News: September 4, 2026
Dear Members and Friends:
This month we launch our annual program year. Over the next ten months, we’ll be exploring the theme of “Revolutions: Body & Soul” in services, workshops, and through the senior minister’s book group. This Sunday, we’ll kick things off with a sermon in honor of the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution and reflections on how our Unitarian Universalist tradition has played a role in inspiring both political and spiritual revolutions.
September contains a very important anniversary for the United States. It includes the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. We will be marking this profound event and all the loss that followed it with a vigil on Friday, September 11th that we are organizing with Rothko Chapel. We will read the names of thousands of US, Afghani, and Iraqi dead. We are looking for volunteers to help read names and I hope that you will join me in this lamentation.
The work of religious community includes honoring the fullness of human experience. While we are marking this significant national milestone, we will also be uplifting some of things that make First Unitarian Universalist a wonderful place. On Sunday, September 13th, we will be joined by Rev. David Messner, PhD, a Unitarian Universalist who specializes in welcoming and hospitality, to help us reflect on and learn about how we can best do the work of widening love’s circle. Rev. Messner will be preaching both services and then, at 1:00 p.m., he’ll be providing a workshop on radical hospitality to encourage us to share the beauty of our congregation.
This takes place in advance of our September 20th service, “Bring a Friend Sunday”. I don’t know when the last time, if ever, that First Unitarian Universalist has done so a thing. I hope that you’ll consider inviting someone you know who would benefit from being part of our congregation. We will welcome them with an uplifting service and special events afterwards meant to help our collective light shine.
The following Sunday, we’ll be welcoming a very special guest to our pulpit. Dr. Abdullah Antepli, an Imam and the President of Rothko Chapel, will offer our sermon. I am not sure the last time we had an Islamic faith leader preaching in our pulpit at First Unitarian Universalist. I’m delighted that we will be able to live into our mission of fostering religious pluralism by welcoming a religious leader from that tradition on Sunday morning. It is especially lovely that the person we are welcoming is such a good friend of our congregation.
September is a meaningful month in two other ways. It marks the start of our ninth year together. The beginning of my twentieth year in parish ministry. Over years, I have preached around 500 sermons, about 270 of them at First Unitarian Universalist. People sometimes ask after the texts of my sermons or things I have preached before. You can find the majority of my sermons on by website: https://www.colinbossen.com. If you want to sign-up to the text of the week’s sermon emailed to you, you can also follow me on Substack at https://colinbossen.substack.com/. The church maintains an extensive back catalog of videos of our services and sermons on our YouTube page.
Of course, the best places to catch a sermon, and experience a service, is either in-person or via the livestream on a Sunday morning. I hope to see at church soon!
love,
Colin
Where is the Minister?
I will be in the pulpit on September 6th and 20th. On September 11th, I will be either at First Unitarian Universalist or Rothko Chapel for the entirety of our vigil (it runs until midnight). I will be out of the office on September 14th to recuperate and then out on vacation from September 21st to 27th. On September 10th, I will be giving a lecture at Rice University. On September 26th I will be part of a panel at the Network for Public Education discussing the work of the Commission on the HISD Takeover.
This month we launch our annual program year. Over the next ten months, we’ll be exploring the theme of “Revolutions: Body & Soul” in services, workshops, and through the senior minister’s book group. This Sunday, we’ll kick things off with a sermon in honor of the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution and reflections on how our Unitarian Universalist tradition has played a role in inspiring both political and spiritual revolutions.
September contains a very important anniversary for the United States. It includes the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. We will be marking this profound event and all the loss that followed it with a vigil on Friday, September 11th that we are organizing with Rothko Chapel. We will read the names of thousands of US, Afghani, and Iraqi dead. We are looking for volunteers to help read names and I hope that you will join me in this lamentation.
The work of religious community includes honoring the fullness of human experience. While we are marking this significant national milestone, we will also be uplifting some of things that make First Unitarian Universalist a wonderful place. On Sunday, September 13th, we will be joined by Rev. David Messner, PhD, a Unitarian Universalist who specializes in welcoming and hospitality, to help us reflect on and learn about how we can best do the work of widening love’s circle. Rev. Messner will be preaching both services and then, at 1:00 p.m., he’ll be providing a workshop on radical hospitality to encourage us to share the beauty of our congregation.
This takes place in advance of our September 20th service, “Bring a Friend Sunday”. I don’t know when the last time, if ever, that First Unitarian Universalist has done so a thing. I hope that you’ll consider inviting someone you know who would benefit from being part of our congregation. We will welcome them with an uplifting service and special events afterwards meant to help our collective light shine.
The following Sunday, we’ll be welcoming a very special guest to our pulpit. Dr. Abdullah Antepli, an Imam and the President of Rothko Chapel, will offer our sermon. I am not sure the last time we had an Islamic faith leader preaching in our pulpit at First Unitarian Universalist. I’m delighted that we will be able to live into our mission of fostering religious pluralism by welcoming a religious leader from that tradition on Sunday morning. It is especially lovely that the person we are welcoming is such a good friend of our congregation.
September is a meaningful month in two other ways. It marks the start of our ninth year together. The beginning of my twentieth year in parish ministry. Over years, I have preached around 500 sermons, about 270 of them at First Unitarian Universalist. People sometimes ask after the texts of my sermons or things I have preached before. You can find the majority of my sermons on by website: https://www.colinbossen.com. If you want to sign-up to the text of the week’s sermon emailed to you, you can also follow me on Substack at https://colinbossen.substack.com/. The church maintains an extensive back catalog of videos of our services and sermons on our YouTube page.
Of course, the best places to catch a sermon, and experience a service, is either in-person or via the livestream on a Sunday morning. I hope to see at church soon!
love,
Colin
Where is the Minister?
I will be in the pulpit on September 6th and 20th. On September 11th, I will be either at First Unitarian Universalist or Rothko Chapel for the entirety of our vigil (it runs until midnight). I will be out of the office on September 14th to recuperate and then out on vacation from September 21st to 27th. On September 10th, I will be giving a lecture at Rice University. On September 26th I will be part of a panel at the Network for Public Education discussing the work of the Commission on the HISD Takeover.
