Listen to Past Sermons

This Sunday we welcome back the young South Africans of the Bokamoso Youth Choir. Drawing on South Africa’s rich tradition of freedom singing, the young people of Bokamoso (joined by the All Souls Jubilee Singers and All Souls Childrens and Junior Choirs) will intermingle their own stories with the stories of their nation and ours. This is one of the most inspiring services of the year! Please invite your friends and family to share in this special intergenerational service!

In A People’s History of the United States, historian Howard Zinn helped us uncover forgotten or untold stories from our collective past. Now, we’re desperately in need of just and sustainable visions for our shared future. On Martin Luther King, Jr. Sunday we’ll turn to Dr. King and others to help us imagine what a people’s future of the United States could look like.

Whether we’re traveling through an airport or entering into a new relationship, we are invited in different ways to “check” our baggage. What are we holding on to? What is weighing us down? Is it time to let it go? Join All Souls Chaplain, Christin Green, to explore the practice of checking our baggage.

Our Vespers worship service is modeled after the traditional Taizé worship service, which uses silence, scripture, prayer, and repetitive singing of short chants and rounds to quiet the mind and promote deep meditation. The Taizé Community promotes peace and justice through prayer and meditation. Our Vespers service mirrors Taizé-style attention to silence, holy words, prayer, and singing, but has also evolved to include other meditative traditions such as yogic singing and Buddhist chanting. Followed by a time for community gathering. Every second Wednesday of the month, September through June.

The New Year represents a time of new beginnings and new possibilities. Yet with each passing year, a sense of urgency has crept into the New Year’s spirit, as our planet hurtles toward a “point of no return.” How can we seize upon the window of good intention that opens at the New Year to make a change for our lives and our world?

Our intergenerational worship service is inspired by the Kwanzaa principle, Ujima, the celebration of collective work and shared responsibility. Not only will this principle shape this service’s message, it will shape this service altogether! A central feature of our time together this Sunday will involve a ritual of altar building in which we will each contribute an object or written-down message to our sanctuary’s altar space, creating a piece of sacred art in real time during the service. As such, we invite you to bring something you don’t mind parting with, something in the spirit of Kwanzaa like corn or another fruit/vegetable and/or something that connects to the work of building beloved community. We will also have items already in the sanctuary for you to add to the altar. Reach out to Minister of Congregational Care Tony Coleman (tcoleman@allsouls.ws) if you have questions.

Join Rev. Hardies and the All Souls Choir in welcoming Christmas into the world and into our hearts during this candlelit service of lessons and carols. Rev. Hardies’ homily will be “Do You Hear What I Hear?” Christmas is a story of how good news can enter a broken world in unexpected and out-of-the way places. At the margins. What wisdom can this age old tale offer us in these dark times? Don’t forget to bring a bell to ring every time we sing “Alleluia.”

Our early Christmas service is designed especially for families with young children—as well as the “young at heart” of all ages! This year features a dramatic reading of a classic Christmas story. The Jubilee Singers and Children’s Choir will sing. Don’t forget to bring a bell to ring every time we sing “Alleluia.”

The winter solstice invites us to take stock of our lives. Another year draws to a close: what’s done is done; what’s not done is not done. Let it be. What must we let go of in order to begin the New Year with a fresh and free spirit?

On this Sunday, Rev. Hardies will be joined by the children of the church to tell a very special story set to some very special music. An All Souls tradition.

Register your children to be part of the pageant (link coming). There is a mandatory rehearsal on Sat. Dec. 14 from 9:30 to noon.

Bring an unwrapped gift this Sunday for the children of La Clinica del Pueblo.

Our Vespers worship service is modeled after the traditional Taizé worship service, which uses silence, scripture, prayer, and repetitive singing of short chants and rounds to quiet the mind and promote deep meditation. The Taizé Community promotes peace and justice through prayer and meditation. Our Vespers service mirrors Taizé-style attention to silence, holy words, prayer, and singing, but has also evolved to include other meditative traditions such as yogic singing and Buddhist chanting. Followed by a time for community gathering. Every second Wednesday of the month, September through June.

Our great Unitarian forebear Margaret Fuller wrote that “Unity is only possible to those who are units.” We must know ourselves—be strong in ourselves—even as we work to build community and learn to live in covenant. Join Minister for Adult Spiritual Development Rev. Norman Allen as we explore our individual and collective journeys toward renewal, and recognize anew all the “wonders we survey.”

Bring an unwrapped gift this Sunday for the children of La Clinica del Pueblo.