Love Is the Answer!

October 27, 2024 – 10:00 am

Eliot Unitarian Chapel

This coming Sunday is an important day in the life of our congregation. You voted to call me as your Lead Minister on March 3, 2024. You and I will be formalizing and celebrating the covenantal relationship between us on Sunday. 

What is the deeper meaning of an Installation? Why is it so special?

In Unitarian Universalism, we do not see the Minister as someone who is higher than the people they serve. We don’t have a closer relationship with God or the spirit of life. We aren’t necessarily smarter than the people we serve. We aren’t even more righteous or better human beings than you are. What makes ministers special is that we have dedicated ourselves to Unitarian Universalism and dedicated our lives to serving this faith. Our calling is to inspire those we serve in living our core UU values and serving our world because we believe from the depths of our being that these core values, of which love is the center, are life-sustaining and life-saving in the largest sense of things. They are the path toward the world we imagine where everything and everyone is in right relationship and we can truly live into the fullness of who we are as individuals and as intertwined communities. 

Those of us who choose parish ministry are specialists in congregational life. We have felt called to lead and support the members of our congregations in living the missions they have chosen. By mission, we mean the central purpose that a congregation has democratically decided is their reason for being. 

At Eliot Chapel, the members democratically chose this as our mission: to love courageously, to grow spiritually, and to inspire compassionate action. My task as your spiritual leader is to guide, inspire, and strengthen you to live into this mission as individuals and as a community.

Our Installation Services are where we formally make promises to each other for how we will live into our mission-centered ministry. You will make promises to me, and I will make promises to you. In Unitarian Universalism, the theological explanation for this is “entering into covenant.” Covenants are sacred promises that we make to each other. Our faith is rooted not in any doctrine or dogma. It is rooted in our covenants. UU Minister Rev. Sue Phillips describes covenants as thriving “at the intersection of individual, community, and the Sacred.”

I am so excited about Sunday. I know many of you are as well. But remember, this isn’t my day. It’s our day. We are celebrating the beginning of our journey together. 

If you have recently begun attending services or are considering visiting, I extend a special welcome. Everyone is welcome, not just those who are members of the congregation.

May the ministry we are entering together be filled with joy, hope, healing and always, love.

Yours in faith,

Rev. Krista Taves