Worship Services at Unity Church

During the church year (the Sunday after Labor Day through the third Sunday in May) worship services are held at 9:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., and 4:30 p.m., except where noted. The entrance to the Sanctuary is at 733 Portland Avenue and parking is available in the church's lot on the corner of Portland Avenue and St. Albans Street. Map and Directions

From the Sunday before Memorial Day through the Sunday before Labor Day there is just one service each week at 10:00 a.m.
​
Each Sunday, through the work of the Generosity Ministry Team, seventy percent of the offering is placed in the hands of the chosen community non-profit recipient. The remaining thirty percent goes to support of the Community Outreach Ministry at Unity Church. Offering recipients for each Sunday are listed below the Sunday service description. If you would like to nominate a non-profit to receive the Sunday offering, please fill out the online nomination form.

March Sunday Worship
9:00 a.m., 11:00 a.m., 4:30 p.m., except where noted.

February 24: Paradise on Earth 
As Unitarian Universalists, many of us believe that paradise is found here on earth, not in a hard-earned heavenly afterlife. Yet as Joni Mitchell once sang, “we paved paradise and put up a parking lot.” Earth itself is our Garden of Eden, but we are destroying it. Join Hallman Ministerial Intern Kathryn Jay as we explore ways we might reclaim the earth as holy ground and recover paradise, bit by tiny bit.
Offering recipient:​ East Side Freedom Library
​
Story Sundays happen frequently throughout the church year, with children in grades 1-8 beginning in worship with the congregation in the Sanctuary. After the opening hymn, prayers, and children’s message, Workshop Rotation children (grades 1-5) proceed with their Journey Guides to classes while junior high youth (grades 6-8) remain in the Sanctuary for the entire worship service.

March 3: The Courage to Let Go
The word surrender carries a variety of negative connotations, but the process of surrendering into faith is an essential element of spiritual growth. Rev. Rob Eller-Isaacs and worship associate Erika Sanders will offer a service on theologies of spiritual surrender.
​Offering recipient: Project Namnyaki

March 10: Willing to Be Changed by What We've Started
In Bring Many Names Brian Wren invites us to sing: "Young, growing God, eager still to know, willing to be changed by what you’ve started, quick to be delighted, singing as you go: hail and hosanna, young growing God!" The hymn offers portraits of the many faces of the God within. It invites us to try on ways of being we can scarcely imagine. Revs. Janne and Rob Eller-Isaacs and Karen Hering will welcome us the very threshold of our changing lives.
Offering recipient: Growth & Justice

March 17: Surrender Dorothy!
Was the witch telling the Munchkins to surrender Dorothy to her, or for Dorothy, our heroine, to give up and surrender to her evilness? Perhaps only the wizard knows for sure, but Rev. Janne Eller-Isaacs and worship associate Alex Askew will wrestle with the witch to better understand what she meant as she spewed her message across the sky.
Offering recipient: Listening House St. Paul

Story Sunday • March 24: Not My Will but Thine
Given the costs of empire and patriarchy it is troubling to consider the insistence that we must submit or surrender to a power far beyond our own if we are to have any hope of spiritual fulfillment. How does power play into religious practices designed to encourage enlightenment? Rev. Rob Eller-Isaacs and worship associate Lia Rivamonte will delve into these troubled waters.
Offering recipient: Balazs Scholar Program

Story Sundays happen frequently throughout the church year, with children in grades 1-8 beginning in worship with the congregation in the Sanctuary. After the opening hymn, prayers, and children’s message, Workshop Rotation children (grades 1-5) proceed with their Journey Guides to classes while junior high youth (grades 6-8) remain in the Sanctuary for the entire worship service.

March 31: The Hope of Surrender
It has been said that surrender is the antidote to despair and the door to freedom. And yet it can take a lifetime to discern what is worth surrendering, and to what, or to whom. In a world that teaches us never to surrender our truest selves, Rev. Lisa Friedman and worship associate Bob Peskin will offer a service exploring how the practice of surrender can bring hope and meaning to our task of being human.
Offering recipient: People Helping People

Family and Story Sundays

Family Sundays 2018-19
Family Sundays take place five times each church year:
  • Sunday, September 9: Merging of Waters
  • Sunday, November 18: Thanksgiving
  • Sunday, December 23: Carol Sing/Shout
  • Sunday, April 21: Easter
  • Sunday, May 19: Flower Communion
On Family Sundays, children experience the entire worship together with their families in the Sanctuary. A children’s message and activity books related to the stories and sermon help children to engage in the experience of worship. Regular religious education programming does not take place on Family Sundays; however, the nursery is open for children under three years of age.

Story Sundays 2018-19
Story Sundays happen frequently throughout the church year, with children in grades 1-8 beginning in worship with the congregation in the Sanctuary. After the opening hymn, prayers, and children’s message, Workshop Rotation children (grades 1-5) proceed with their Journey Guides to their classrooms for religious education programming while junior high youth (grades 6-8) remain in the sanctuary for the entire worship service.
  • Sunday, October 28
  • Sunday, January 20
  • Sunday, February 24
  • Sunday, March 24