Sermon Archive
Let My Heart Be Open
Let My Heart Be Open Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church May 26, 2019 With spring finally here, I have been trying to spend some time out in the yard. The other day I decided to get a shovel and dig up the new patch of Japanese...
Connecting the Threads of Kindness
Connecting the Threads of Kindness by Kelly Knox May 26, 2019 I came across kindness by accident. Kindness as a project that is. Kindness in general, that was birthing happenstance. My mother is one of the kindest people I know. I never heard her say an unkind word...
Getting Proximate
Getting Proximate Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church May 12, 2019 “Be brave enough to start a conversation that matters.” “Treasure curiosity more than certainty.” (from “Turning to One Another,” by Margaret J. Wheatley) Bryan...
To Touch Inward Springs
To Touch Inward Springs © Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church May 5, 2019 Two hundred years ago, the arguments between liberal and conservative Congregationalists in New England were almost as intense as the conflicts between...
Resurrection of the Creation
Resurrection of the Creation © Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church Easter Sunday, April 21, 2019 The ancient story tells us that on the day Jesus was crucified, there were two other men crucified beside him. One of them asked Jesus to remember him as he...
What Might You Sacrifice?
What Might You Sacrifice? © Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church April 14, 2019 …And last spring along the Back Shore swam right whales. Early in May last year, a pod of right whales, a rather large percentage of the tiny number of right whales still...
A Journey in Poetry
Sunday, March 24, 2019 Call to Worship by Kathleen McTigue (excerpt) Here in the refuge of this Sabbath home We turn our busy minds toward silence, And our full hearts toward one another. We move together through the mysteries: The bright surprise of birth and...
From Heart to Head and Back to Heart
From Heart to Head and Back to Heart Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church March 31, 2019 “We were born with silence, and as we grew up, we lost the silence and were filled with words. We lived in our hearts, and as time passed, we moved into our heads…”...
Greening Power
Greening Power Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church March 17, 2019 Today is all about green. Each year Americans celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, taking to the streets to party, with parades, and green clothes, hair, face paint, and...
Encountering the Sacred Everywhere
Encountering the Sacred Everywhere Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church March 10, 2019 On my very first morning in India, I found myself in a tour bus bouncing down the highway from the Varanasi airport to the hotel. Suddenly the tour guide called our attention...
Risking Trust
Risking Trust © Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester Unitarian Universalist Church February 3, 2019 Recently a young woman wrote to a newspaper advice column looking for help in coping with the end of a romantic relationship. Her partner, who had been mentioning...
Answering the Knock
Answering the Knock Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church January 20, 2019 Year after year, Martin Luther King Day is observed in various ways all across the country. Right here in Cape Ann a week ago, despite the ice, we had the march and service at the...
Upcoming Services
Gloucester UU joins Rockport and Essex for worship this Sunday at First Univ of Essex, or on Zoom.Sunday August 23rd 10 am Stronger Together with Rev. Tess BaumbergerJoin us for a service about how we can be stronger by working together, using the symbols of spinning threads and weaving tapestries. The service will include a simple ritual, poetry, and meditations on the power of collaboration.To join us via Zoom please visit uuessex.org and click on the Zoom link. If you’re coming in person, there is some street parking or you can use the municipal lot. Coming from Gloucester you would go past the church and take your first left onto Martin Street, then go left again on Shepherd Street. Please know the central spots in the lot are reserved for boat and trailer parking during the summer. If you go up the stairs at the end of the lot, you can cross the parking lot and make your way to the church.
Recent News
To Take Back Our Land Again
To Take Back Our Land Again © Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church January 18, 2026 As I was writing this sermon yesterday, I heard that there was a large-scale protest taking place in Minneapolis, the city most recently targeted for authoritarian control of...
Sunday Jan 18
o Take Back Our Land Again, led by Reverend Janet Parsons We take time each year to honor and remember Dr. Martin Luther King and try to ask ourselves some of the questions he might be asking us today. Music by Robert Noble. Please join us at 10am, in-person or at...
We Fight for Roses, Too!
We Fight for Roses, Too! © Reverend Janet Parsons Gloucester UU Church January 11, 2026 The story began 114 years ago, on January 1, 1912. That day, a new law took effect in Massachusetts that reduced the number of hours in the work week for women, from 56 hours per...