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In tough times, many people turn to their faith, their houses of worship, their clergy. The Miami Valley offers a rich variety of religious options.

This is the first in a series of periodic articles that examine the major religions represented in our area and the ways in which they are affecting the daily lives of their members.

In addition to chatting with a devoted member of each congregation, we're inviting clergy to take us for a video tour of their respective houses of worship. This week, you'll meet the Rev. Amy Russell by watching the above video.

An overview

"Unitarian Universalism is a non-creedal faith which honors all other religions and belief systems. Our members are encouraged to develop their own spiritual paths as well as share their spiritual journeys within our community. We welcome people of every faith, race, gender, sexual orientation, and political affiliation. In 2008, there were 158,000 UU's in 1,018 U.S. churches. In a Pew Forum study, .03 percent of Americans identified themselves as Unitarian. Our local church has 250 members."

— Rev. Amy Russell, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Miami Valley

A conversation with Kate Halpin

Q How did you come to your religion?

A I was raised Unitarian Universalist. There aren't very many of us. UU tends to be a religion that people find. We are growing (the raised UU's) more and more — people are becoming UU's and raising their children UU because they want their children to be raised in an environment where they can find their spirituality themselves.

Q What do you think sets your religion apart and makes it special?

A The acceptance of everyone — we are a Welcoming Congregation, which means we have gone through several programs which make us accepting of everyone.

Our Social Action Committee is very active: we do a lot of community outreach and I'm proud to be a part of that. We've marched in the Gay Pride parade, we provide lunch to St. Vincent De Paul, we donate money to food banks, we recently raised quite a lot of money for the Peace Museum.

Q How does your religion help you get through hard times, such as the current economic crisis?

A I think any kind of community is helpful in hard times — a church is a community and communities care for their members.

Q What is a Unitarian's view of God?

A This is a hard question to answer. The easy answer is: You can believe or not believe in a God, a Goddess, a being, a presence. We don't have a creed. Historically, Unitarians did believe in God and Jesus and some UU churches are still Christian. Rather than following a religious creed, we follow principles on how we want to live our lives. Personally, I believe that Jesus was an amazing prophet and that he taught many wonderful things. But I also think that Moses was a great prophet, and Confucius and others. I can't believe in the divinity of Jesus myself when there were so many other prophets who preached basically very similar ideals all over the world. But ... that is not what all UU's believe, so you can't take my belief and proscribe it to all Unitarian Universalists.

Q What do you love about your religion?

A I do like the way we look at other religions and cultures and learn from them. We look at Christian and Jewish teachings as one of the bases of our religion, but we also look to Native American beliefs, Buddhism, Taoism, Muslim and pagan teachings as well. Part of being a UU is the search for spirituality. I love the community — there are so many vibrant, caring, passionate people, it's comforting and energizing at the same time.

Q How does your faith affect your day-to-day life?

A I try to be open to experience. I try to accept people and what they believe without judging them ... it's not easy. I think that human nature is competitive and many of us have a compulsion to be "right." But I have learned over time that I can be friends with people who have different politics, faith and backgrounds than I have because I can accept what they believe. I may not agree with them, but I can accept them.

Q What holidays or traditions do you especially enjoy?

A We have a big community dinner the Sunday before Thanksgiving. We also have a candlelight Christmas Eve service that is very spiritual.

Q What is a particular observance that has special meaning to you?

A We have a water ceremony in the fall where we come together and reconnect after being apart for the summer. We all bring water from where we were and we share what we did and pool the water together. This ceremony is a wonderful way to reconnect with other members of the Fellowship.

Q What do you think is the most important thing you've learned from your religion?

A Our first principle is the inherent worth and dignity of all people. This is really easy to say, but very hard to live up to. There are people who have done terrible things. While I can really hate what they have done, I believe that they do have worth and dignity.

To learn more: The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Miami Valley is located at 8690 Yankee St. in Washington Twp. Services are at 11 a.m. on Sundays, with children's religious services at the same time. Web site: mvuuf.org

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2440 or mmoss@Dayton

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