for our school Political Journal, a shared love of social studies, and eventually, college application season. Skye, who uses they/them pronouns, has always impressed me with their deep understanding of politics and theology.
I think it’s interesting to note that I knew Skye when they were still a devout Christian. It took me by surprise- probably by virtue of knowing very few religious people our age. I underestimated their dedication to the faith at that time- I still have a hard time believing they’ve read the Bible cover to cover six times. I’m barely ten chapters into Mathew and I started with the New Testament.
I feel honored to say that I was the one that introduced Skye to Second Unitarian and Unitarian Universalism. Recently, we sat down to talk about just that. I’ll let them tell it.
[Comments and historical context for clarification appear in brackets like this throughout this document.]
ALEKSEI: What was your faith growing up?
SKYE: Growing up, I was largely atheist. My family was very much like, you can be whatever you want, we’re gonna go to Christmas, we’re gonna go to Easter, but we rarely went to Church. When I got a bit older, in seventh grade, I started exploring Christianity more fully. I became a pretty avid Christian for a while before I had my full-blown crisis of faith and ended up losing my faith. Now I consider myself an atheist.
ALEKSEI: What prompted you, in seventh grade, to explore Christianity?
SKYE: The most direct thing was a magazine article telling me that people that are religious tend to be happier and I was like, “cool”. But I’ve also always kind of been more of a spiritual person, I believe in the existence of souls, I believe in some level of afterlife, and I think there is something holding the world together. To me, it doesn’t make sense that all of this works without something. So, those things all combined, and becoming a Christian was a large part of my quarantine free time.
[Skye isn’t alone in that experience. Nearly one in three Americans say that the 2020 COVID pandemic strengthened both their faith and the religious faiths of the people in their country, though this phenomenon is unique to the US, other countries report much lower numbers of increased or strengthening of faith. 35 percent of those surveyed in America believe that the pandemic carried one or more lessons from God.]
ALEKSEI: What denomination of Christianity did you belong to?
SKYE: I was baptised Presbyterian. When I was more actively Christian, I was non-denominational.
ALEKSEI: Did your beliefs ever conflict with your identity?
SKYE: Yes. Absolutely. So, I’m pansexual and non-binary, and I think there were parts of my life when I was like “It’s okay for me to be pansexual, as long as I still date a guy, since I was assigned female at birth”. Or if I wanted to be non-binary, I would tell myself, “No, you’re just confused”. That was the rough part of it, believing that I just didn’t understand what gender was. Because the Bible was such an important source in my life, above even my own personal experience, that definitely messed with me.
[Christianity has been clashing with acceptance of homosexuality. In the days of the early Church, when the theology was more heavily influenced by the Old Testament, rules around sexuality were rigid, condemning homosexuality and non-procreational sex. As Chrisitan theology developed, it continued to condemn sodomy and homosexuality as impure and sinful. The word ‘homosexual’ was first included in the Bible in 1946, though many scholars believe that to be a mistranslation. The infamous Leviticus verse most often used to condemn homosexuality, “Man shall not lie with man; it is an abomination” (Leviticus 18:22), can also be translated as “Man shall not lie with young boys”, condemning pedophelia, rather than homosexuality.]
[But even with Biblical texts translated to condemn homosexuality as sinful, attitudes of Christians have been turning towards acceptance. 70% of Catholics and 54% of all Chrisitans believe that homosexuality should be accepted in society. However, it still remains true that none of the 100 largest churches in the US are LGBTQ affirming, and Christianity continues to be weaponized against queer people.]
ALEKSEI: Did it impact other areas of your life outside of your identity?
SKYE: Sometimes. Roe V Wade was overturned while I was still Christian. That really threw me for a loop. While I never ended up going out and saying it, I think for a while I was pro-life while being Chrsitina. Obviously, right now, I’m pro-choice. But because there was so much media coming out of both sides of things like “Well look at these horrible ways that these fetuses are being aborted”, “Yeah, but look at these horrible lives mothers have to live because their ability to choose what happens to their bodies is being taken away from them”. Abortion is a very polarized issue, but I think I know where I firmly stand on that now. I didn’t have that earlier.
[Christianity has played a large role in the anti-abortion movement of the 20th and 21st centuries. Despite the word, or concept, never being mentioned in the Bible, many interpret passages about the beginning of life at conception to mean that the termination of a pregnancy is
murder. White Evangelical Christians are amongst those most likely to oppose abortion, with only a quarter believing it should be legal in all or most cases. Those who are religiously unaffiliated are amongst those most likely to support abortion, at 86% as of 2024.]
ALEKSEI: Mhm. And how did it come to be, your disillusionment with Chrisitianity?
SKYE: So, that was just a long, long, long process of being exposed to what I term as rationality. It’s this whole thing like, “Why do we know what we know?” and when you’re confused about something, try to find an answer. Don’t just assume there is an answer, but you can’t get it. I think the real question that it came down to was, why do churches burn down? It truly does not make sense to me, even with a loving God that only cares about Christians, it doesn’t make sense to me that he would make it harder for Christians to worship him.
ALEKSEI: Did your identity play at all into your disillusionment?
SKYE: I don’t think it did. While it definitely made it easier, the whole thing with rationality, it’s pretty agnostic about your gender or your sexuality. It’s just, “This doesn’t make sense to me and I don’t see how an all loving God that cares about his members would let that [churches burning down] happen”.
ALEKSEI: So, I know this story, but I’d love to hear it again. How did you come to Unitarian Universalism?
SKYE: You introduced me to it and I started coming once a month. Now, I go there pretty regularly. Once I stepped foot in that place, I was like “You know what? This could genuinely be a safe space” and since then I think it has. I’ve kind of fallen in love with that place. It’s just something that helps me grow as a human. I’m a high schooler, I don’t know what I’m doing with my life, and I’m right in the middle of making a bunch of important adult decisions. And I think that 2U really helps me at least feel better about the whole situation and I love that. Also, I loved how queer-friendly it was because Christianity hever gave me that. I never felt like I could be non-binary and accept that part of myself. Whereas at 2U, people introduce themselves with their pronouns. It’s a lot more accepting and it’s a lot safer, and I love it for that.
ALEKSEI: Were you familiar with UU as a theology before I brought it up?
SKYE: No, honestly, I was familiar with Unitarianism and Universalism, because they’re both denominations of Christianity, but I wasn’t familiar with it in the way that I understand it now. My parents, every time I tell them “I’m going to church, I’m going to 2U”, they’re like “So it’s a Christian denomination?” And I’m not like “No, it’s really not.”
ALEKSEI: When you started going, or I guess right before you started going, were you looking for a place like that?
SKYE: Kind of. I had the idea that I wanted to explore a bunch of different churches and religions, because at the time my girlfriend, Callie, and I were talking about trying out some places. So we created a spreadsheet, all of that. So I was vaguely booking for other places but not fully into it until 2U.
ALEKSEI: I know that you’re moving away for college. Is your plan to attend another UU church?
SKYE: 100%. There is a First Church of Oberlin on my campus, but I don't think I’m gonna go there. I Zoomed into service last Sunday and it was still more powerful than anything Sunday Service I went to at other churches.
ALEKSEI: Are you interested in exploring churches in the area or is this, 2U, the place?
SKYE: This is the place.
Sophia McKean
As part of my search for queer Unitarian Universalist stories, a fellow 2U member connected me with her classmate at seminary school, Sophia McKean. Sophia, who uses they/them pronouns, had unique insight to share about growing up Unitarian Universalist, their own research into the topic of the gay experience in our faith, and their calling to ministry. I’ll let them tell it.
[Comments and historical context for clarification appear in brackets like this throughout this document.]
ALEKSEI SOKOLOV: Were you raised in a religious community or like with some sort of faith?
SOPHIA MCKEAN: Yeah, I actually grew up Unitarian UniversalistGoing back on my mom's side, we were Unitarian for at least a few generations. My mom wasn't super raised in it, but she started going back to UU churches in college. And then when my mom and dad had kids, she wanted to raise us Unitarian. So we started going to church when I was pretty young.
ALEKSEI: And did you continue going since then? Or was there ever a break?
SOPHIA: Yeah, I've been pretty continuously involved. I definitely would go a lot, like all of my childhood and teenage years, I was really involved in my church as a teenager. When I went to college, I would go to church on and off, just 'cause like, you know, I got busy with college. In the few years after college, I was less involved 'cause I was moving around a lot. So I would check out churches in the area, but I wouldn't always be super consistently involved in a specific UU church. But then in the past few years- I was raised in Grass Valley, California and I just moved back about two years ago. And so I've been really involved in UF Church since then.
ALEKSEI: How was it moving between different UU churches? Was that like a difficult experience or is it kind of like, well, since it's Unitarian Universalism, it's kind of a community everywhere you go.
SOPHIA: Yeah. I mean, I was kind of surprised by, well, so in Portland, I was attending the First Unitarian Church, I think it's called. Reverend Sanford was the minister at the time who is a big figure in Unitarian Universalism. He's an amazing preacher. So I really, I know I really liked the services when I went there. It was really cool to get to see him preach. But I just wasn't super involved just because I didn't really have the time.
I was kind of surprised in Seattle and in Philadelphia,I didn't really find churches that super clicked with me, even though they were Unitarian. You know, part of that could just be like, sometimes the preaching style of the minister just wasn't for me. Like one of the churches in Seattle that I was attending was like meeting in like a basketball court because their building was being renovated. Part of it was honestly just like this space alone just didn't really feel, um, yeah. It's hard to feel as worshipful in a basketball court, even though, you know, Unitarian churches do have a long history of meeting in unconventional spaces. So I think that was part of my disconnect in the past few years. I do think that Unitarian churches can have very different characters and so it has not always clicked for me in every space I've been in.
ALEKSEI: That makes a lot of sense. Do you mind sharing how being queer has shaped your experience with Unitarian Universalism?
SOPHIA: Yeah, I mean, it's really interesting. Almost all the ministers I've had have been gay. I guess not almost all, but like my minister growing up was a gay woman. My current minister is a gay man. And in some other context I've had some other gay ministers and so I think I've had a really different experience than some people that, you know, grow up with straight ministers. And so to me, I think, it's always felt very integrated like gayness and Unitarian Universalism. And you know, also I'm 29, so there was already a lot of progress made in terms of acceptance of gay people and championing of gay rights and Unitarian Universalism by the time I was growing up. It's really interesting.
[For context, by the time Sophia was born, the Unitarian Universalist Association had endorsed the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Equal Rights and Liberation, as well as passing a resolution to fight against discrimination on the basis of sexuality twenty years
prior.]
I didn't realize that I was gay until I went to college.In preparation for this interview I was like thinking back on my experiences and
when I was a teenager, like I was really involved in youth programming and we had two people that were just like always teaching the kids and so I had a like really close relationship with them and like with this one woman, Rochelle especially. I remember, we would go on weekend
retreats sometimes with the local kids. And I remember driving, we were driving up to Tahoe, it's like an hour drive and we were blasting Lady Gaga and blasting “Born This Way” and stuff like that.In a sense, we've all grown up, like almost every single kid that I was in our group, we're all gay now. Even though I don't think any of us knew at the time or they just weren't out to me at least.
We lived in Grass Valley where I was raised. It's like a relatively small town and it's this interesting mix of liberals and rednecks and it wasn't like this super like oppressive homophobia in the town, but I don't think there was like a ton of presence of gay people. So I think like a lot of us maybe just didn't realize just because like we, I don't know. It's just like a cyclical thing. I didn't know I was gay, so I wasn't looking for gay community, so I didn't realize I was gay. But I do think that there was this generally very accepting atmosphere of gayness and Unitarian Universalism. Once I did realize I was gay, I didn't struggle with whether to tell my parents. I didn't like, I didn't really struggle in terms of accepting that. I think I struggled more with things like, “Am I really gay?” You know, like right before I had actually dated a woman. But I think Unitarian Universalism really contributed to me feeling like really able to accept that about myself and not having a conflict.
ALEKSEI: Has your Church or any of the Churches you've been to ever had struggles with backlash when discussing queer topics, or has it always been widely accepted?
SOPHIA: I've always had it be widely accepted. I mean, I'll say in my church growing up, we didn't have, and we still don't have a gay affinity group, but simply because, I mean, we only have like about roughly one 50 members. We definitely have gay members, but you know, we don't really have affinity groups for anything. I think that's just like not a big enough community in some ways. So there’s not affinity groups, but I personally am not aware of any weirdness about it. I know that my minister when I was growing up, like identified as bi at the time, but was married to a man and I think sometimes felt like people just weren't aware of her gay identity necessarily. I only learned that she was gay later. I think there was maybe sometimes not a full awareness on the community's part around like gay identity. But my impression is that no one would've had a problem with it. It's more
that I feel like bi people can struggle with that. Just like not always having their identities recognized.
At other churches, I mean, I wasn't as deeply involved. So like I wasn't seeing as much into the community, but I don't know, I've never felt like there was a conflict between gay identity and Unitarian Universalist in my experience and during the time I've been alive.
ALEKSEI: That totally makes sense. I had a question about a phenomenon we've seen at our church, and I don't know if you've seen it anywhere you've been, but there has been a measurable influx of people coming in right after the election, like literally the Sunday after. Have you seen anything like that at your church?
SOPHIA: Yeah, we definitely have had a huge increase right after the election. As I said, you know, we have approximately 150 members and our sanctuary is pretty small, and so we literally have been running out of space to hold services. We were doing two services before the pandemic, and then we were fully remote for a while and have been
doing one service since then. And so we’re considering going back to two services. We have an overflow room that we sometimes need to use. So yeah, I've definitely seen the same thing happen at my church.
ALEKSEI: Would you mind telling me a little bit, or as much as you would like about your thesis and your work and the work you've done on this topic?
SOPHIA: Yeah, definitely. I did it when I was in college, I was probably like 21.I haven't reread it since then. So I don't know if everything I said is like something I totally agree with now, but I think it was really interesting to do. I did my thesis on the gay and lesbian experience in Unitarian Universalism. I was a religion major and I went to Reed College where you have to do a year-long thesis.
[The Reed Thesis is described by the college itself as such- “During your final year, you will plunge headlong into an intellectual adventure—the senior thesis. Undertaken with support from a Reed professor, the thesis is your opportunity to explore a problem or answer a question that holds particular significance to you.”]
I had been really interested in the history of gay people in our church. I wanted to look at the LGBT experience in general, but honestly, I just found that there's even less documented history of trans people in our religion than there is of gay, lesbian,and bisexual people.It was a year long undergrad thesis, which is actually
kind of like a short amount of time, so I was like, “I’m just gonna narrow my scope and write about the gay experience”. I was having trouble finding information about that history. So, I did some research and I also worked with, I think it's called First Unitarian in San Francisco. I worked with the church in San Francisco and I found, I think like six or eight people from that church that were gay in some way and were willing to talk to me. And so I did interviews with them. And so the coolest part of my thesis is that I transcribed the interviews and had them as an appendix at the end of my thesis. The more research that I did, I think, similar to you, I just wanted to record a tiny piece of it, right? Gay history. So the people I spoke to- It was interesting. A lot of them were older, probably like sixties plus, but a lot of 'em also hadn't been involved in Unitarian Universals before the eighties.
It was very cool. I mean, I have, like, I have the same questions,kind of about, you know, like, did you ever experience conflict between our religion and your gay identity and like, I mean, partially by virtue of being in San Francisco and their involvement only being since the eighties...But I don't remember off the top of my head, I think everyone had really positive experiences. A lot of my research ended up focusing on Unitarian Universalism's involvement in the fight for gay marriage. Because that's where there's the most history. I forget what they're called exactly, but like social justice statements that like we passas part of GA [General Assembly] every year, we passed a social justice statement about supporting gay marriage, like before any other religion. And we were really involved. And like, the cool thing is that when I was re you know, I won't get into all of it 'cause you can, I'll send it to you and you can read of course.
[The Unitarian Universalist Association issued a resolution in support of same-gender marriage in 1996. The resolution stated “Be it finally resolved that the 1996 General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association urges the member congregations to proclaim the worth of marriage between any two committed persons and to make this position known in their home communities.”]
But like, I think the cool thing for me was the conclusion that I came to that I still think is true. As I was researching it, it seemed like we hadn't really had a super strong theology around marriage because we'd been super, as a religion, like sort of swung into that seventies culture of free love that was kind of liberatory. But also it was kind of really damaging as it played out and just like reacting against like, you know, such strict, you know, no sex before marriage, like
all these things around marriage that like were pretty damaging and coming from other religions. We had sort of reacted against it.
And so it was like, we didn't really have like, “Okay, well what do we think marriage is if we don't think it's like just between straight people?” We don't think you have to wait to have sex before then. We don't think you can never get divorced. We were just like, we don't think about all these things.
But then when we got involved in fighting for gay marriage, it like became apparent, well, what we need to have a theological basis for what we think marriage is because that's gonna help us advocate for this. And so I think a really cool thing is like, it's not just that
like Unitarians, like we've, it's not just that we've like supported gay rights, I think that like queer people have like really enriched our religion because like our fight for gay marriage made us come to this like deeper understanding of what we thought marriage was like
just as a whole.
So that was really cool. The people I interviewed also talked about Gavin Newsome. In San Francisco, he was the mayor at the time. He temporarily was like, “We're gonna issue marriage licenses to gay couples” before it was legal in California. And so some of the people I talked to went and got marriage licenses in that two day period or like a very short period, but they went and got marriage licenses. They had very personal experiences and so it was really cool that I got to speak to people and hear those like personal experiences that connected more like academic research I had been doing. So off the top of my head, that's like a little bit about my thesis.
[The then mayor of San Francisco, Gavin Newsome, directed the city to issue marriage certificates for same-gender couples in 2004 between February 12 and March 11. All the marriage licences, however, were voided the following August by the California Supreme Court. Gay marriage was legalize in the state four years later.]
ALEKSEI: You mentioned developing theology. Is there now theology around marriage yet in Unitarian Universalism?
SOPHIA: We started to develop more of a theology around marriage at the time that we were fighting for gay and lesbian rights. I mean, as with everything, it's not like we have one Unitarian theology of marriage. Right? But I do think we were developing this in the eighties onwards, eighties, nineties. We started developing more robust marriage counseling. And so like there's, you know, you can
find guides where like those people that develop those are like offering their theology around marriage.When we started developing, that's when we started developing “Our Whole Lives”, the Sex Ed curriculum.
“Our Whole Lives” is the UUA sexual education curriculum that aims to build self acceptance and challenges myths around sexuality. The UUA states the curriculum is built around the values of sexual health, self worth, responsibility, justice, and inclusivity. The curriculum is broken down by age, from K-1 to Adult.
I think most ministers now have more, and I'm really generalizing, but I do think there's like a deeper understanding that ministers have today of what marriage means. Other than just like everyone should just like to do what they want, which, you know, like there's this tension always in your Universal between really wanting to affirm individualism and individual choice, but then also like, where's the coherence of our identity?
I think for me, like what I was seeing as common, common threads. My thesis advisor was an Eastern Orthodox man. He was practicing Eastern Orthodox anD taught that as well, which was really interesting because it's like, in some ways very opposite. Like Eastern Orthodoxy is so community based and he was talking about his understanding of marriage is like, it's not about you. It's not even really about the couple, like, it's about what you're doing for the community, like you're following God's will and that marriage is this very divine thing. You're supposed to have children, he just described it as divine suffering. it was really interesting andI don't know, I can't do justice to like the way he talked about it.
[Eastern Orthodox Christianity offers significantly stricter rules around marriage than most other faiths. Interfaith marriages are discouraged and marriage between an Orthodox and non-Orthodox Christian must take place in an Orthodox church. Widows are expected to remain faithful to their late husbands. And of course, marriage is only recognized between one man and one woman.]
It made me realize that I think Unitarian Universalists like the theology of marriage is really different. We're communally holding the couple. I think it's this microcosm of like this larger tension of like, it's this affirmation of like the beauty of these two individuals and the affirmation of their choice to come together, but also like the community is coming together to affirm that choice.
I think that the theology of marriage and I don't know, my theology of marriage is like, it's this affirmation of both. The beauty of individualism, but as affirmed in community and ]our interdependence and in our inheritance and dignity.That interplay of it.That’s my rambling answer to that.
[While Unitarian Universalist beliefs around marriage vary, one proposed description of marriage that I find fascinating is described through three elements: 1) intimate relationship between the couple, 2) a social relationship between the couple and their broader social web or community, and 3) a relationship with something larger than humans.]
ALEKSEI: No, that's totally fair. I know you talked about you majored in religion, right? In college?
SOPHIA: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
ALEKSEI: What have you done with that degree since graduating?
SOPHIA: So I am actually in seminary right now. To become a Universalist minister.
ALEKSEI: Oh that’s amazing, okay. How long have you been in seminary school now?
SOPHIA: Yeah, this is just my second semester, so I'm still pretty early in it. But yeah, I actually, I've wanted to be a Unitarian minister since I was 16. And so my religious studies, I mean, I was also just really interested in religion. But the religion undergrad degree was sort of like a part of that interest in ministry. I'm finally actually pursuing it now.
ALEKSEI: Is it difficult finding a job from what you know as a minister?
SOPHIA: So, this is all just like hearsay. I don't know the statistics, right? But when I was considering becoming a UU minister, I was like, “Is this a little crazy” And my mom, who's also very involved with the church, was telling me that she's heard from our minister- there's actually I think a shortage of candidates that are interested in being like pastoral ministers. So like being called and settled in a church, um, because. More and more people are turning to some form of community ministry. I think we are at a really interesting inflection point of church, you know, used to be something
that you were like, sort of had to go to in American society I mean. You know, there's always been like Jewish people that were going to synagogue and stuff like that. But just like the cultural norm was often like, we expect most people to be going somewhere on Sunday morning. That societal pressure is just like less and less.
[Pastoral ministers are similar to pastors in other faiths. However, community ministers take on a different role. They’re not necessarily associated with a singular congregation, and their service sites may include prisons, hospitals, social justice advocacy groups, journalists, and many more positions.]
So I think there's this question of, “What does church mean and how does it evolve to be relevant?” And so I think some people are trying to do community ministry because, I don't know, I think some people's vision is just expanding, that vision of church. But I've always been interested in regular old pastoral ministry.I think it’s going to continue to be challenging in terms of like, will churches see a decline in revenue? But at the same time, like we were talking about before, people are feeling called to Unitarian Universalism in the wake of the election. I think we're at an inflection point, but I think probably you can find an inflection point in like every decade of our history. My feeling, I mean, I think it's like, in some ways it's not hard to find a job. I mean, I also, I haven't, I'm not actually on the job market yet, so you know. But my impression is you can find a job, but there's also, there's gonna be unique challenges in this time period of what that is gonna look like. But I don’t know. I think that, I don't know, becoming a Unitarian Universalist minister probably has always been a little crazy.
And if I feel called to it, I just gotta run with that.
Drew Heckman
Drew and I first met to discuss starting an LGBTQ affinity group at our church and hosting a queer dinner as the kick-off event. Our church hasn’t had any sort of consistent group for queer people in, from my understanding, decades. From an earlier conversation, I learned that we used to have a gay caucus, that eventually dissolved, at least in part due to the fact that queer people were becoming more accepted broadly and did not need to seek a safe space at the church. But as the political climate gets more and more dangerous for queer, and especially for transgender people, I think many of us are seeking community.
In any case, me and Drew have met a few times to discuss how we’re gonna make this work, from scheduling to our intentions for the group. Drew, who uses he/him pronouns, works with LGBTQ asylum seekers here in the US. This time, we sat down to talk about his history with Unitarian Universalism and social justice. I’ll let him tell it.
[Comments and historical context for clarification appear in brackets like this throughout this document.]
ALEKSEI SOKOLOV: In what faith, or religious community, did you grow up in?
DREW HECKMAN: I didn’t really go to church that much growing up until I was in middle school. Then, I started to go to the Methodist Church so I could get confirmed, the United Methodist Church in Omaha, it was called Saint Luke. We went every Sunday for a year until I got confirmed and then we literally never went back.
ALEKSEI: Was there a reason your parents wanted you to get confirmed?
DREW: Only because that is what other middle-class white parents were doing in Omaha at the time. They’re not particularly religious people, they don’t go to church anymore. And they didn’t before they took me for a while, so I really don’t know what that was about.
[Confirmation, in the United Methodist Church (UMC), is the first time a Christian vows to live by the church's covenant and officially becomes a professing member of the UMC and their congregation. Before confirmation, church members will usually attend youth groups, services, service projects, and a variety of other church-sponsored
faith activities. While there is no age minimum for getting confirmed, the UMC states that since this requires a degree of agency and commitment, this is more compatible with early adulthood, or at least late childhood.]
ALEKSEI: Was the church that you went to accepting or progressive?
DREW: It’s hard to remember, because I did was youth group. I don’t think they ever really talked about gay people. So, I don’t know what their feelings were, I didn’t have a good read of the people's situation there. I sort of just did youth group and left.
ALEKSEI: When did you find out about Unitarian Universalism?
DREW: I looked into UUs when I was doing faith organizing as part of my job for the Human Rights Campaign in Nebraska. I was researching open and affirming congregations and religious traditions to see which of them might be willing to sign on to an LGBT anti- discrimination pledge. And that’s how I discovered UUs.
[On their official website, the Human Rights Campaign details the specifics of acceptance of LGBTQ people in the Unitarian Universalist faith, including that Unitarain Universalit Association has fully supported LGBTQ people since 1970.]
ALEKSEI: Is that when you started going personally?
DREW: No, I actually didn’t start going personally until a couple years ago. So that’s probably like ten or fifteen years later. I started going personally because I was looking for jobs and one of the jobs I interviewed and got pretty far in the interview process for was at an interfaith organization. During that process I was wondering “What tradition would I identify with? What services would I go to?” So, I remembered my UU encounters from the past and did some reading. I read A Chosen Faith, which is a book about UU and then looked up the Second Unitarian Church and saw that Rev. Jason was the pastor. And I was like, “Oh, he’s really cool”. So, then I started attending on Zoom and eventually started attending in-person.
ALEKSEI: Can you tell me a little bit more about your career?
DREW: Yeah, so I got started doing LGBTQ activism and organizing in Nebraska, which is where I'm from. And then after, so while I was an undergraduate student, I started an organization called the Queer Nebraska Youth Network, which was for LGBTQ youth throughout the
state. It provided health and national online discussions, in-person social events, and then connections to resources in the community. And then after that, and after graduating from undergrad, I got hired by the Human Rights Campaign to be their field organizer for the state. So I did that for a little over a year. And then I went to law school and policy school. And after that, I was an immigration attorney for a year and change, working with LGBTQ asylum seekers. And now I'm at Rainbow Railroad, which is an international nonprofit that helps LGBTQ people fleeing persecution.
[The Rainbow Railroad is a nonprofit that is based in the United States and Canada, helping LGBTQ people escape persecution. The organization has helped 19,000 people since their founding in 2006. They offer support through emergency travel support, cash assistance, partnership development, government resettlement pathways, information services, and crisis response. Over 7,000 people have requested the organization’s support since the beginning of 2025 as of May.]
ALEKSEI: Has that job changed since the new administration?
DREW: Yeah, I was implementing a State Department program in the US called Welcome Corps, sort of like Peace Corps or AmeriCorps. It was a national volunteer program that let volunteers get involved in refugee resettlement by forming volunteer teams and then getting paired with refugees who were arriving. And they would help them for their first three months in the country. After Trump was inaugurated, the Welcome Corps was canceled and all refugee admissions were halted indefinitely. So there's currently no refugees who are arriving. So that part of my work has ended.
And we've been building a few different programs to go in its place. The main program is the one that I'll be working on that we'll be launching soon called Community Support Teams. And so that very similar to Welcome Corps is where we will recruit and train volunteer teams who will be paired with LGBTQ asylum seekers for a period of about six months. And they'll help them do a number of things like learn how to access food banks in their local community, learn where the LGBTQ center is, plug into health care, whatever help they might need, the volunteers can help them navigate that locally.
ALEKSEI: And what is the difference between, in this context, a refugee seeker and an asylum seeker?
DREW: Yeah, so it's a similar population. It's people who have experienced persecution or would experience persecution in their home
country based on race, religion, nationality, or membership in a particular social group. And for LGBTQ people, it's that last one, membership in a particular social group, which is the LGBTQ community. That's their basis for protection.
The only difference between refugees and asylum seekers is where they request humanitarian protection. So people who come to the U.S. first and then request protection once they're here move through the asylum system. And while they're still waiting for their case to be decided, they're called an asylum seeker. Once the base is granted, if they are
awarded asylum, they become an asylee.
Refugees, on the other hand, are people outside of the U.S. who are usually displaced to some other third country that isn't their country of origin, who seek humanitarian protection, usually by getting in touch with the United Nations. And from there, the United Nations will determine what someone's best option is, whether they can eventually return to their home country, whether they should permanently resettle in that third country where they're transiting through, or whether they should permanently relocate to a country like the U.S. as a refugee. And so refugees do all of their processing abroad before they even come to the U.S. So they do security screenings, they do health screenings, and they do their resettlement interview, and they pass all of that. So on the day that they arrive in the U.S., when they take their first steps off the airplane, they have a permanent legal status in the U.S. And so after being here for a year, they can get their green card, and in a few more years, they can get their citizenship. And so refugees also have access to a number of public benefits from the moment they get here. They have work authorization so they can get a job. They can get Medicaid, which is health insurance. They can get refugee cash assistance, which is like a monthly cash stipend for their first few months.
Asylum seekers, on the other hand, don't really have access to public benefits. And in fact, they don't even have the right to work until six months after they have submitted their asylum application. From then, they can get their work authorization document, which is called an EAD, Employment Authorization Document.
ALEKSEI: And what is currently the standard of proof required to be granted asylum as an LGBTQ asylum seeker in the U.S.?
DREW: LGBTQ people have to prove the same thing as anyone else requesting asylum. that you have experienced harm or would experience harm amounting to persecution. So it has to be pretty serious. In your
country of origin, that harm has to be by the state or by actors that the state cannot or will not control. And that harm has to be because of your protected characteristic. So it can't be because you owe your neighbor money and so she hates you and wants to fight you. It has to be because someone doesn't like the fact that you're LGBTQ and wants
to punish you for that.
You also have to show that there's no safe place for you in your country of origin. So the reason that U.S. citizens can't really seek asylum anywhere right now is that, like, yes, it might be bad in red states, but there's still places like Chicago, like San Francisco, like New York, where people could go to find safety. So those are the broad things you have to prove. And then you also have to show that you're not ineligible, like that none of the bars to asylum apply to you, meaning you haven't committed a particularly serious crime, you haven't been involved with any sort of terrorism, and you have to file your asylum application within one year after arrival. If it's after that, you need an exception.
ALEKSEI: Do you know what percentage of people who apply for asylum because they're LGBTQ get approved in the United States?
DREW: In general, I don't know. But what I can tell you is that I used to work at the National Immigrant Justice Center on their LGBTQ Immigrants Rights Team, and our success rate was, like, above 95%. I will say of all of the types of cases, asylum is pretty cut and dry for LGBTQ people, because typically they're being persecuted very clearly for their sexual orientation or gender identity and often it's by complete strangers. So the motive is often pretty obvious. And in a lot of those cases people are coming from countries that outright criminalize LGBTQ identity. So it's not difficult to show a lack of state protection when the state is one of the actors persecuting people.
ALEKSEI: Are there specific countries from which you saw many people?
DREW: I had clients from all over. I had clients from Jamaica, Mauritania, Senegal, El Salvador. Guatemala. I'm trying to think. And then in my work with refugees we saw people come from some additional countries. Venezuela, Colombia, Syria, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Ivory Coast. There's over 60 countries today where it's illegal to be LGBTQ. So any country on that list we've probably seen someone at one point or another.
ALEKSEI: Since the new administration has it become more difficult to be granted asylum or has the process stayed about the same?
DREW: That's an interesting question. It's not clear if the standard for receiving asylum has changed at all, but it has become much more difficult for people to arrive in the U.S. and request asylum. So people at the southern border are pretty much just being turned away now without being given the chance to apply for asylum, which is illegal under international and domestic law and is being challenged in the courts. But people who are able to arrive on potentially a valid visa, like a tourist visa, are still able to come into the country as normal. And then at some point after that they can submit an asylum case if they feel they have a fear of return
ALEKSEI: How have either Unitarian Universalist values informed the work you do or the other way around?
DREW: I think the reason I came to the Unitarian Universalist community was because I was very interested in a non-dogmatic spiritual community that really centered some of the values that I cared about, like human dignity, like the value of human life, like community, like justice, like equity. And I really historically have not liked being told what to believe religiously. And so I think one of the things I really appreciate about UUs is their sort of choose your own adventure approach to faith where it's like we will expose you to lots of different ideas from lots of different traditions and we want you to critically engage with them and take what's helpful and leave the rest. So I think that's how I got where I am today. And I think what's helpful about services and the activities I'm involved in at the church is that it's like a way to live out a lot of my commitments and beliefs. And even just seeing the crossover between my work and UU has been cool because UU is one of the first organizations to form a private sponsor group in the Welcome Corps program. Alicia led that. It was very great. And I think Alicia is really interested in also fielding a team for this community support teams program.
ALEKSEI: Oh, yeah. Do you know how it's going with the family at the church?
DREW: I just talked to Alicia a couple days ago. It sounded like it's going well. I think there's just some questions about what the next steps are for the family. I think because the husband got detained, the wife wasn't yet working. There's questions about whether it makes sense for them to stay in Chicago, whether they might even want to consider going back to Venezuela now that some of the political
climate has changed. And now that the political climate in the U.S. is also changing for the worse.
Kristin Clowes
Kristin and I really met during an Advocacy Day hosted by Equality Illinois. Every year, EI hosts a day where they bus volunteers to Springfield, where they advocate for progressive bills in the State Capitol. This year, EI fought to codify the right to public education regardless of immigration status, to update the parenting laws and protections to include a more diverse range of family structures, and for a healthcare transparency bill.
Neither of us got ahold of our representatives, but nevertheless, it was a day of directly engaging with the democratic and legislative process of our state.
Kristin, who uses she/they pronouns, grew up a Unitarian Universalist. We spoke about how her religious upbringing informed her life now, how Unitarian Universalists are involved in social justice work now, and about what young Unitarian Universalists were up to in the 90’s. I’ll let them tell it.
[Comments and historical context for clarification appear in brackets like this throughout this document.]
ALEKSEI SOKOLOV: What faith or religious community did you grow up in?
KRISTIN CLOWES: I was raised Unitarian.
ALEKSEI: Were your parents also raised Unitarians? Or did they convert?
KRISTIN: Neither of their families were extremely religious growing up. But I think... Oh, man. Actually, I don't even know. They were both raised Protestant.But I don't know which exact faith.
ALEKSEI: Were you active in the Unitarian Universalist community growing up?
KRISTIN: Yeah, I was. When I was young, there were a lot of youth conferences. There was an organization called YRUU. They planned all of these regional conferences, and so they were all over the place. I was in Wisconsin, and the Midwest region was, I think, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Michigan, Indiana. So they did youth conferences. And so there were three really huge ones every year, and then there were a whole bunch of mini ones. And so I was involved in some of those.
[Young Religious Unitarian Universalists, or YRUU, is the term for regional youth organizations of Unitarian Universalists. Many churches now have their own YRUU groups for teens in the congregations. These organizations were particularly active during the mid to late 20th century in their political organizing. The predecessor to YRUU, the Liberal Religious Youth (LBY), organized national conferences and rallies in support of social and political issues. The cons were mostly youth led and organized, allowing young adults to take on leadership roles in their advocacy.
David Lotz, a former participant in LRY between 1969 and 1974 said the following about his experience with LRY:
“ I do not know of any group youth or otherwise that provided the insight and experiences that I was fortunate enough to experience through LRY. My teen years well into my life have been molded by my experience, the friends I made, the insights I acquired, the people I loved. The seventies for me was initiated by LRY. All the political upheaval from the Vietnam War to Watergate and beyond mirrored our struggles to fight the good fight for social and civil justice. There was a lot of Peace and Love within LRY but it was life, not fantasy, that made us who we really are.”]
KRISTIN: Within my own church, we had a social justice group. And I was only somewhat involved in that. I wasn't one of the leaders, and I wasn't one of the most active members. But I did some work with them. And we also had a youth group, and we did a bunch of just kind of fun activities with the youth group.
ALEKSEI: What did the youth conferences entail that you had mentioned?
KRISTIN: Well, some people would say drugs, but that wasn't something that I got involved in. So the big ones were like a weekend long, and so we would stay. There were homestays. The
Friday night, you would arrive, and then you would stay at the home of somebody who was a volunteer from the hosting church. And with a whole bunch of other kids that were also at the con. And then everybody would reconvene Saturday morning, and there would be all kinds of workshops. And the workshops depended on what the theme of the con was. But it was often just kind of silly things. Like, have you ever played silent football?
ALEKSEI: I don't think so.
KRISTIN: Okay. It has nothing to do with football. It's just a dumb game that everybody who went to cons pretty much had to learn. And there were massage workshops. There were meditation and yoga workshops. And some of them were actually serious. But it really depended on what the host church youth group decided to make the theme.
And then the smaller cons weren't necessarily a whole weekend long. Sometimes they were just for a day. But those were usually more focused on one action or one idea. But the big ones were just kind of just a free-for-all. There would be like hundreds of kids from all over the Midwest region just hanging out together.
ALEKSEI: What were some examples of themes that they would have?
KRISTIN: I mean, they were very loose. So the first one that I ever went to was called DefCon. They all had con at the end. So that one was more focused on the idea of being anti-war. So some of the workshops were actually serious and were about how to put together peaceful protests and some of the actions you could do. Like one of them was like how to get involved with Amnesty International. But those probably weren't the ones that I went to. I probably just went to the ones that all of my friends signed up for. And yeah, so that was kind of the theme of DefCon.
And I remember one that I couldn't go to was called LepreCon. And that one was based more on the idea of magic. And so some of the workshops might have been more like just talking about fantasy, like whatever fantasy fiction was popular at the time. And I think there was a workshop about Wicca. Yeah, it's just they were mostly just people hanging out. It was very loose themes.
ALEKSEI: Have you stayed active in the Unitarian Universalist Church throughout your life? Or did you ever take a break from it?
KRISTIN: I took a break. I would have still called myself a Unitarian, but I was not active with any congregation for quite a while. I went to college in Holland, Michigan at a religious school that ended up not being great for me. It was way more religious of a religious school than I was prepared for. And there were no Unitarian churches anywhere near there. So I didn't go to any Unitarian churches at that point.
And then for a year, I lived in Milwaukee and I did not attend any churches while I was there. And then I moved to San Francisco for a year. And I kept meaning to go to the San Francisco church, but never made it. There's a theme here. And then I moved, I was in culinary school in San Francisco. And so when I finished school, I moved to Tucson, which is where my now husband was living. And eventually, I mean, I lived there for a couple years before we got involved in the Tucson church. But eventually we did start going to the church in Tucson. And he was more involved than I was because I worked in food service and I wasn't always able to attend on Sundays. But that was how we kind of got back into going to church.
So then when we moved to Chicago, we knew a lot of people in Chicago who were already Unitarian, we already knew a lot of Unitarians in the Chicago area. So when we moved to Chicago, it was like, of course, we're going to go to church because we already know people there. And so we've been at 2U since we moved there. And I think that was 2007, 2008.
ALEKSEI: Is there any specific reason you picked 2U?
KRISTIN: Yeah, because we knew a bunch of people at 2U. I mean, we live in Rogers Park and we have since we moved here. And we moved once from an apartment to we bought a condo and we moved three blocks. So we're kind of equidistant between the Evanston Church and 2U. Those are probably the two closest congregations. that we knew about. There's actually a third one, North Shore Unitarian, but it's much smaller and we didn't even know about it. I think it came down to that we just knew more people who went to Second Unitarian. Also, I have a feeling that's where we would have chosen anyway, had we known more people in the Evanston Church. I think that there's just a very different vibe between Second Unitarian and the Evanston Church. And I think we would have chosen Second Unitarian.
ALEKSEI: Yeah, from what I've heard people say that Second Unitarian is more personal, because Evanston has a bigger congregation.
KRISTIN: Yeah, I feel like we're just a little bit more... I'm trying to think of, like, the word that comes to mind is gritty, but I don't mean that in a bad way. I feel like Evanston is a little bit more polished. And they actually have a more extensive social action network than Second Unitarian does. But I think it has to do with the fact that a lot of people at Second Unitarian already work in non-profits or they work in social justice circles. And so they come to church not to find a social action community, but to, like, fill their cup back up. And so there are a lot of people who are very active in social justice who don't do social justice at 2U.
ALEKSEI: I know you mentioned that you work for a non-profit. Can you tell me a little bit more about that?
KRISTIN: Oh, yeah. I mean, I don't feel like I'm in the category I was just speaking of, because the non-profit I work for is called the Women's Business Development Center, or WBDC. And we help people who are starting their own business. And those are for-profit businesses exclusively. If anybody wants to start a non-profit, we help them find resources, but our group doesn't do that, because there are already so many other groups in Chicago that do that. So there's no reason for us to, like, try to take over their turf, you know? So when people call wanting help starting a non-profit, we give them a list of resources and say, “Here are some of the organizations you might want to go to”. I'm not doing any, like, grassroots organizing for my job that I work.
ALEKSEI: Are you involved at all with, like, social justice work outside of your career?
KRISTIN: I think just at Second Unitarian.But I have gotten involved in other social justice networks just through connections that I've made at Second Unitarian. Like, I think that, like, the Equality Illinois Day of Advocacy that I went to...Well, that we both went to last Thursday. I'm pretty sure that 2U doesn't actually partner with Equality Illinois. It was just, like, we found out about it and we just were kind of like, “Is anybody else interested in doing this?”
[As mentioned previously, Equality Illinois hosts yearly days of advocacy to encourage Illinois residents to become more active in the democratic process of the state and to encourage representatives to pass progressive legislation. This year, they advocated for the Equality for Every Family Act (HB 2683 and SB 2507), Health Care Transparency Act (HB 2904 and SB 1679) and Safe Schools for All Act (HB 3247 and SB 2065).]
I also do accounting work for the Unitarian Universalist Advocacy Network of Illinois, or UUANI. And I found out about a lot of grassroots organizing and partner organizations through UUANI. So I think that through UUANI, I first found out about ICIRR, which is an immigrant and refugee support network. And well, I already knew about prison ministry groups because Second Unitarian has been very involved in prison ministry advocacy.
ALEKSEI: What does UUANI do? What are they involved with?
KRISTIN: That's a very good question. We're kind of involved in a lot of things. So at a very superficial level, and the way that most people know about UUANI is we put out actions of the week, which is where you can sign up for an email every week where they'll make it very easy for you to contact your legislators. It's usually for statewide initiatives, but sometimes we do federal initiatives too. And so they put out one action every week and they have a boilerplate message already created. All you have to do is click a button and you've just emailed your state legislators, your state senators, sometimes your representatives to Congress. And that's all you have to do is click a button and you're done.
And that's how most people know UUANI. However, we do a lot of other things. One of the things is we work with partner organizations. Like I just mentioned ICIRR, and I can't remember what the acronym stands for, but it's an immigrant and refugee rights organization. And they're trying to get people more into gathering within their congregations into legislative advocacy groups. I'm hoping to help make that happen at 2U, which is part of the reason I went to the Equality Illinois thing. I wanted to get an idea of what an advocacy day looks like and what an advocacy group would look like. I think I got a really good idea of that even though I didn't actually get to do a whole lot of advocacy while I was there. I'm more ready to do something like that in the future. So that's good. UUPMI, which is the Unitarian
Universalist Prison Ministry of Illinois, I think, is definitely one of our partner organizations.
ALEKSEI: I know that PMI, I know that they're involved in letter writing and pen pal sort of things. Are they active in any other sorts of advocacy?
KRISTIN: I think they are. I think that that's mostly what we're trying to get people into at Second Unitarian, because it's a really good on-ramp in most cases to get people more interested in what's happening with people inside of prisons. But I think that they also do work with people who are recently released, helping them find their way back in society, like help them find jobs, because that's very difficult when you have to put on your resume, well not on your resume, but when you're filling out applications, most of the time they ask, “Have you been incarcerated?” And when you have to put yes to that, that's usually a non-starter, you don't get the job. So it can be really difficult for people just getting out of prison to find work. That's probably the hardest thing, but also housing. People are just as discriminatory with housing as with jobs. So I know that UUPMI does some work with that. I think that they also do some advocacy work on the state government level, trying to get legislation written to make prisons more safe and to improve life for prisoners. I think that they've had limited success with that, but I think that is one of their focuses.
ALEKSEI: Did growing up as a Unitarian Universalist shape what you wanted to do in terms of your career or things outside of your career?
KRISTIN: Not at first. I think that a lot of the values I learned growing up have shaped how I feel about advocacy now. But I think that in my 20s, I didn't do a whole lot of advocacy work. I went to some protests against the Iraq War, but I didn't do anything beyond that. I was part of the problem, somebody who has these ideals but doesn't do anything about them. And that's very unfortunate. I wish that I could go back and change what I did, but I can't, so I can only change what I do now. And so now I'm a lot more involved, and that's a good thing.
I can’t thank everyone enough who supported me throughout this project. To Judy Corbeille, Skye Warner, Sophia McKean, Drew Heckman, and Kristin Clowes for sitting down with me to tell me their stories. To Reverend Jason for supporting me through this project and welcoming me into the community. And to
There’s only so much one can learn independently. All the research I’ve done on the subject of Unitarian Universalism, social justice,and queerness, has been fascinating. But nothing could substitute conversations. The diversity of experiences and viewpoints I’ve encountered has helped broaden my understanding of something I care so much about.
My intention, whenever I talk about Unitarian Universalism, is never to encourage someone to join. Many people have negative or even traumatic experiences with the Church, others are tired of evangelism, which is often weaponized against queer people to shame them for their existence. I do, however, like speaking about my experiences, because I didn’t know this community existed. I didn’t know where to find anything like it. And my hope is that as we face unprecedented difficult times, people find a place to feel safe, and for some people, it might be this community.
