The Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) recognizes us as a Welcoming Congregation. The term “Welcoming Congregation” has a special meaning in our faith tradition. It represents our commitment to offering an abiding welcome to LGBTQ individuals and families.

Get involved!

The Welcoming Congregation program was created by the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) to assist congregations to explicitly welcome LGBTQ+ folks into all aspects of congregational life. FPUU-Canton has been a UUA-certified Welcoming Congregation for many years. This means that we did a number of congregation-wide activities to learn about the LGBTQ+ community.

For information on Welcoming congregation programs and events at First Parish and locally, visit Welcoming Congregation renewal.

Welcoming Congregation Renewal 2024 – 2025

Below is a letter we received from the UUA, congratulating us for our successful completion of Welcoming Congregation Renewal events and contributions. I want to thank all of you at FPUU who helped make last year’s WC-Renewal so rich with your energy, input, and on-going support.

In our coming church year I will again facilitate conversation(s) for our educational module. Rev. Michelle has suggested the UUA’s Common Read for this year which is Authentic Selves: Celebrating Trans and Nonbinary People and Their Families (Skinner House, 2023). It can be found at https://www.uua.org/lifespan/curricula/read We will likely have conversations during the winter but if you have spare time before then and/or want to get a jump ahead, you can order, share, and begin reading. Again, thanks for all the support. I’m looking forward to learning more during the upcoming year.

Diana

Welcoming Congregation renewal/recertification

Honoring a truly welcoming reality for the LGBTQ+ community has become a bit more complicated since then. Further, the UUA wants to be certain that Welcoming Congregations are truly up-to-date in their welcoming efforts. The UUA has asked congregations such as ours to renew these efforts and to remain UUA-certified. A group of us are reactivating the Welcoming Congregation Committee with the intention of becoming re-certified.

Steps in the recertification are:

1. Plan two Welcoming Sunday Services.
2. Make note of Welcoming Days of Observance to keep this effort in front of all of us.
3. Implement a Welcoming Congregation Module, a seminar or a webinar open to our congregation and our Canton community to inform, educate and raise awareness about the needs and issues of the LGBTQ+/TGQNB community; and
4. Support a Welcoming Project or to support LGBTQ+ organizations or campaigns.

We look forward to achieving a truly welcoming, accepting, and comfortable church experience for all people.

Resources

Please visit the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) website for information on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer welcome and equality.

A member of our congregation compiled a Transgender Resource List.

Read the official document from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts: Declaration of Religious Support (PDF).

Same Sex Freedom to Marry in Massachusetts

Saturday, May 17, 2014, marked the tenth anniversary of the right to marry in Massachusetts. Members of our congregation celebrated the event by ringing our Paul Revere bell at noon that day.