Unitarian Universalist Church of Boulder
Ministerial Legacy
1883 – 2005
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
Thomas J.Van Ness
1883 – 1884
This is the first of a series of biographical/historical sketches about UUCB’s
past ministers. All of the ministers pictured in the Ministerial Legacy photo
gallery will be featured in the coming
months. The information in this
month’s column is taken from
Elizabeth Maloney’s excellent history,
The First Unitarian Society of Boulder,
Colorado, 1883-1890. Elizabeth is the
wife of a later UUCB minister, Tom
Maloney. All the quoted sections in the
article below are from this manuscript.
The Reverend Thomas J. Van Ness
delivered his first sermon to Boulder’s
First Unitarian Society on Sunday,
October 6, 1883. The society had
been organized by Colonel Ivers
Phillips, who brought Unitarianism
with him when he moved to Boulder
from Fitchburg, Massachusetts in
1873. The group, which was made up
of other eastern transplants and several University families (including
President Sewall and Mary Rippon),
met in the Seventh Day Adventist
Church on the SE corner of Broadway
and Mapleton. During the 1880s this
building was often referred to as the
Unitarian Church. The Boulder
County Herald reported about Van
Ness’ first service “that there was a
large audience present – an audience
which was marked for its intelligence,
and the strict attention it paid the sermon. And when the services closed, it
was a well-pleased and evidently satisfied audience which rose to go.”
“Thomas Jefferson Van Ness was
born in Baltimore, Maryland, on 29
June 1859… [He} went to Harvard
Divinity School, the theological
school for the liberal ministry, from
where he graduated in 1883. He was
called to the Boulder church shortly
after.” The Boulder County Herald
regularly reported on Van Ness’ sermons and the many activities of the
growing congregation. He participated in joint services and activities with
other Boulder Protestant
congregations, and also
exchanged pulpits with the
minister of the Universalist
Church which existed then
in Longmont.
Jane Sewall describes the
young Thomas Van Ness –
he was only 24 when he
came to Boulder – as follows in her book, Jane,
Dear Child (as quoted by E.
Maloney):
“He had a small brown
moustache, and though his
hair was carefully brushed,
his clothes looked somewhat shabby. He carried
his head a little to one
side, and one hand was
thrust into the pocket of
his jacket… Overall, in his
voice as well as his manner, there appeared a distinction. He seemed somewhat more “finished” than
most of the young men
who surrounded us.
“In spite of Mr. Van Ness’ youth
and inexperience, he quickly matured,
and from all reports was a very successful and popular young minister.”
Many of his sermons caused theological debate in Boulder, and one of
them, The Harm Done to Morality by
a Belief in the Inspiration of the Bible,
was published in its entirety by the
Boulder County Herald. Indeed, many
extra copies were published so that
people could decide for themselves
whether or not they agreed with him.
Van Ness was so successful and popular that, after his one-year engagement
in Boulder, he was called unanimously to Unity Church of Denver
(Unitarian.) Van Ness accepted the
call, though he agreed to stay with the
Boulder Church through September
1884, and his connection to the congregation continued, especially after
he married Ann Sewall, the eldest
daughter of CU’s President. Van Ness
stayed in Denver through the building
of their Unitarian Church building on
19th and Broadway and went on to
serve congregations in San Francisco
and Boston.
The Boulder congregation was
never able to secure a minister on a
long-term basis after Van Ness left.
George Leverett Stowell stayed for
only 9 months (October 1884 – May
1885.) Both J. E. Roberts and R.F.
Johonnot accepted calls, but never
delivered more than candidating sermons; and John Frederic Dutton
stayed for only five months in 1887.
There is no official record of when
or why Boulder’s First Unitarian
Society disbanded, but no other ministers were hired after Dutton’s departure, “and, although newspaper
reports indicate that a Unitarian group
continued to meet for a short time, it
never again attained the stature of a
church, and eventually disbanded
completely.”
Tessa Davis
September 2005
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
Rudolph W. Gilbert
MENTOR
1946 – 1957
This is the second of a series of
biographical/historical sketches about
UUCB’s past ministers. All of the ministers pictured in the Ministerial
Legacy photo gallery (above the counter in the front hall) will be featured in
the newsletter during this church year.
The information in this month’s column is taken from Chapter 2 in
UUCB’s history, The First Fellowship
(1946-1958), written by Maria
Botsford in 1973 and expanded in
1980 by Pauline Ives and Forrest and
Alice Davis. All the quoted sections in
the article below are from this chapter.
Although the Reverend Rudolph
(Rudy) W. Gilbert was never a settled
minister of our church, he played an
indispensable part in the emerging
presence of Unitarianism in Boulder,
both before and after the Unitarian
Society of Boulder became the country’s first denominationally recognized
Fellowship in July, 1948. During these
years, Gilbert was the minister of
Denver’s Unity Church (Unitarian). He
spoke monthly to the Boulder group,
and was a guiding force and mentor
to the Unitarians in Boulder from
1946–1957. As Maria Botsford wrote,
“The help, both direct and indirect,
given to the[se] early Boulder
Unitarian pioneers by Dr. Rudolph
Gilbert cannot be overemphasized.”
The seeds of the Unitarian
Society of Boulder sprouted in
1946 when a small group of CU
students, faculty and Boulder
townspeople joined together “to
discuss their liberal, non-doctrinal religious beliefs. They called
themselves the Student Religious
Liberals,” met on the CU campus,
and were sponsored by a retired
Unitarian dentist, Dr. LeRoy
Cooke. Reverend Gilbert became
involved with the group very
early on. “The assistance that he
offered was invaluable, since he
could not only direct the students toward developing their
religious beliefs, but he would
later advise the group of the
resources available to them
through the American Unitarian
Association.” By the 1947-48 academic year, many other townspeople had joined the Student
Religious Liberals; and as they
began to dominate the students
in the group, it was mutually decided
in March, 1948, to have the two
groups meet separately. The “town”
group began calling themselves The
Unitarian Society of Boulder, and
gradually, the student group began to
see them as their “parent group” and
to feel more and more affiliated with
the Unitarian denomination. Dr.
Gilbert “continued to be a guiding
force [for both groups], and his talks
were often concerned with human
values and how they related to religion.”
Some of the early, founding members of the Unitarian Society of
Boulder were Bill Lemons and Drs.
Albert and Amy Bowen (who would
later donate their property on
Cherryvale Road to the fledging congregation), all of whom had strong
ties to Dr. Gilbert. Bill Lemons had
been a member of Gilbert’s congregation in Bloomington, Illinois; and the
Bowens (Albert Bowen was from a
family of Unitarians going back to the
Civil War) was a member of Gilbert’s
Denver church for a year (1945)
before moving to Boulder.
In early 1948, Dr. Gilbert helped
the women in the Unitarian Society of
Boulder get in touch with the
Religious Education Department of the
American Unitarian Association, and
by the spring “an informal Sunday
School had been organized by Lenore
Stewart and others who valued liberal
religious training for children. The
pupils gathered on Sunday mornings
at the homes of the teachers…”
In July, 1948, the Unitarian Society
of Boulder officially became the
Unitarian Fellowship of Boulder. In
September of that year, they “held
their first meeting in the public library
and twelve people attended.
Thereafter, and for the remainder of
the academic year, they met for formal evening presentations in the Little
Chapel of the Congregational Church.
Dr. Rudolph Gilbert continued to lend
spiritual support by speaking to fellowship members once each month.”
There was no Boulder Turnpike in
these years and the drive between
Denver and Boulder was well over an
hour each way. That Rev. Gilbert was
willing to make this trip for so many
years is indeed evidence of his dedication and commitment to the
Boulder congregation. On November
27, 1949 (Thanksgiving Day), a renovated carriage house at 2227 16th
Street was dedicated as the young
Fellowship’s home. Not surprisingly,
Rudy Gilbert delivered the main
address on this festive occasion.
During these years, Dr. Gilbert had
“a 15-minute radio program every
Sunday morning at 10:15 a.m. in
which he discussed religion on a
world-wide basis, and in January 1951
the Fellowship donated $220, so that
his talks could be aired on KBOL,
Boulder.” It would be wonderful to
hear some of them now or at least to
have them in our archives.
“Dr. Gilbert’s talks were of great
importance during the McCarthy
era when he openly attacked
threats to academic freedom.
Indeed, Dr. Gilbert came to
Boulder for an emergency meeting, called by the America
Association of University
Professors when one member of
the Unitarian Fellowship was
under personal attack. Forrest
Davis recalls those years as a
time when all Unitarians were
regarded as Communists because
they wore horn-rimmed glasses
and drove station wagons, but
many non-members felt at the
time that the Unitarian Church
provided the only anti-McCarthy
platform in the greater Denver
area.” The Unitarian Social
Action group prepared a fullpage advertisement (a letter to
President Eisenhower) in the
March 10, 1954 issue of the
Daily Camera, which was signed
by most of the members of the
Fellowship as well as well-known
Democrats and Republicans in the
community.
Dr. Gilbert’s connection with the
first Unitarian Fellowship of Boulder
ended in 1957 when he left Denver
and accepted a call to the Unitarian
Church in Spokane, Washington. He
served there for 15 years and was
then named Minister Emeritus. His
picture in the Ministerial Legacy
Gallery came from Spokane, sent to
me by the current church historian,
Susan Tyler-Babkirk. After Spokane,
Gilbert served brief interim ministeries
in Charlottesville, VA, Tulsa, OK, and
Richmond, VA. He retired to Boulder
and was the part-time minister of the
newly founded Boulder UU
Fellowship from 1979-1981. He died
in Boulder on July 1, 1986, when he
was only 76 years old.
Tessa Davis
October 2005
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
Thomas J. Maloney
1957 – 1962
This is the third of a series of biographical/historical sketches about UUCB’s
past ministers. Fred Cole and I were
very fortunate to be able to meet and
talk with Dr. Maloney’s widow, Betty
Maloney and their daughter, Greta
Maloney Palaich, on October 1. Much
of the information in this month’s column comes from our conversation that
day. Other information is taken from
Chapters 2 and 3 in UUCB’s history
written by Maria Botsford in 1973 and
expanded in 1980 by Pauline Ives and
Forrest and Alice Davis. All the quoted
sections in the article below are from
these chapters.
When Thomas Maloney came to
the Unitarian Fellowship of Boulder as
their part-time minister in the fall
of 1957, it was not the first time
he had been involved with
Boulder Unitarians. Born and
raised near Boston,
Massachusetts, Tom had come
home from World War II disillusioned with the Catholic faith of
his upbringing. His search for a
faith he could embrace led him
to the Unitarian Church in
Needham where he was
befriended by a Mr. and Mrs.
Gartner who soon introduced
him to their daughter, Betty. Not
long after he and Betty were
married, Tom came to CU as a
graduate student in Chemical
Engineering in the fall of 1948.
He had heard about the Boulder
Fellowship and the Student
Religious Liberals (who were
increasingly affiliated with the
Unitarians and soon changed
their name to the Unitarian
Channing Club), and became
actively involved in the group –
even becoming its president – while
he was here. It was during this year
that Tom decided to become a minister, and in the fall of 1949, he moved
his growing family back east to
attend Harvard Divinity School, graduating in 1952. The now Reverend
Maloney served churches in
Davenport, Iowa and Quincy, Illinois
from 1952-1956. While he was in
Quincy, Tom also earned an M.A. in
Anthropology / Sociology from
Washington University, and completed
the course work for his PhD. He com-
pleted his dissertation and became Dr.
Maloney, in the mid 1960’s.
Early in 1957, Tom wrote to the
Fellowship’s President, Forrest Davis,
about the possibility of his coming to
Boulder as their part-time minister, a
job he could combine with part-time
teaching in CU’s Anthropology
Department. In May, after Mr. Maloney
had visited Boulder, the Fellowship
members voted to offer him the position. The family, now with four children, moved into the house on East
Cherryvale Road, recently donated to
the Fellowship by Drs. Albert and Amy
Bowen, and lived there as the only parsonage tenants we were to ever have.
For the next five years, the
Maloneys “made all church members,
friends, and students at the University
welcome [at the Parsonage]; they
opened their home for picnics, for teas
and suppers, for celebrations and New
Year Gatherings, and [Betty] held
nature classes there in the summer-
time.” Current members and friends
will be interested to know that Fred
Cole remembers meeting with Tom for
pre-marital counseling at the parsonage before he (Tom) married Fred and
his first wife, Wendy, in July, 1961.
During Reverend Maloney’s tenure,
services were held at several downtown locations: Dottie’s Dance Studios
in what is now the Karma Dzong
building; Whittier School; and the Old
Christian Church (now demolished) on
15th and Walnut Streets. Sunday
School classes, the Liberal Religious
Youth (LRY) group, and the
Cooperative nursery met at Fellowship
House, the carriage house at 2227 16th
Street. Membership grew to 120 plus
80 attending non-members, and a
Sunday School attendance of 90+ children. On June 14, 1959, “the
Fellowship celebrated the Seventy-fifth
Anniversary of Unitarianism in
Boulder. On that occasion the
Reverend Maloney presented the sermon first delivered in 1884 on “The
Harm Done to Morality by a Belief in
the Inspiration of the Bible by Thomas
Van Ness…” In February of that year
(1959), the congregation had voted to
retain Rev. Maloney as their full-time
minister. The change from Fellowship
to Church status also happened during
1959, as did the vote in favor of the
merger of the Unitarian and
Universalist denominations. Our congregation didn’t express much interest
in this or other national UU issues,
however, and the final, legal
vote in February, 1960, had to
allow written proxies in order to
achieve the necessary quorum.
Instead, “Boulder Unitarians
tended to be more humanistic
and far less orthodox than members of churches in large Eastern
cities… [They were a congregation where] intellectualism,
unconventionality, and nonconformity was accepted, even
encouraged.” Reverend Maloney
himself was, and remained all
his life, very involved in humanist and social justice concerns.
While in Boulder, he was chair
of the local ACLU, and also
regional consultant for the UU
Service Committee.
What was engaging the
Boulder congregation during
this time was the debate about
whether to build a new building in the outskirts of town or
to buy a building downtown.
The long and contentious
debate finally ended when, at a June,
1961 congregational meeting, “members voted to build their own building
on the land on Redwood (now
Pennsylvania) Avenue and to hire an
architect for that purpose.” Even then,
however, it wasn’t until May 16, 1962,
when the Maloneys held an Open
House at the parsonage, followed by
a tour of the building site, that “in
one day ‘pessimism, low morale, and
destructive talk changed to open and
glowing enthusiasm,’”
The church newsletter at this time
was called The Boulder Unitarian and
Rev. Maloney was its editor for most
of his tenure here. He wrote a much
beloved column, under the heading
of the Wee Liberals Marching and
Chowder Society (membership: his
two dogs, a Noble Redman, and
Parson Tom) in which he poked fun
“of people who are so often accused
of taking themselves too seriously.”
Rev. Maloney is also remembered for
his pipe smoking at church events
(though never during a service).
Many members of the congregation
were also smokers during these years,
a fact which caused at least one
member, Amy Bowen, to send Tom a
letter resigning from the church.
At his last worship service as minister, on June 3, 1962, Reverend
Maloney introduced the first Flower
Communion service to our congregation. It is a tradition that is still followed at UUCB and in most UU
churches today. During the preceding
year, some members of the congregation began to express some concerns
about his ministry, and Maloney submitted his resignation in July 1962,
not only to accept a position at New
Mexico Highlands University, but also
in response to the financially troubled
congregation’s lowering his salary.
Although he did return to UUCB to
take part in the new building’s
Dedication Service on January 24,
1965, and he did remain active in the
UU Ministers’ Association, Reverend
Maloney never again was a settled
minister with a congregation. He
stayed in academia, holding tenured
positions at Rippon College in
Wisconsin (1967 – 1969), and
Southern Illinois University (1969 –
1989) after leaving New Mexico
Highlands in 1967. With his wife
Betty, Maloney retired, as Professor
Emeritus, to Fort Collins in 1989. He
did extensive traveling during the following years, and became very
involved in Central American human
rights issues. His last formal visit to
Boulder UU’s was at the 100th
Anniversary dinner held in 1983. He
died, at age 82, on May 6, 2005. His
obituary speaks of his love for Robert
Frost’s poem, The Road Not Taken,
which “captured his wanderlust and
desire to explore the world,” a trait
certainly evident in his rich and very
full life – a life which UUCB was
lucky to share for five years.
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
1942 – 1946, he was a Chaplain in the
US Army Air Force. In 1961,
Pennington transferred his allegiance to
the Unitarian Universalist ministry, perhaps due to the influence of his wife’s
family. He had married Harriet Dexter
in 1941, and her father had been a former director of the Unitarian Service
Committee. Pennington served a UU
church in Bangor, Maine before accepting the call to UUCB in 1964.
After Tom Maloney resigned,
UUCB spent the following year and a
half without a minister. Members,
however, were actively engaged with
the construction of our current church
building and the necessary fund raising that accompanied it. The groundbreaking ceremony was held on June
16, 1963, and for the next six months
“church members mixed cement,
moved rocks, [and] stained ceilings.”
The first service was held in the
almost-finished Earth Room on
Christmas Eve of that year. “[The
congregation sat on new folding
chairs purchased for $4.00 each.”
The formal dedication service was
held on January 24, 1965.
It was also at the end of 1963 that
the Committee to Recommend a New
Minister announced that they had
selected the Reverend Philip
Pennington as their first choice. He
was elected by the congregation after
his two candidating sermons in
January, 1964. Phil then moved to
Boulder (Martin Acres) with his wife
and their four children. His installation service was held on May 3, 1964.
When Pennington was here, he
looked like the picture to the left.
The picture on our “Ministerial
Legacy” wall is one that his family
gave us and is representative of how
he looked during his retirement years.
In it, Pennington also, incidentally,
looks exactly like his son Robert did
when Alan and I met him in Santa Fe
last spring to collect the picture.
From the many accounts I have
heard about his ministry, Phil
Pennington was very introverted and
not a people person. He was, however, an intellectual and a gifted speaker. According to Bev Sears, who was
the church secretary / administrator
during those years, “his sermons were
his forte,” and he worked every day
writing them. Bev particularly remembers a series he preached on
Prometheus. Pennington was a
humanist, and he steered clear of
talking about God or Jesus, but, Bev
says, all his sermons had a way of
opening people up to new ways of
thinking and seeing the world, and
there was a great demand for printed
copies. Under his leadership, “attendance at Sunday morning services
increased to about 132… and the
church school had an enrollment of
250 children and an average weekly
attendance of 150” by 1966. Even
with this large church school enrollment, however, it wasn’t until 1968,
that the Board of Trustees voted to
approve the hiring of a Director of
Religious Education. UUCB experimented with two Sunday services for
Philip Ward
Pennington
1964 – 1969
This is the fourth of a series of biographical/historical sketches about
UUCB’s past ministers. The information in this month’s column comes
from several sources: the “In
Memoriam: Unitarian Universalist
Ministers 1999-2000” page of the UUA
website; a wonderful conversation
with Bev Sears, church secretary during Phil’s ministry here; and from
Chapter 4 in UUCB’s history written by
Maria Botsford in 1973 and expanded
in 1980 by Pauline Ives and Forrest
and Alice Davis. Unless otherwise
noted, all the quoted sections in the
article below are from this chapter.
The Reverend Philip Pennington
was born in Guymon, Oklahoma, in
1914. He came from
a strict, fundamentalist family; but Phil
himself came early to
a liberal theology. He
received his BA from
the University of
Wichita and his BD
from the Chicago
Theological
Seminary. After his ordination in 1941,
Rev. Pennington served Congregational
churches in Iowa, Colorado, and
Illinois. During World War II, from
Tessa Davis
November 2005
the 1966-67 church year, but changed
to a service/coffee hour followed by
an informal diversified program the
following year because the “double
sessions had not proved popular
with church members.”
“Throughout his stay in
Boulder, Rev. Pennington
stressed the need for widening
the intellectual and social concerns of the congregation.” He
introduced talk-back sessions
after worship services and
arranged discussions led by
prominent speakers.” Pennington
also encouraged small, informal
gatherings in people’s homes,
and what started as a monthly
Supper Club, with 45 couples
and 9 singles, became known as
the Circle Suppers we still enjoy
today. The church encounter
groups and sensitivity training
sessions, and “the Women’s
Alliance continued to be a driving force,” during these years.
The UU Christmas Bazaar, held
first in 1963 (in the not-quite-finished building), sponsored by
the Alliance and often with Bev
Sears at the helm, was an annual
event in Boulder for several
years, netting the Alliance thousands of dollars which they then used
to enhance the church building in
many and various ways. The congregation had many talented artists at the
time who would, according to Bev,
lead workshops for months before
the Bazaar to create the ornaments
and crafts that were sold.
The years of Rev. Pennington’s
ministry coincided with and reflected
the social unrest and turbulence in
the country at large during the late
1960s. The church was broken into
and vandalized several times, and for
a while a young “hippie” was hired to
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
derful phone conversations with Dale
Reed (President of the congregation in
1970), Margaret (Johnson) Haun,
and Scotty himself. My thanks to all of
the above individuals for so generously sharing their memories.
Alexander “Scotty” Meek was
UUCB’s interim minister for only six
months – from January through June
1970, but the impact he had on the
congregation was so strong that people who were here during his tenure
find it hard to believe that it was for
so short a time. Bev Sears says that
his coming was “like a breath of fresh
air,” and, indeed, everyone I talked
with, including Scotty himself, spoke
of his ministry here as a “love affair.”
Alexander
“Scotty” Meek
INTERIM MINISTER
1970
This is the fifth in a series of biographical/historical sketches about
UUCB’s past ministers. The information in this month’s column comes
from the conversation that flowed at a
wonderful coffee hosted by Bev Sears
and attended by Ron and Marlies
West, Fred Cole, John Lemp and
myself, as well as from equally won-
sleep in the building to deter further
break-ins. Internal dissension grew –
over what was seen as the too-free
and unstructured LRY youth group,
and also among those who wanted a
more spiritual and religious content in
the Sunday services. In the spring of
1968, “it was estimated that the strong
dissident group… comprised about
30% of the membership,” many of
whom wanted to see Pennington
leave. At a long and contentious
meeting on May 12th of that year, the
congregation voted to retain
Pennington; but a year later, on May
21, 1969, he announced his resignation, later writing a letter
telling members that “[t]he division within our Church as to
what the basic philosophy, the
directions we should attempt to
pursue, and the expectation of
ministerial leadership, has
become so great as to destroy
our sense of unity, and the continued effectiveness of my leadership.”
After leaving UUCB, the
Penningtons moved to Santa Fe,
New Mexico, where Phil pursued
his wood carving interests and
the family later opened a nursery
which Robert Pennington still
runs today. Philip Pennington
died on June 24, 1999. Perhaps
the best way to sum up his
beliefs and ministry with UUCB
is to quote from what I suspect
were his own words that
appeared in the UUA’s “In
Memoriam” pages for the years
1999 – 2000:
“The liberal minister must be
his authentic self. He is neither
the ‘agent of God’ nor the servant or
institutional representative of the
church. He can only be, speak for,
and act as the person he is himself. As
true man, he is both rebel and lover: a
free spirit, an inquirer, a builder of
community, a passionate lover of life
and of people.”
Tessa Davis
December 2005
Scotty Meek was born to Scottish
immigrant parents in Andover,
Massachusetts in June of 1929. He
discovered Universalism as a 15 year
old, when, his voice having changed,
there was no longer any reason to
stay at the Free Christian
Congregationalist church where he
had grown up and had been an
active member of the choir. The
Universalist church in town not only
had a great Halloween party that year
but also a wonderful minister in
whose footsteps Scotty became determined he would follow. After three
years in the military, Scotty graduated
from Tufts University in 1956, and
then went on to the Universalist
Crane Theological Seminary (also at
Tufts) where he received his MA in
Sacred Theology in 1959. He met his
wife, Dorothy (Dotty), during his student ministry in Medford,
Massachusetts, while he was
still an undergraduate. They
were married in 1956.
Scotty was ordained at the
Stafford, Connecticut
Universalist church in 1958,
and it was there that Scotty
and Dale Reed (who was a
student minister at a
Congregational church)
became friends as members of
the area’s Ministerial
Association. Twelve years
later, Scotty was looking for a
place to spend his sabbatical
from the Lynn, Massachusetts
church (his plans to do a pulpit exchange with a Unitarian
church in England had gone
awry) and contacted both the
UUA and Orloff Miller, then
the UUA Mountain District
Executive, about possible
placements. Dale, by then a
Unitarian and UUCB’s
President, heard about Scotty’s
availability, gave him a call,
and the rest, as they say, is
history.
The Meek family – Scotty,
Dotty and their two young children,
Sherry and Steve – arrived in Boulder
on January 1, 1970 and were invited
to live with Alf Koenig in his mountain home, thereby saving the congregation considerable money. Towards
the end of their stay, the Meeks
moved into town and lived in the
house of another church family, the
Colwells, in South Boulder.
Scotty was a dynamic, if not an
intellectual, speaker. As a Universalist
in the then largely humanist Unitarian
congregation in Boulder, Scotty felt it
was his mission to bring the message
of Universalism to his ministry here. As
he told me, he was fearful that the caring part of Universalism would be lost
after the UU merger in 1962, and so he
made a point of stressing Universalist
themes in his sermons. He is particularly remembered for his Benjamin
Rush sermon, which he delivered
dressed in full period costume!
Scotty also considered Religious
Education to be an “extremely important part” of his ministry. This is not
surprising since for 20 years he was
the Director of the Ferry Beach
(Maine) UUA summer camps and
later President of the Ferry Beach
Association. (Dianne Ewing remembers him well from the summers she
and her family spent at Ferry Beach.)
It was during Scotty’s year with us
that he and RE Coordinator Margaret
Johnson (now Haun) initiated the
practice of sometimes having children
present during the first part of the
service. People remember him reading stories during “For All Ages.” He
and Margaret also encouraged and
arranged for many family activities in
the RE program.
Scotty is remembered as being very
outgoing and a people person who
connected quickly and easily with
members of the congregation. His
engaging and energetic personality
was, indeed, a wonderful “breath of
fresh air,” and he and Dotty fit in easily with the active social life of the
church. I was told about lots of very
fun church parties and ski outings
during the time the Meeks were here.
Dotty also became very involved with
the Women’s Alliance and remembers,
especially, sewing carpet squares
together with Laura Sangster for the
RE rooms.
What is most memorable and
appreciated about Scotty’s tenure
here, however, is, as Dale Reed told
me, “the healing spirit he brought”
following what had been a very
painful time for our congregation.
Scotty helped the membership lose
the burden of guilt they were feeling,
and lift themselves up and again be
proud of who they were. The healing
and renewed level of openness that Scotty brought was
also helped by Project
Vanguard, a journey of selfdiscovery developed by the
UUA for churches in transition.
The congregation had already
signed up to participate before
his arrival and the process
continued even after he’d left.
Project Vanguard was led at
UUCB by its creator, the
Reverend Josiah Bartlett with
the help of Rev. Leon Hopper
from Jefferson Unitarian
Church. Scotty’s role was more
as an observer/facilitator than
a director. His very presence
and unobtrusive leadership
during that time, however, was
central to its success.
Scotty told me that his experience in Boulder “became a
springboard” for him professionally. Before he came, he’d
never imagined leaving New
England. After he left, he
knew he wanted to become
an Interim minister; and when
his children were grown and
he and Dotty were free to be itinerant, that’s just what he did for 20
years, serving churches in Arizona,
Arkansas, California, Missouri,
Nevada, New York, Texas and
Wisconsin, as well as becoming the
chair of the UUA’s Interim Ministry
Advisory Committee. He retired to
Sun Lakes, Arizona in 2004.
One of the many fun, wonderful
stories Scotty told me over the phone
was that at his last service here in
June, he was supposed to be piped
out by a bagpiper. The bagpiper,
however, had burst his bag while
warming up before the service, and
Scotty was instead drummed out by
John Galm. He has never, however,
been drummed out of the minds of
the many friends he made here, as
evidenced by the long-lasting relationships he has kept with so many.
UUCB was certainly lucky for the
“love affair” that happened here for
six months in 1970.
Tessa Davis
January 2006
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
Forrest J.Whitman
1971 – 1993
This is the sixth in a series of biographical/historical sketches about
UUCB’s past ministers. The information in this month’s column comes
from many sources: Chapter 5 in
UUCB’s history written by Maria
Botsford in 1973 and expanded in
1980 by Pauline Ives and Forrest and
Alice Davis; several “Clearlight
Messengers” from the 1980’s;
enjoyable and informative personal and phone conversations
with Carrol Kalafus (Church
Administrator from 1980 –
1985 and President in 1988
and 1989); and Margaret
(Johnson) Haun (Adult RE
Coordinator and involved
church member in the 1970s);
a wonderful meeting with Jon
Bond and Forrest himself in
Golden on January 7, 2006;
and the heartfelt and wonderful conversation that flowed at
a coffee held at Alan’s and my
house on January 12, 2006
and attended by Fred Cole
(President, 1978), Alan Davis
(President, 1990, 1992 – 3),
Jenny and Hilton Fitt-Peaster
(Ministerial Relations Chair in
1978 and Moderator in early
1980s), Bev Sears (Church
Administrator from 1964 –
1976), Margie Sugar, Marlies
and Ron West (Chair of the
Search Committee that brought
Forrest to UUCB), and Valerie
Williamson (RE Director from 1975 –
1982). My heartfelt thanks to all of the
above individuals for sharing their
memories and perceptions. Unless otherwise noted, all the quotes in the article below are taken from Chapter 5 of
the church history.
The Reverend Dr. Forrest Whitman
was the minister of UUCB for 22+
years, longer by far than any of our
other ministers, and to capture his
ministry and legacy to us is no easy
task, especially because, at times, it
involved great controversy. However,
much of what we now consider “traditional” in our services began with
Forrest, and the overall “spiritual feel”
that outsiders often notice at UUCB
springs directly from his ministry here.
Forrest was born in the far west
side of Chicago in 1942, next to the
Great Western RR yards. His father
was a Universalist, and Forrest grew
up in a Methodist church that had
accepted a Universalist minister as
their pastor (common in that time
when independent Universalist
churches were dying). This minister,
and his high school Sunday school
teacher, also a strong Universalist,
were important influences that later
led Forrest to the UU ministry. At
Illinois Wesleyan College, he majored
in Philosophy and chaired the Social
Action Committee at the Unitarian
church he attended. In 1968, he
received his D.Mn. from Meadville
Theological College at the University
of Chicago where his mentors were
Mircea Eliade and Paul Tillich. While
in college and afterwards, Forrest
became very involved in political and
social causes – as a railroad union
activist (he worked in various capacities for the Burlington and New York
Central Railroad for several years), for
the Democratic Party, and as an advocate for air pollution control. Because
the train stopped there, Forrest began
attending the Elkhart, Indiana UU
Fellowship where he was ordained in
1968 and also served as one of their
ministers.
In late 1970, the UUCB Search
Committee heard about Forrest
Whitman from the Chair’s (Ron West)
mother-in-law who was a member of
the Elkhart Fellowship and who recommended him very highly. With the
blessings of the UUA, the Search
Committee approached Forrest, and
on March 28, 1971, the congregation,
in a nearly unanimous vote, called
him to be our minister. The young
Whitman family arrived in Boulder in
August, and Forrest was formally
installed in October of that year.
A noteworthy event during the
early years of Forrest’s ministry was
the 25th anniversary of the Boulder
UU Fellowship (which had become
Unitarian Church of Boulder in 1962
and added “Universalist” to the
name a few years later). At the
25th Anniversary service on
April 7, 1974, “several members who had helped found
the Fellowship were honored
and the address was given by
Robert N. West, the first president of the UnitarianUniversalist Association to visit
Boulder. In the afternoon of
the same day the Dedication of
the Elsa Deutsch Memorial
Garden took place.” Several
members had some or all of
their ashes scattered in the garden during these early years.
UUCB’s congregation continued to grow throughout the
1970s, “and on many occasions
it was ‘standing room only.’
Vesper services on Wednesday
evenings were added to the
weekly calendar.” RE was overflowing with children, and the
singles group had, on occasion, over 100 people attending its events. This group produced several marriages,
including Jenny and Hilton FittPeaster, Jon and Helene Bond, and
Forrest himself and Frances Shonle.
The need for more space led to the
building of the Sky Room in the early
1980s. Paul Berry, with the help of
innumerable volunteers, oversaw the
construction of this new space –
intentionally built, with Forrest’s and
others’ vision, as a complement to the
Earth Room, with windows placed
specifically to allow viewing of the
moon’s passage. The May 11, 1982
Clearlight Messenger joyfully
announced “the Grand Moving In
Day” ceremonies which were held
after church on May 23, 1982. In
1983, Wes Sears directed a crew of
many church members in the building
of all the moss rock walls. Then, in
1983 – 84, the patio and minister’s
office (which Forrest called the Sky
the first of many successful fall family
and beloved UU minister Jacob Trapp
Room Kiva) were finished, with landweekends at Camp Shoshone haptogether. They met while Forrest was
scaping and parking lot work to conpened in 1974, and these weekends
studying for the ministry, and Jacob
tinue for several years.
were very popular, as are our spring
became a real mentor for Forrest.
Forrest had an enormous intellect –
weekend retreats in Allenspark today.
Many of us remember well Jacob
he loved to talk philosophy one-onForrest had a good singing voice and
Trapp’s yearly visits to UUCB during
one and could do so for hours; but he
often participated in the informal
the ‘70s and ‘80s and his gifts to us,
was not a rationalist, and his sermons
choirs that were organized from time
not only of his poetry and meditawere more often full of metaphor and
to time while he was here.
tions, but, more tangibly, of the
parable than logical argument. His conForrest had worked as an RE
wooden lecturn with the figure on
cern always was to bring to UUCB the
Coordinator before he came to
the front which he carved for us.
transcendental, mythological and spiriBoulder, and also with inner city
Though the figure has been controtual dimensions of our faith. He talked
youth in Chicago, and he was always
versial to some in our congregation,
often about “our spiritual grandfather”
very involved in RE activities, eager to
Jacob always called this figure neither
Ralph Waldo Emerson and other UUs
find ways to include children and
male nor female, but “simply orawho exemplified the transcendentalist
youth in our services and other activicionero – a spiritual searcher.”
point of view. Forrest believed that the
ties. During the 1980s at least two
During the 1970s and ‘80s several
“land of the soul” resides in
intergenerational plays
tales, and he is best rememwere produced. Forrest
bered for the poetry,
brought a unique touch to
Since his poetry was such an important part of
metaphors, and stories he
baby blessing, coming-ofForrest’s ministry at UUCB, I asked him to send us a
used to convey his mesage and graduation cerepoem to accompany this article. This is the poem he sent.
sages – messages which
monies which often
centered on themes of letincluded corn pollen and
Dogs
ting go of ego, fear, and
smudging as well as roses
anger; abundance in the
dipped in our holy water.
Just when you think you’ve got enough of ‘em
universe; faith; and love.
Boulder youth participated
There always seems to be more of ‘em!
His favorite metaphors were
in the Ninth Grade Trip for
“Hey f.w.”, says your wife one night
baseball, dogs, and most
the first time in 1972, the
This cute little red one got dumped in my sight.
especially, coyote, and they
year after Forrest arrived.
So soon besides your one old sweet tottery black
appeared frequently in his
He took an enormous
You’ve got two youngsters to tear your grocery sack.
talks. Forrest’s identification
interest in the trip and is
with coyote also reflected
the only minister of our
But when there’s alpine glow on the peaks
the deep connection he felt
church ever to have gone
and While Shell Woman her caribou cloud seeks.
to Native American culture
down the road with the
Then Coyote laughs at your little pack
and spirituality. The congreTrippers, which he did in
God’s dogs remind you to pull your pride back.
gation heard from many
1980 – the Wind and the
You’re just one more critter by Spirit here blown
Native American speakers,
Rose Trip.
Ambling up that gulch to some fate unknown.
including Wallace Black Elk
On a personal level,
and Tawa Nedeka (a San
most
members of the conby Forrest Whitman from the Rollinsville Caboose
Carlos Apache medicine
gregation found Forrest to
woman who taught us
be a good-natured, sensimany of our closing circle
tive, generous and nonchants), during his tenure;
judgmental person. He is
new programs and activities were
and he encouraged us to see Flagstaff
remembered as a wonderful raconstarted at UUCB with Forrest’s
Mountain as a Holy Mountain. The
teur, both in and out of the pulpit. He
encouragement, support, and particiMen’s Group began their yearly solstice
is also remembered for the many colpation. Soon after his arrival, the
hikes up Flagstaff with Forrest and
orful robes and stoles he wore when
Firelight Bookshelf, so named
even held a sweat lodge on the mounhe preached, as well as for his everbecause it was first located by the
tain one year. John Galm led drumpresent Birkenstock sandals. During
fireplace in the Hearth Room, was
ming circles and often participated in
his long tenure with our congregaopened by Margaret Johnson Haun,
Sunday morning services.
tion, Forrest established and instituwho after her time as RE Director had
Forrest brought other cultures and
tionalized many of the elements of
volunteered to be in charge of Adult
religious viewpoints to UUCB as well.
our current Sunday service and
Education. It was Margaret as well,
He was especially interested in
church year:
who initiated and oversaw the
Central and South America, traveled
• Closing Circle – as a way of bringExtended Family Program, and by
there often, and not only learned
ing the congregation together after
1974 there were 10 extended families,
Spanish, but wrote and read Spanish
what was often a very heated “Talk
with 25 members each, flourishing at
poetry from the pulpit. Indeed, his
Back” after the sermon. Many of the
UUCB. In June 1973, the first of many
poetry, most of it in English,
songs and chants we sing during our
week-long Mountain Desert UU
appeared often in his talks and in the
closing circle today come from his
camps took place at Ghost Ranch in
newsletter, and he encouraged memtime with us.
New Mexico and many UUCB members of the congregation to share
• For All Ages – What had started as
bers attended that summer and for
their poems as well. It was their joint
an occasional practice under Scotty
many summers thereafter. In addition,
love of poetry that brought Forrest
Meek became a regular part of the
service.
• Our Covenant – While our current
covenant (written by Forrest Davis)
had been used from time to time
before Forrest arrived, he made the
reciting of it a regular part of our
service and also our Congregational
Meetings.
• Meditation – Forrest also made
meditation a regular part of our service. While he was here, our services
often included meditations that lasted
up to 5 minutes, and the Meditation
Room was always open for meditation for an hour before the service on
Sunday mornings. Forrest also led
meditation/chanting/fasting groups
during Holy Week for many years.
• Homecoming/Water Blessing
Sunday – Forrest brought this fall
ingathering ritual, now beloved to
many UU congregations, to UUCB
early in his ministry. We think that
our church was one of the very first
in the country to have it.
Other “events” that people remember fondly as happening under
Forrest’s leadership but which are no
longer part of our congregational life
are the well blessing ceremonies which
took place every December or January;
the Posadas every Christmas Eve, when
members and friends would walk the
neighborhood around the church, once
with a live horse, singing (in Spanish)
the Posadas carol and asking for shelter; and, most memorable, the candlelight Christmas Eve Service where the
four signs of Earth, Fire, Water, and Air
were joined by messengers from the
four directions.
Forrest was involved in social
action and the peace movement in
Boulder and beyond, but usually
more in a personal than institutional
way. He was a member of the
Planned Parenthood Board in
Boulder, and his “Guest Opinions”
and Letters to the Editor appeared frequently in the Daily Camera. He and
Program Planning brought many
speakers to the church from CU and
the wider community to talk about
social issues. Forrest supported and
welcomed the gay community in
Boulder and performed several gay
marriages. Most notably, UUCB was a
Sanctuary Church for many years,
sponsoring a total of 8 – 10 refugees
from Guatamala and El Salvador for
short periods of time. Another important legacy from Forrest is the Vest
Pocket Fund. Forrest, and ministers
after him, used the money from this
fund, which came from congregational contributions, to quietly and unobtrusively help people caught in financial hard times.
In the late 1970s there were some
older and more conservative members
of UUCB who felt that Forrest’s style
of ministry and his focus on the spiritual rather than the humanistic and
rational dimensions of UUism had
taken the church beyond familiar UU
practice. It is also important to understand people’s discontent with
Forrest’s ministry in the context of the
freewheeling and open culture and
lifestyle of Boulder in the 1970s. He
participated fully in this culture; and it
was this participation, which many
thought reflected a lack of appropriate professional boundaries, as well
as the philosophical differences, that
led a group that had been meeting
separately for a more humanist service two Sundays a month for some
years to leave the church and form
the UU Fellowship of Boulder in
1978. The vote of confidence taken at
the time was 85% in support of
Forrest’s ministry, and the church
pulled together strongly after this rift.
However, the same issues and new
allegations of professional misconduct
came up again in 1993. After a
painful spring for everyone involved,
Forrest resigned his Ministry at UUCB
prior to a scheduled vote of confidence in June, 1993. Later that year,
he also resigned from ministerial fellowship with the UUA. Forrest now
lives in Rollinsville, CO, where he
serves the non-denominational
Rollinsville Community Church and
continues to perform nondenominational and interfaith wedding ceremonies throughout Colorado and
beyond. He is also a Gilpin County
Commissioner and serves on several
statewide and national advisory
boards. He writes weekly articles for
the Central City and Nederland
papers and continues to write poetry,
to enjoy bird watching, and to search
for the spiritual essence beneath the
realities of every day life.
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
more than 1-1/2 hours on the phone
on February 3, 2006. I also communicated in person and by e-mail with
several current and past members of
UUCB (Martha Ann, Jon Bond, Paul
Gibb, Lee Redfield, and Jackie
Schwarz) who shared their memories
of Stan with me. On Saturday,
February 4, the following people met
with me at to talk and reminisce
together about Stan’s ministry: Dan
and Lois Anderson, Fred Cole, Alan
Davis, Sally DuGar, Dianne Ewing,
Barb Richards, Paul Riederer, and Liz
Ellen Sawhill. It was a rich and wonderful conversation, and I thank them
one and all for their willingness to
share so fully.
Rev. Stan Stefancic arrived in
Boulder from California, in the middle
of a major snowstorm, late in January,
1994. He arrived with a car full of
books, a few clothes and wearing his
lightweight “For Members Only” jacket! (He weathered 13 more storms
that first winter while living with
friends in Coal Creek Canyon before
moving to a small apartment in North
Boulder.) Originally both Stan and
UUCB believed that he was coming
for a three months crisis intervention
with our congregation after the first
UUA assigned Interim Minister was
diagnosed with cancer and unable to
come. Those three months, however,
stretched into 2-1/2 years of a wonderfully warm and productive Interim
ministry which left our congregation
healthy, with renewed organizational
vitality, and ready to call our next settled minister.
Stan was born in Cleveland, Ohio,
in 1937. He grew up there in a blue
collar family with no church affilia-
Stanley R. Stefancic
INTERIM MINISTER
1994 – 1996
This is the seventh in a series of
biographical/historical sketches about
UUCB’s past ministers. Because we are
now dealing with the recent past, I
had no written history to draw upon
this time. Instead, the information in
this article is taken partly from several
1994 – 96 “Clear Light Messenger”
articles, partly from the ministerial
history developed in February by the
Healthy Congregation Workshop participants, but mostly from the personal
memories and perceptions of many
individuals. I am very indebted to
Stan himself for talking with me for
Tessa Davis February 2006
tion, his grandparents having given
up their Catholicism when they left
Yugoslavia. He began attending a
Presbyterian church while still in high
school, becoming more active in this
church while attending night school
at Cleveland State University and
working as a brick layer’s apprentice
(his father’s trade) during the day. It
was the required reading in his
English classes (The Jungle,
McTeague’s: A Story of San Francisco,
and The Bridge of San Luis Rey) at
Cleveland State that first
opened Stan’s mind to the
wider world and the moral
questions which surrounded
him – so much so that he felt
called to the ministry. The
Presbyterian Church awarded
him a scholarship to
Maryville College in
Tennessee, where he
majored in English and
American Literature and
graduated in 1961. At
Maryville, he became very
involved in the civil rights
movement and was the campus chair of Crossroads
Africa. Drawn to Unitarianism
(his undergraduate thesis was
on Ralph Waldo Emerson),
Stan received a scholarship
to Harvard Divinity School,
graduating with a M.Div.
degree in 1964. It was there,
in Cambridge, Massachusetts,
in the midst of all the intellectual and cultural stimulation, living and studying with
people of so many different
nationalities, Stan says, that
his real intellectual growth began.
After completing his studies at
Harvard, Stan spent 1-1/2 semesters at
the Episcopal Theological School in
Cambridge before winning a fellowship to study Philosophy of Religion
at the Southern Methodist University
Perkins School of Theology in Dallas,
Texas. There he again became very
involved with social justice issues,
civil rights, and the anti-war effort,
and it was this engagement with the
real world which led him to make the
decision to become a minister rather
than pursue his PhD. Stan applied for
and was granted Fellowship status
with the UUA and from 1967 – 1985
served churches in Michigan,
Alabama, Washington, and California.
He continued to be involved with
social justice and anti-war efforts, as
well as with civil rights and women’s
reproductive rights issues in all these
ministries, and it was during these
years that he became particularly
involved with counseling conscientious objectors and women with
problem pregnancies.
In 1985, after an unhappy experience with the San Francisco UU
Church, Stan left parish ministry to
further his deep interest in human
relationships and emotional growth.
He joined the faculty of the Hoffman
Institute which offers a unique
(“Quadrinity”) eight-day process to
individuals “who are looking for
transformational change in their
lives.” (from the opening page of The
Hoffman Institute website). This background, along with his long history of
UU ministry combined to give Stan
just the skills and experience we
would need to heal our congregation
in a time of real financial, as well as
emotional, turmoil.
When people remember Stan’s ministry at UUCB, they think not only
about his physical size and great
shock of white hair (which Barb
Richards remembers as being black
when she first heard him at a 1974
General Assembly workshop in
Minneapolis!). More importantly, they
remember Stan’s strength of character,
his direct approach to communication,
and his listening and conflict manage-
ment skills. They also remember his
lack of defensiveness, his non-judgmental nature, his patience and civility, his warmth and compassion, and
his deep desire to help people grow
into being the best they can be.
To lead us out of the turmoil that
followed Forrest Whitman’s departure,
Stan focused on developing right relations within the congregation. He
encouraged active listening and openness through weekly “Share and
Listen” sessions. He modeled and
coached us in how to use
effective conflict management
skills, and he demonstrated
for us how to establish
healthy personal and institutional boundaries. He made
us feel safe again; and by his
honoring and respecting all
the good things we already
had, he also helped us to
again honor and respect them
and each other as well.
But Stan was also down to
earth and practical in his leadership! During his tenure, he
helped us to develop a strong
committee structure with fixed
terms, established procedures,
and focused on accomplishing
real, practical goals. A Council
on Committees (Ray Knudson,
chair, Dan Meyer and Lois
Anderson) worked diligently
to standardize and document
all the church committees,
match them to the Bylaws,
and create a manual to help
them all function properly.
Stan’s ability to help UUCB’s
leadership and committees
focus on real needs and issues rather
than on personalities and conflicts
was especially evident when the congregation was able to overcome the
nearly $18,000 deficit which existed
upon his arrival.
Stan also knew how important it
was to pay attention to our physical
building which was beginning to fall
into disrepair before his arrival. One
of the first events he helped to organize was a painting day which tackled
the entire front wall of the sanctuary.
This effort not only improved the
building’s appearance but also began
to restore the congregation’s pride in
our church. This was the first of many
such Building and Grounds work
days, all of which Stan attended. He
also made it a point to attend all
Board meetings and most committee
meetings as well. He held regular
Known, Born But to Die: The Glory,
office hours, worked closely with
and loudly made it known when he
Jest, and the Riddle of the World,
church staff, and led several adult RE
had “slipped up.” Stan was very
Religious Realism, and The Sacred
classes. This active and visible presresponsive to these concerns and
Mirror: Reality as It Is! Stan also conence lent great stability and continuity
helped us all to achieve a better balnected us in his sermons to the wider
to our healing and growth. His ability
ance in both the words and content of
world of Unitarian Universalism. It
to be so present among us was, of
our services. Finally, it was while Stan
was during his tenure that we began
course, in some measure due to
was here and with his full encourageto pay our full Fair Share of UUA and
Stan’s being in Boulder without his
ment that the first steps towards
MDD assessments! He supported the
wonderful Danish wife, Marianne,
becoming a Welcoming Congregation
conversations that were going on durwho stayed in San Francisco to conwere taken. Elena Slusser, working
ing those years between UUCB and
tinue her psychotherapy practice. He
with a small study group which
the UU Fellowship of Boulder about a
was always very open about missing
included Judy Feland and Barb and
possible reunification, but also helped
her and treasured their infrequent
Morgan Richards, read and discussed
us to move forward on our own
times (mostly summers) together. He
the earliest literature available from
was equally open in saying
the UUA on GLB (no T yet)
that it was because of their
issues and proposed that
separation that he was able
UUCB should begin the
to fully focus his energy on
process. In June, 1994, the
Our Minister Emeritus, Stan Stefancic, sent the folhis work with UUCB.
inclusive tagline that came
lowing quote to accompany this article. With sensitivWhenever Marianne was
out of their study and was
ity, he changed Murray’s “man” to “one” in the last
able to visit, she was always
approved by the Board –
line. Stan writes, “I’m sending this as a greeting and
warmly welcomed and
We welcome diversity of
a hope. I believe it, and it happened for us during my
accepted into the congregarace, sexual orientation,
2-1/2 years among you.”
tion.
age, abilities, culture and
Until one is committed there is hesitancy, the
Stan credits the leaderreligious backgrounds –
chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness.
ship of UUCB (Barb
first appeared on the mastConcerning all acts of initiative (and creation) there
Richards, Paul Riederer and
head of The Clear Light
is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills
Larry Metzroth in particular)
Messenger.
countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment
during his years with us as
Stan’s life here was
one definitely commits oneself, then Providence
being crucial to our healing.
not all work and no play.
moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that
He was very committed to
Reed Bailey taught him how
would never otherwise have occurred. A whole
both the congregational
to ski, and he often attendstream of events issues from that decision, raising in
leadership and the church
ed Sally DuGar’s Friday
one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and
staff (Jude Stirts, DRE,
night poker groups, though
meetings and material assistance which no one
Morgan Richards, Office
he was not, she says, a
could have dreamt would come their way.”
Administrator, and Marc
“happy loser.” He was also
Heeg, Music Director). He
an active participant in
W.H. Murrray, from The Scottish Himalayan
stressed their importance to
UUCB’s poetry group at the
Expedition, 1951.
our community and insisted
time, and at times shared his
that their worth be recogown poetry from the pulpit.
nized. Stan sang in the
Stan loved fun occasions,
when the Fellowship voted to not
choir (stepping out of the pulpit to
and one of the best remembered ones
pursue the discussion of reunification
do so), and always attended the perwas the February, 1996, Roast the
further at that time.
formances in the Concert Series that
Minister, Fuel the Furnace fundraising
Social justice issues continued to
Marc put together which were also
event. Indeed, the new furnace that
play an important part in Stan’s life
significant fundraisers for us.
resulted from that evening is lovingly
while he was in Boulder, but specific
Speaking of music, it was Stan who
named and labeled “The Stanley
actions were driven by the concerns
introduced us to singing Spirit of Life
Stefancic Memorial Furnace!”
of the congregation rather than from
and made it a regular meditative part
Stan told me that his years with
his own agendas. Particularly rememof our services.
UUCB were wonderful, warm and
bered social justice actions are his
Stan knew the importance of havrewarding ones for him. His confileading a small group from the coning a quality Sunday service. His serdence in and commitment to the UU
gregation to protest against a pro-life
mons, which he often read, were
ministry were reawakened and
activist speaking in Longmont, and his
always well thought out, deep and
restored (symbolized for him by again
support of the congregation’s efforts
from the heart. Printed copies of them
wearing his Harvard robe during his
to gather and send blankets to
were always much in demand. He
first and last Sundays with us). After
orphanages in China. Both of these
was definitely not a theist and shied
he left Boulder, he spent four years at
actions were spearheaded by Jim
away from talking about God. Rather,
the Tucson, Arizona UU Church
Vacca and Jackie Schwartz who had
he called (and continues to call) himbefore formally retiring from settled
recently adopted Emma from China.
self a “mystical humanist” – conministry at the 2002 UUA General
On another front, Martha Ann and
cerned about the value of all persons
Assembly. Stan is now once again
others made Stan acutely aware of
and helping them to deal with their
working at the Hoffman Institute,
gender issues in both the language
real, here-and-now problems. A samenjoying life with Marianne and dotand conduct of our Sunday services.
pling of his sermon titles include By
ing on being a grandpa to his 2-1/2
Martha Ann kept a tally each Sunday
Our Words Shall We Know and Be
year old granddaughter and soon-to-
be-born grandson.
In June of 2002, UUCB voted Stan
as our Minister Emeritus. It is indeed
unique for an Interim to ever be
granted this status which is usually
reserved for a settled minister who
has served a congregation for many
years. But there is no doubt for
those of us who voted to bestow the
Emeritus title on him about Stan’s
meritorious service to us. He had
assuredly been a very beloved presence in our midst. Before he came to
Boulder, Stan had been given the
name of Wise Scenting Bear – a very
appropriate name for the “big loving
bear” we remember, and we presented him with a bear fetish as one of
his presents when he left in June,
1996. It seems to me that an appro-
priate way to sum up Stan’s time with
us is with the title of his monthly column in The Clear Light Messenger:
Pieces of My Mind and Heart. He
gave both to our congregation and
left us forever grateful.
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
Kuhwald arrived as UUCB’s fourth
settled minister in September 1996.
His four years with us, while not
without controversy, were years
marked by continuous growth in
membership, Sunday service attendance, financial stability, and organizational structure. Kurt challenged us
in many ways – especially in the
areas of shared ministry and social
justice; and when he left, we were a
more vibrant, growth oriented, and
institutionally healthy congregation
than we had been when he arrived.
the age of nine. He stayed very
involved with this group, and was
even on the staff at times, until well
into his adult life; but he came to realize its corrosive and cultish nature, and
both Kurt and his mother left before
the group dissolved in 1984. Kurt graduated from San Diego State with a B.A.
in English in 1969 (having taken time
out to live in the Bay area and experience the counter culture of the ‘60s)
and received his Secondary and Special
Education certificate in 1970. For the
next 23 years, he taught Special Ed in
the Grossmont Union High
School District in East San
Diego County. During a paid
sabbatical, he received a
Masters in Counseling from San
Diego State, and while still continuing to teach, decided in the
1980s to pursue a career in psychotherapy. It was at the Carl
Rogers Institute for
Psychotherapy Training and
Supervision, a trans-racial and
intentionally integrated institution that Kurt says he grew the
most. He received his license as
a psychotherapist in 1985 and
for a time had a small private
practice along with his teaching
job. It was also during this time
that Kurt, looking for community, first attended the San Diego
Unitarian Church. Finding mentors in the ministers there, Revs
Tom and Carolyn Owen-Towle,
Kurt joined the church in 1985
and soon began taking classes
offered by the Claremont
School of Theology in San
Diego. There he found another
mentor in John Cobb. Kurt felt
increasingly called to the UU ministry,
but because he shared custody of his
daughter, Caitlin, felt that he could not
leave San Diego until she started high
school. In January, 1994, the time was
right and he entered the Pacific School
of Religion and the Graduate
Theological Union in Berkeley, receiv-
Kurt A. Kuhwald
1996 – 2000
This is the eighth in a series of biographical/historical sketches about
UUCB’s past ministers. With no written
history to draw upon, the information
in this article is taken partly from several 1996-2000 “Clear Light Messengers”;
partly from the ministerial
“highlights/stresses” sheets developed in
February by the Healthy
Congregation Workshop participants; but mostly from the personal memories and perceptions
of many individuals. I am very
indebted and grateful to Kurt
himself for talking with me for
over an hour on the phone on
March 8. I also communicated
individually with several current and past members of UUCB
(Kathryn Alexander, Lois
Anderson, Ruth Barnard, Bob
Gailer, Ken Ogren, and Jude
Stirts) who shared their memories and perceptions of Kurt’s
ministry with me; and I met
with two groups of past and
present members for coffee
(March 11) and dinner (March
12) to talk about Kurt and his
legacy to us. Present at one or
other of these group conversations were: Fred Cole, Alan
Davis, Sally DuGar, Dianne
Ewing, Meri and Paul Gibb,
Barb Goldworm, Valerie Hobbs,
Neal McBurnett, Barb Richards,
Paul Riederer, John Russell,
Sarah Watts, and Jonathan Williamson.
All of these conversations were very rich
and rewarding, and I thank everyone
who contributed for their willingness to
share so fully.
It was with great mutual excitement and promise that Rev. Kurt
Kurt was born in Philadelphia in
1943 but considers himself a “seminative” Californian, having grown up in
San Diego from the age of three. His
only religious affiliation during his
childhood and adolescence was with
the Helen Craw Theosophical
Foundation which he attended with his
mother (his parents had divorced) from
Tessa Davis
March 2006
100 children during these years and
Jude was able to hire an assistant.
Perhaps Kurt’s most important work in
terms of institutional health was to
help us see the spiritual underpinning
of all that we did – whether it was
participating in the sacred democracy
of a congregational meeting, planning
a social justice action, or developing
the annual budget. He encouraged us
to hold all committee meetings in the church building,
to begin all meetings (not
With Mary Oliver’s permission, Kurt rewrote her
just those of the Board) by
Services
poem, “The Summer Day,” while he was at UUCB
lighting a chalice, and to be
Kurt Kuhwald is rememand has offered it here again as an accompaniment
intentional in all our discusbered perhaps more than
to this article. He sent the following words of introsions and actions. A
anything else for the content
duction: “I rewrote Mary Oliver’s poem for the
Council of Committees,
and delivery of his Sunday
Stewardship work of UUCB. Her poem was such a
under the leadership of
services. Kurt’s services were
clear testament to the power of paying attention,
Anna Kay Johnson, met
a gift, and the Earth Room
and to the gifts of holding one’s self in a space of
monthly and brought
was often Standing Room
openness and receptivity. In my rewrite, the last
together committee chairs to
Only on Sunday mornings.
line… turns us toward the question of community. I
address church-wide issues
His sermons always made
feel it is a question all UUs need to ask.”
and problems. The
you think, and think deeply;
Committee on Ministry
they were poetic and merged
A Sunday Morning
changed its name from
both head and heart; and
Ministerial Relations and
Who made the world?
they were delivered with
was expanded to five memWho
made
the
grown
folk
and
the
youth?
consummate attention to lanbers. The work they did
Who
made
the
children?
guage and rhythm. He was
with Kurt became the
This
child,
I
mean,
sitting
here
–
intentional, authentic and
springboard for a series of
the one who has spun herself out of the pews,
often vulnerable in what he
workshops on Shared
the
one
who
sits
here,
wiggling,
yet
so
rapt
and
aware,
had to say, and as he often
Ministry – an emerging conwho
listens
with
innocent
ears
and
wide
said to us, his goal was “to
cept within the UUA at the
light-absorbing
eyes.
comfort the afflicted, and
time. A Long Range
Now she lifts her face as we speak.
afflict the comfortable.” He
Planning Committee was
Now
she
rises,
skipping
off
to
class
as
we
sing.
opened us up to the shadow
also active and worked with
I
don’t
know
exactly
what
it
is
to
worship.
side of ourselves and the
the congregation on visionI
do
know
how
to
sit
attentively,
how
to
enter
here
world, and he raised our
ing and developing a misinto this sacred space, how to open my heart
consciousness about issues
sion as well as leading diswith
all
the
other
hearts,
how
to
let
my
mind
sharpen
many of us had never
cussion about moving us
with
the
sometimes
passionate,
sometimes
thought about before. He
from a pastoral to a promerciful,
words.
also introduced us to Rumi
gram church. The growth
It is how I spend this hour.
and other poets and writers –
and health of UUCB during
Tell
me,
how
else
shall
I
worship?
most especially Mary Oliver.
Kurt’s tenure was evident in
Doesn’t
every
hour
of
worship
end?
and
too
soon?
His favorite Mary Oliver
membership that reached
Tell
me,
what
is
it
you
plan
to
do
poems, including Wild Geese
225, a pledge drive that
with your one wild and precious church?
and The Summer Day,
exceeded its goal, and a
became familiar to all of us
budget for the 1999-2000 fiswhether we had read them
cal year of $207,000.
Institutional Growth
or not. He often read his own poetry
Another indicator of our institutional
Kurt continued the work Stan
and made sermons out of his deeply
health was our improved relationship
Stefancic had done in strengthening
personal (some thought too personal)
with the UU Fellowship of Boulder.
the organizational structure of UUCB.
letters to his daughter Caitlin. Kurt
During 1998-1999, we jointly celebratHe supported the church staff, advoloved the sound and rhythm of laned the 50th Anniversary of a UU prescated for them and was very respectguage. One of his best remembered
ence in Boulder with social getful of their time. Jude Stirts, RE
services was the Flower Sunday when
togethers (picnic and dances), pulpit
Director during his tenure, talked to
he spoke aloud the common names of
exchanges, history circles, and a speme about how rewarding it was to
our native wildflowers. Kurt made few
cial celebratory service on April 11,
work with Kurt on the joint services
changes to our service structure. While
1999 with UUA President John
and workshops they presented. Kurt
he was skeptical at first of our tradition
Buehrens as the speaker. The Church
always supported the RE program and
of congregational sharing after the serand the Fellowship also sponsored
strongly encouraged us to integrate
mon, he came to appreciate the pracjoint Adult Religious Education classes
families into the wider church comtice and renamed that part of the servduring these years. Finally, a fitting
munity. RE registration grew to over
ice Responses from the Gathered People
symbol for our institutional health
ing his M.Div. in May, 1995. His internship was with the UU Church in
Walnut Creek where he found yet
another mentor in the minister, Rev.
David Salmons. After his internship,
Kurt was immediately hired as the
Interim Minister at the Second
Unitarian Church in Chicago, where he
was ordained in May, 1996. The call to
UUCB came in June of that year and
he moved to Boulder for his
first settled ministry in
August.
– the name which we have continued
to use. As Sunday service attendance
continued to grow, the congregation
began to talk about moving to two
Sunday morning services. The idea was
quite controversial, however, and this
did not happen (except on Easter
Sunday). Kurt did lead meditative
Wednesday Vespers services for some
time while he was here.
during Kurt’s years with us is the
wonderful two-sided UUCB banner,
made by Sarah Watts, which made its
first appearance at the 1999 Boulder
Mid-Summer Night’s AIDS Walk and
has been carried at every General
Assembly and MDD meeting since
that time.
Social Justice
Kurt Kuhwald was deeply committed to social justice work. He was
involved in several national UUA antiracist/anti-oppression initiatives – the
Jubilee Workshops and the Journey
Towards Wholeness Transformation
Committee – and was often away from
Boulder engaged in this work on his
weekends off from the pulpit. He
brought UUCB’s presence to many
Boulder community action activities
and was involved in several local
groups: the Safe House Spiritual
Support Team, the Board of the San
Juan Learning Center, Reading to End
Racism, WILPF, Colorado Progressive
Coalition, and Boulder’s Restorative
Justice Program. Under his leadership
at UUCB, the Social Action Committee
became very strong and active (40+
people often attended meetings), and
they sponsored several UUA-developed workshops/programs for the
congregation, starting with Weaving
the Fabric of Diversity. The two-year
long Welcoming Congregation process
which followed, led by Kurt and Barb
Goldworm, was a transformative experience for UUCB, and was cemented
by the joyous celebration of Barb and
Karen (Blackwell)’s wedding in
August, 1998, and then by the overwhelming vote to become an official
Welcoming Congregation in February
1999. The congregation was divided,
however, when, after a congregational
vote to do so, we moved towards the
anti-racism and anti-oppression curricula in the UUA’s Journey Towards
Wholeness and its Language of Race
and the Jubilee I and II workshops.
Some members felt that the emphasis
was focused on black/white relations
to the exclusion of other social justice
work; others strongly disagreed with
what was seen as an emphasis on
confronting white guilt and white privilege. There was also a feeling that the
process of our social justice work often
dominated any meaningful action. For
those who were involved, however,
the work was transformative and led
to new and deeper levels of understanding. Even with the growing congregational disagreement, Kurt made
many of us realize that our work and
actions did indeed make a difference,
and during his years with us a large
number of UUCBers participated in
events like the Gay Pride Parade and
Martin Luther King Day Marade in
Denver and the Boulder AIDS Walks.
Personal Connections
As a single, charismatic male and
informed by his therapeutic background, Kurt maintained very strong
personal boundaries. Some members
thought that he was not active enough
in his pastoral care role, and found
him aloof and not engaged in making
personal connections or interested in
attending purely social church events.
At the same time, other members
found Kurt to be very responsive when
directly approached and felt empowered and supported by him to take on
new leadership roles in the church. He
continued the work of right relations
begun by Stan Stefancic, encouraging
us to use “I” statements, to be respectful, to avoid triangulation, and, most
memorably, to “stay at the table.”
After Boulder
Kurt’s leaving was filled with the
same intentionality that marked his
tenure here. After a month-long intown retreat during the summer of
1998, Kurt, realizing that his soul really
was on the West Coast, told us that he
felt he needed to leave. After extensive
conversations with the Board, the
Committee on Ministry, and his Search
Committee, a plan was developed for
him to leave UUCB in June of 2000. It
was a long separation process but a
good and healthy one in many ways.
What everyone involved now agrees,
however, is that it was a mistake for
Kurt to act as his own Interim Minister
and that the congregation never had
the time to do the necessary work of
preparing ourselves for a new minister.
After leaving Boulder, Kurt spent a
year as an Interim Minister at the
North West UU Church in Atlanta,
Georgia, before going back to
California as the minister of the UU
Church of Palo Alto from 2001- 2003.
While studying Spanish in Oaxaca,
Mexico, in the summer of 2002, Kurt
felt a deep call to live and work with
marginalized people. Later that year he
would participate in a San Francisco
“Street Retreat” where he would
decide that he had “come home” to
his true life’s work. In the fall of 2003,
Kurt moved to the Tenderloin district
of San Francisco and joined the
Faithful Fools, a street ministry founded in 1998 by a UU Minister, Kay
Jorgenson, and Carmen Varsody, a
Franciscan sister. Kurt describes the
work of the Faithful Fools, which
includes regular street retreats, as
being a journey of “accompaniment”
with the marginalized and the street
people of San Francisco, offering them
“a place of connected relationship,”
and opportunities to deepen and transform their lives. Kurt has continued his
parish ministry as well, serving as a
one-half time Interim in the Sierra
Foothills UU Church in Auburn, CA
during 2004, and currently as a onehalf time Consulting Minister at the
Berkeley Fellowship of UUs. He told
me that he feels sure that the next
phase of his ministry will include acting, as he is working with playwright
Martha Boesing to adapt her onewoman play The Witness to a one-man
version that he will perform. It is certain that whatever his future path, Kurt
will continue to live his life with intention and authenticity and that he will
continue to ask himself, as he asked
us, “What is it you plan to do with
your one wild and precious life?”
Tessa Davis April, 2006
UUCB’s Ministerial Legacy
Jacqueline A.
Ziegler
2000 – 2005
Everyone involved, including
Reverend Ziegler herself, agrees
that it is too soon to write a comprehensive historical/biographical article about Rev. Jacqueline
Ziegler and her tenure at UUCB.
Our fifth settled and first female minister, Jackie resigned less than a year
ago, in June 2005. It will take time to
gain the perspective necessary to write
an article that adequately captures
the full depth and breadth of her five
years with us. What follows. therefore,
is only a very brief biography (with
information taken from The Minister’s
Page of her current, River of Grass UU
Congregation’s website), and a preliminary summary of UUCB members’
memories about the highlights of Rev.
Jackie’s years here.
Jacqueline A. Ziegler was born in
Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She gained an
early respect for, and appreciation of,
diversity, having grown up in an ethnically and racially mixed neighborhood. She attended a Christian Science
Church as a young child, but stopped
attending when she was about
10 because she didn’t believe
that Jesus Christ was the only
son of God. Jackie had several
careers before becoming a
minister. Her college major
was Health and she spent
many years as a health educator, focusing on wellness. In
1969, as a young adult, Jackie
discovered the First Unitarian
Society of Milwaukee and
quickly became very active
and involved – teaching
Religious Education, serving on
several committees, and being
elected a member of the
Ministerial Search Committee.
It was Thomas Berry’s cosmology and his “Universe Story”
that drew Jackie to the UU
ministry. She attended both
Meadville Lombard School of
Theology and the University
of Chicago’s Divinity School,
and was ordained by the First
Unitarian Society of Milwaukee
in 1997. Her first ministry was
as an Interim Minister at the
Unitarian Church in Harrisburg,
Pennsylvania. She was called to UUCB
in 2000, and was installed as our minister on March 11, 2001. Jackie is married to Daniel Ziegler and has two
grown sons.
Rev. Jackie, as she preferred to be
called, brought to UUCB a strong pas-
toral presence, a profound commitment to our denominational 7th principle, and a deep identification with
the process theism of Alfred North
Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne.
While she was here, we started serving fair trade coffee during coffee
hour; and it was during her tenure
that the Peace Pole was erected on
our patio. We had many services that
focused on environmental and animal
rights issues, including a pet memorial
service which Jackie led each year
and which was open to the entire
Boulder community. Jackie taught
several classes on process theology,
and also co-led the popular
UUA workshop Build Your
Own Theology.
UUCB enjoyed several very
innovative – many of them
multi-media – services under
Rev. Jackie’s leadership.
Particularly remembered are
services on The Wizard of Oz,
Star Trek, and The Greatest
Story Ever Told, based on
Thomas Berry’s cosmology.
Jackie also led memorable solstice services, as well as a special service after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Elements of our
Sunday service that Rev. Jackie
introduced, and that we still
include, are the ringing of the
peace bowl; the honoring of
our ancestors; and the Change
for the Future collection of
coins in our offering for the
benefit of local non-profit
organizations.
Since resigning last June,
Jackie has been serving the
River of Grass Unitarian
Universalist Congregation in
Plantation, Florida as their Interim
Minister. UUCB has been lay-led for
the past year but expects to have an
Interim Minister on board by the end
of the summer.
Tessa Davis May, 2006