When the doctor, whom I'll call Dr. Smith, was asking me the basic first-visit questions and jotting down my answers on his official notepad, he happened to ask me what I do for a living. I told him proudly that I was the ministerial intern at the Unitarian Church in Summit. "Oh!" he said, "I was raised a UU!" Ahhh, fate! I started asking him questions, and soon I had out my official notepad and was taking notes. He told me he didn't mind if I used his story in my sermon, and I told him that he should come back to a UU church, although I confess I told him not to come here, as it would be just too embarrassing to have my doctor come to my church.

Well, as it turns out, I just had a normal flu, and Dr. Smith's story began in the Montclair UU church. Like many kids who were raised UU, including myself, his parents had been an interfaith marriage, and found a home in Unitarian Universalism. During his Coming of Age year, when his age group was asked to formulate their beliefs to present to the congregation, my doctor's self-described "scientific, rational" mind started to ask some questions that hadn't been answered in Sunday school. They had learned all about other religions in his Sunday school classes, and yet he thought that none of them -- not even Unitarian Universalism -- had been presented as "the right choice." Unlike Vince's daughters, he hadn't received the guidance he needed along his spiritual journey. At 13, he felt disillusioned by what seemed like a multiple-choice test among a bunch of man- made worship systems, and he hasn't been a member of a UU church since.

However, in Dr. Smith's own words, "The message got through." The message of UU values, doing good works, and caring for the interdependent web of existence had gotten through. When he was in medical school, he applied for and was accepted to a very selective conference for medical students interested in community activism. Naturally, conversation among the participants turned to the driving force behind their desire to use their medical degrees to do activism. Dr. Smith said to me (and I am trying to be as true to his words as possible):

There were a lot of big Christians there, even one who wanted to live like Jesus at the poverty level while working as a doctor. I was the only one there who was coming from a place of secular humanism. I didn't feel like there was a higher power or a possibility of a reward in what I was doing. One person told me they didn't think they would have the strength to do good works if they didn't have Jesus helping them. I said I didn't need strength from a faith in Jesus: I just felt like it was the right thing to do. I wanted to give back.

Here we have a man who was raised a UU, who still holds very clearly the intrinsic UU values, yet who as a child was not bonded to a sense of Unitarian Universalist identity, and who as an adult remains "unchurched."

So how do you raise a Unitarian Universalist? How do you raise a child from crib to adult whose religious and spiritual identity is firmly and joyfully Unitarian Universalist? I know what worked for me, and I've seen what has worked and is working for other life- long UUs, and I have four main theories.

These theories do not only pertain to parents of children who happen to be in RE right now. They pertain to every member of this congregation. One illustration of this is a story from the Jewish tradition. A person sees an aged rabbi planting trees. The observer asks, "Rabbi, why do you plant these trees? Truly, as a man of great age and wisdom, you do not expect to live long enough to reap a harvest; it will take many years for them to bear fruit." The rabbi answered, "I am not planting them for me, but for the generations to come." (Essex Conversations, p.33) The children of this congregation are the UUs of generations to come, and we are their UU extended family. We can all do our part in tending to their care.

So how do you raise a UU? Theory No. 1: You live your own life as an enthusiastic, dedicated adult Unitarian Universalist! Boy, does that sound obvious. But I knew children in my Sunday school classes growing up whose bathrobe-clad parents dropped them off at church on Sunday morning, then drove home to read the paper and drink coffee until it was time to pick their kids up again. Church was a baby-sitter, not a meaningful family activity. By doing the simplest things, like going to worship every Sunday, talking about what happens there, and showing enthusiasm for congregational activities, children will see a model for their own attitudes towards their religious identity. Sing hymns in the shower, say grace at the table, talk about what was said in Sunday school and during the sermon.

I saw a great example of this recently when I was lucky enough to have dinner with members of this congregation, Steven and Susan Cramer, and their daughter, Charlotte. Before dinner started, Charlotte brought out a crystal bowl. Inside was a chalice Charlotte had made herself. Using a candle, Charlotte hit the makeshift gong, which made a beautiful ringing sound. Then she and her father lit the chalice, and we all said the unison Chalice Lighting -- and of us all, Charlotte was the one who knew it by heart.

This church ritual-turned-family ritual was Charlotte's idea, and it had been warmly encouraged -- even when the ritual required giving a good whack to Susan's best crystal bowl! A child's parents are the primary religious educators, and from her parents, Charlotte was learning that what happens here is so important, we can do it every day.

Perhaps slightly less heartwarming than Charlotte's bowl is my childhood story about how Unitarian Universalism saved Mr. T. When I was in fourth grade, doing the Stepping Stone curriculum year, we were learning all about famous Unitarians and Universalists in history. During the section on Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, we actually learned how to bandage a wound in the way she might have done on the battlefield. As it happened, earlier that week I had accidentally broken the arm of my most precious doll, which was a Mr. T action figure. Thanks to the lesson of Unitarian Clara Barton, I was able to go home and bandage my Mr. T, and he lived to see another few years as a precious possession. Even the littlest lessons we learn in Sunday school and during worship are things that can make our whole lives better.

Secondly, congregations need to place a high value on religious education. I'll say it loud and proud: Sunday school teachers are my heroes! I've heard people say in recent years that you can't possibly expect a Sunday school teacher to teach every Sunday, let alone for more than one year. I disagree; we don't need to set a low bar of expectations. In the congregation I grew up in, Cedar Lane in Bethesda, Md., religious educators taught classes for years ... five, 10, 30 years! No, I'm not kidding. The woman who taught me the curriculum "Haunting House" in first-grade Sunday school -- she's still teaching that class. The two older women who taught me fifth-grade Bible study? Still teaching. The man who taught me during my "Growing Up Year" of sixth grade and who led the youth group? Still mentoring, still leading the youth group. I could go on. The respect members of the congregation have for these long-time teachers is boundless, and they try to show their admiration as best they can. When one amazing woman named Ilsa Fleischmann, bless her soul, reached 35 years of teaching the third-grade class "Holidays and Holy Days," everyone knew that a bunch of flowers was nowhere near a fitting thank you. So on Teacher Recognition Sunday, Ilsa was given a gift more precious than gold or silver: She was given her very own, personally labeled parking spot ... right next to the senior minister's.

I would not be here today if it weren't for the works of a bunch of normal, everyday people who happened to teach Sunday school for a few hours once a week. They had families and jobs, but they still taught that same Sunday school class, year in and year out. Luckily, we had two services, so people could teach and attend the service as well. I'm very close with a few of my teachers still and I remember them all with deep affection and gratitude. My entire foundation of Bible knowledge, Unitarian and Universalist history, human sexuality, and world religions was laid by the time I was 13. More than that, as a deeply shy child, I was given a priceless gift: I had trustworthy adults outside of school and home who actually listened to what I had to say and took me seriously. My Sunday school teachers were my ministers, and it is thanks to their ministry that I was able to discern my calling.

At Cedar Lane, we valued our RE teachers, gave them all the support they needed to do their job, and they earned our trust and admiration, year after year. There was a deep camaraderie and love between teachers and their generations of students. Children need caring, nurturing mentors who are not their parents, and who are not academic teachers or coaches whose job it is to grade and judge. My spiritual identity as a UU solidified when I volunteered to help teach a Sunday school class, which I did during my four years of high school. All teenagers were encouraged to become assistant teachers. Being a teacher of Unitarian Universalist religious education was such spiritually and emotionally fulfilling work that my teenage mind started thinking about how I could be equally fulfilled in my adult vocation. To successfully raise children with UU values and a UU identity, an entire congregation needs to value and support the religious education program -- with their gifts of recognition, funding and time.

My third theory is one that grows out of the first two. When asking "How do you raise a UU?" some people might think I can tell them how to create a vibrant youth group. Well, I have no idea; I was always way too shy to do anything with my church's youth group. What I do know is that every Sunday, I was expected to go to church and do something with the community. When the Sunday school curriculums ended after eighth grade, and I told my parents I did not want to attend the youth group during the service, I was given a choice: Come to the worship service with my parents or teach a Sunday school class. There was no option C, sleep in and watch TV. During my teenage years and my younger sister's teenage years, we all continued to go to church as a family. I know that kids are committed to a zillion-and-one things these days, but in my family, if there was a choice between hockey practice and church, play practice and church, band practice and church, sleeping in and church -- church always won. On Sunday mornings, we went to church -- period. It was our No. 1 priority. The way I see it, the chance is remote that a child will grow up to be a world-renowned soccer player because of all that Sunday morning soccer practice. But the chances are pretty good that a child will grow into a moral, ethical and spiritual person from all that Sunday morning church-going.

Just because I'm in training to be a minister doesn't mean I was a goody-goody, church- lovin' teen. I had my mornings of whining and saying, "Do I have to go?" But the answer to my whining was always, "Get in the car!" In the words of UU minister John Marsh:

It should be all right to expect children to attend Sunday school regularly and to make up for a missed lesson. It should be all right to ask our children to sometimes do things they consider boring. It should be all right to expect our children to be familiar with a body of knowledge about our religious heritage by the time they reach a certain age. (Essex Conversations, p.172)

Thanks to parentally enforced church-going, I was able to have the incredible experience of being a Sunday school assistant teacher for four years. If my parents had given up and said, "Fine, sleep in," I would be a better-rested but infinitely less thoughtful, spiritual and responsible person. In teaching the values and history of Unitarian Universalism, I became stronger in my own UU identity.

So here we are, trying to raise a UU, by always going to church, bringing religious education into the home, helping out in Sunday school, and giving love, admiration and apples to our religious educators. What if the child still ends up like Dr. Smith -- a good person with a sound values system, but adrift from a religious community, without a true understanding of our religious heritage and unsure of why it is so great to be a Unitarian Universalist? Dr. Smith's religious education fell into a trap that I think Unitarian Universalists need to learn to avoid. Like many young UUs today, he learned all about other religions, but in the course of that absolutely worthwhile and important education, he didn't learn why it is so special and so great to be a Unitarian Universalist.

My sister told me a story of how her UU identity was tested at a young age. She said to me in an e-mail:

I was friends in the 6th grade with a girl whose mom was an (evangelical Christian) and when she found out I was UU, she had my friend invite me to their church for some kind of fair. She tried to convert me and I was like: "NO I'm Unitarian," even when I couldn't really explain what that meant, I knew it was what I wanted to be and should be. And I think the girl's mom was (mad) because I won a jar of M&M's in the raffle and I didn't convert.

In our religious education, we need to empower our children to say: "I am a Unitarian Universalist!" Learning about other religions is profoundly important, but not if we present the entire span of world religions as relative, with Unitarian Universalism as just another drop in the bucket. UU minister Gary Smith has sounded this call. He writes:

We do not have a catechism, but we do have a history. We are not rootless. We do not teach our children that any behavior is okay. We have an ethic. We have morals. What underpins them? How did we come to this point? Who taught us these things? What is the poetry? When our children come up against (hard times), and they will, where should they turn? What have been our gifts to them? At least part of this answer needs to be concrete. We as Unitarian Universalists did not arise out of nothingness. People made sacrifices. People told stories. Our history has been written. We are charged with passing this on to the next generation. That is the task. (Essex Conversations, p.260)

My Sunday school teachers used Unitarian Universalism as the lens for everything we learned about. By the time I reached the ninth grade, it was natural to me to examine my thoughts and feelings around any topic through my spiritual identity as a UU. I could learn about another religion and visit their place of worship and be able to talk truthfully about what I had enjoyed and been moved by, and to also speak truthfully about the aspects of their religious practice that made me glad that I was a UU.

Without grounding religious education and the search for truth in our faith tradition, we will not be able to raise UUs. One memory from my weeklong interfaith trip to Japan this summer stands out. A young American of about 21 was on the trip. He was raised UU and his parents were very involved in the denomination. But after visiting a few Buddhist sites during the trip, after only a week, he decided that he wanted to be a member of the Buddhist denomination Rissho-Kosei Kei, despite the fact that their services consist entirely of chanting in Japanese, which this young man did not know. But when we met up with his mother in the States, she laughed indulgently and even a little proudly at her son's statement that he was leaving Unitarian Universalism and becoming a Japanese Buddhist. I wasn't laughing. I don't consider that story a triumph of religious understanding, I consider that a failure of religious education. If his understanding of Unitarian Universalism was so weak that he could suddenly "convert" to a new religion he barely understood, with very little thought, then he had never really learned what it means to be a UU.

We are doing a disservice to our children if we send them out on a spiritual quest but do not give them the right guidance along the way. It heartened me to hear Vince describe his daughters' Coming of Age experiences. They were guided through that narrow passage between the two extremes: On one end is the rote memorization Vince experienced, on the other the too-free-wheeling, guideless experience of my Dr. Smith.

In our search for the truth, and as guides in that search to the children in our congregation, let us be brave enough to find some truths and share them gladly. I'll use a metaphor by the UU theologian James Luther Adams: An artist is someone who creates art. Without that creation of an art form, we would not call them an artist. In the same way, a young person cannot be told to "be spiritual" and then not have a form, a structure, a religion within which to sort through those spiritual yearnings. We do not want our children to grow up as critical thinkers undergoing an existential crisis; we want them to grow up as critical thinkers and spiritual Unitarian Universalists. May we all do our part in showing our community's children why we are here, why we love being here, why we love being Unitarian Universalist. For this is the life we were given; may we rejoice, and do good in it.

The sermon in a Unitarian Universalist setting is never the last word on any subject, but rather an invitation to further dialog.

You may want to read other visitors' comments on Claire Phillips-Thoryn's "How to Raise a UU" .

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