Faith in Action
Our Faith in Action is the way we get involved in our own community at large. When we have concerns, when we see the need for change, when we want to help, we find ways to act and ways to make relationships with individuals and organizations. We find ways to get involved and ways to contribute. Here are some of the ways we give to our community:
Community Involvement: Helps make church members aware of current social problems, promotes and organizes community projects, and demonstrates that active interest can make a difference.
Pride Festival and Parade: Celebrated on the last Saturday of June in Houston’s Montrose area. Join fellow Houston-area Unitarians as we reach out to the GLBT community by taking one hour shifts in the UU booth during the daytime festival and marching in the nighttime parade. 2010 Parade and Festival Information
Sunday Offering: Each Sunday we split our offering with an organization that is working to support our values.
UU Serves: Our flexible and fun volunteer program which gives us a way to work together to serve people in need in our Houston community. It's a collection of teams of volunteers who work together at various times during the week cooking, building, or doing other jobs to help make our community a better place. The goal of UU Serves is for First Church members collectively to volunteer the equivalent number of hours in non-profit settings as a full time, non-profit professional would work during the course of a calendar year. We can meet this goal if every First Church member volunteers for just four hours a year.
- Emergency Aid Coalition: A large organization which helps families in poverty. We need teams of four to work Friday mornings making sandwiches and helping clients with clothing selection.
- Gulf Coast Volunteers for the Long Haul: Organized relief trips of up to fourty volunteers go to the Gulf Coast to help rebuild following hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The president of Gulf Coast Volunteers for the Long Hall is Mary Harrington, one of First Church’s former ministers.
- Letter writing: A group of First Church volunteers will gather at the church once a month to write letters on social justice issues.
- Meal Packs for the Homeless and Hungry: To help ease the pain of hunger in our community by ordering pre-packaged, nonperishable meals to be distributed to the homeless and hungry. Order meals to distribute yourself or to be given to the Emergency Aid Coalition for distribution. Place your orders on line at www.firstuu.org or by filling out an order form at the church.
- Rebuilding Together-Houston: A nonprofit organization which provides home repair services for low income, elder and/or disabled Houston area homeowners. We send crews of eight to ten people who work most of the day to do exterior painting and repair work four times a year.