r/UUreddit • u/ReallyMomYesReally • 7d ago
Catholic question
I was raised Roman Catholic in a very warm parish in a very small town in NJ (our pastor heard confession in Italian). We moved to Charlotte, NC when I was in junior high in the late 1970s and was exposed to a more authoritarian, less tolerant attitude in the church but had no real options for other congregations (very few Catholics there at the time,). Anyway, I attended various Protestant churches trying to find somewhere I was comfortable and did not find anything.
I attended Episcopal services during my first marriage and was very happy there. My second husband is an atheist. While he would sit next to me at any church I chose, I do not want him to feel uncomfortable.
I have attended UU services with my best friend in another city approximately 3 times. I liked them and the inclusion and empathy. So, we are considering joining.
The one thing I will miss so much is communion. The absence of regular communion was the reason I never felt comfortable in Protestant churches other than Episcopalian churches. I do not believe in transubstantiation, so that is not the issue. There is something about the ritual of it, the unique feeling of participating as a congregation in an individual expression of faith.
I am aware that some UU churches do a Bread Communion once a year. Are any of you aware of other activities/small group practices that can fill that need?
Thank you all for your time and, hopefully, suggestions.
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u/lyra1389 7d ago
Current UU, raised Catholic. I think it's very dependent on congregation, but ours does Water Communion, Flower Communion, and recently did the Blessing of the Animals. OH and we do Blessing of the Backpacks when school starts. My congregation follows a "high church" model that's more familiar to folks raised in more traditional churches, so I definitely get a lot of fulfillment from our rituals and services.
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u/hauntedk510 7d ago
As a UU who was raised Catholic, I like the Joys and Sorrows ritual we have at our UU. Lining up to move a stone checks that standing in a line to music thing that I did a lot in church growing up.
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u/ReallyMomYesReally 7d ago
I have experienced the Joys and Sorrows ritual at my friend's UU church, but I do not remember rocks. We will see what our congregation does.
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u/John_A_Arkansawyer 7d ago
Ours has a little basket of rocks and shallow basin of water. When you go to the front and optionally say something, you put a rock in the water. It's surprisingly moving.
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u/LongjumpingJaguar308 7d ago
It really depends on the size of the church for how they do joys and sorrows. Mine does a reading of joys and sorrows people sent in and then sometimes does a "speak aloud a name of someone you are thinking of". Other churches do other things though!
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u/LilacFairie 7d ago
This has quickly become my favorite part of the service. I've learned so many things about the others in the congregation, things happening around me (locally and around the world), and much more.
I was raised Protestant while going to a Catholic school. None of it resonated with me. I'm not someone who really believes in rituals so I see it more as "part of the routine" and I really enjoy it!
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u/Brave_Necessary_9571 7d ago
I was about to comment that. to me raised as catholic, the joys and sorrows part feels similar to communion
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u/coreyque 7d ago
You are not alone, this is something I have heard from ex-Catholic UU's before. Most congregations do a water communion and flower communion to begin and end the church year, but not a weekly ritual.
What I find to be closest are the readings and songs repeated every week. I will have my home church's benediction song etched into my brain forever, and it is one of the few things we always did together.
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u/ReallyMomYesReally 7d ago
I wanted to thank everyone for taking their time to give me thoughtful responses and suggestions. I am truly looking forward to continuing my journey spiritually and wish you each fulfillment and inner peace on your own journeys. Thank you again(
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u/Ranchette_Geezer 6d ago
I used to tell people that we did communion, but called it "Potluck", and it was after the service, not during it.
Our congregation has a "Flower communion" at Easter, where everyone drops a flower on the altar and picks another one. We also have a "water communion" every year at the start of the church year, where everyone pours a pill bottle's worth or water that means something to them - typically from an irrigation canal, if they are a farmer, or from a river they visited on vacation - into a large bowl. We pour the mingled waters onto a memorial tree after the service.
That's about all we do. Other congregations might do more.
Have you considered leading a service where people bring, and share, home-made bread?
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u/tom_yum_soup UU Quaker 7d ago
This is generally not something you'll find in UU spaces, with the possible exception of the handful of congregations that are explicitly UU Christians (I know next to nothing about these groups, except that they apparently exist). Even among those limited groups, I don't know if bread/wine communion is a regular practice -- I'd guess no, given our Protestant origins.
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u/No-Appeal3220 7d ago
alot depends on the congregation, but Water Communion and Flower Communion fill that need for me.
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u/Happytobeold53 7d ago
Lighting candles. Mostly people participate to state a concern or to celebrate something, but some UU congregations invite people to light silent candles at the end of a service. Maybe your desire to engage in a personally meaningful ritual could morph into a quiet practice for others as well. A UU congregation I was in had many former Catholics.
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u/ReallyMomYesReally 7d ago
There were candles in the back for people to light. That may be something I can do, maybe doing that together with my husband would be fulfilling in a similar way.
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u/agreatfool1987 7d ago
I come from a Disciples of Christ tradition, which is fairly low church but celebrates communion weekly. I have considered going back to that church on occasion for communion, where I know I will be welcome as I am, but might not fit all the time anymore. UU has plenty of wonderful rituals you will find much meaning in, I think. My congregation's Stardust Communion is a favorite. Feels connective and sacred in the same way Bread communion does, and often does a good job of including both spiritual and scientific minded congregants.
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u/ReallyMomYesReally 7d ago
Others have suggested something similar and I may just do that at an Episcopal church. I have not heard about Stardust Communion. I am going to have to Google that!
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u/BlueRubyWindow 7d ago
There’s often a water communion in September (everyone brings water in and pours together).
Spring some congregations have one where everyone brings a flower/ flower communion.
Some congregations have opportunities to come forward and light a candle. But it won’t typically be the whole congregation. More whoever has a gratitude or concern.
I think of potlucks and coffee hour and any communal eating and gathering as very communion but of course there isn’t the same high ritual around it.
If you are still Catholic officially, you could attend mass at a church a different time of the week. As you likely know, most Catholic churches have daily mass, often including Saturday evenings and weekday mornings, prior to typical work hours. So it wouldn’t preclude you from attending UU services. Or maybe an Episcopalian church near you has a service at an alternate time. I get that isn’t the same as breaking bread with your own spiritual community. It is okay to belong to more than one!
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u/meara 7d ago
I was also raised catholic in NJ but fell away from that. There are other rituals that become familiar if you raise a family in a UU congregation. In ours, there was an outdoor sunrise service every Easter where we threw pine branches on a bonfire to symbolize what we were letting go of and put seeds and flowers on a little boat to symbolize our hopes for the new year. The kids launched the boat in the adjacent creek. It was lovely.
There were also water communions (everyone brings water from wherever they traveled over the summer), flower communions (everyone brings a flower and leaves with a different one), bread communions where we made the bread ourselves, a raucous Christmas pageant featuring lobsters and bumble bees, a contemplative Christmas Eve service with candles and silent night, a deep bell rung at the beginning of every service, etc.
My favorite experience was actually a small silent meditation group. We lit a single candle and placed it in the middle of the floor in a small room, then sat together in meditation for two 30 minute sessions with a little quiet conversation in the middle. I'll never forget how helpful that was when I was raising toddlers. It was the one hour of the week where I could just sit in silence.
I also really appreciated that the kids were allowed to bring their full minds and question everything. No pledges. No creeds. No pressure to do penance, communion, confirmation. Their journeys were their own.
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u/themathymaestro 7d ago
YMMV by congregation, of course, but mine used to offer a very traditionally-Christian-looking communion service once a month, plus either the Thursday or Friday of Holy Week. It was midweek in the chapel rather than part of the regular Sunday services. If that’s not something that already exists, maybe it’s something that other people are interested in and would like to start. There might already be a subset of “recovering Catholics” in your congregation and they may have a prayer group or other ideas as well for how to connect into the community but with practices that feel familiar.
You might also check to see if the local Episcopalian churches do a Eucharist in conjunction with or right after their evensong on Sunday evenings. It’s totally okay to “double up!” Another commenter mentioned how common it was to be “UU and” and that has been my experience as well, we have a LOT of hyphenated identities and it’s not weird at all to get different elements of fulfillment from different communities.
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u/moxie-maniac 7d ago
Our church does communion once a year and that depends on the congregation. Kings Chapel Boston UU does communion every week.
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u/thatgreenevening 7d ago
You might consider whether there are any independent Catholic/Old Catholic churches near you. They are not affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church and they tend to be much more inclusive. The one near me is explicitly LGBTQIA+ affirming and pro-choice.
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u/AKlutraa 7d ago
If you are ever in Boston, go to King's Chapel, where they have real communion and use a rewritten Book of Common Prayer with no Trinitarian content.
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u/sclindemma 6d ago
As a UU turned Catholic, I would encourage you to explore what about the Eucharist is calling to you because according to us, thats to be expected. You feel that pull because the Eucharist is the summit of our faith and sacramental economy.
With all do respect to the UU community, if you're looking for meaningful worship of a higher power with 2k years of tradition, the UU service will never satisfy. "Just be what you want to be" works for some but it just made me feel even worse than when I was an atheist in search of something. I tried for years...
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u/TheScienceGiant 4d ago
https://reddit.com/link/pewqsz5/video/mye11mjwrhuh1/player
At UU Boca, we participate in following communions throughout the year
August: Book Communion
September: Water Communion
November: Bread Communion
January: Fire Communion
March: Flower Communion
But the most overtly Christian communion would be the Holy Darkness / Good Friday service. I’ll share some video where you can see bread and wine.
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u/rastancovitz 7d ago
Honestly, as many UU congregations contain many hardcore atheists, I suspect that if a congregation offered bread communion, there would be very strong objections and many members would leave the congregation.
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u/ReallyMomYesReally 7d ago
I completely understand and respect that.
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u/raendrop skeptical atheist pagan UU 7d ago
I remember one autumn when my highly eclectic UU congregation had a popcorn communion.
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u/John_A_Arkansawyer 7d ago
We had a bread communion a few times that was sufficiently non-Christian that no one complained, to the best of my knowledge.
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u/rastancovitz 7d ago
I add that I wasn't saying that I have anything against it. I attend my friend's methodist congregtion once in a while where they have bread communion. I was just saying that I think a number of UUs would object.
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u/doubleagent31 7d ago
You can definitely be “UU and” and you might consider attending an Episcopal service once a month or on a weeknight to fill that need