First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin: Recent Episodes
First UU Church of Austin
Weekly podcasts of sermons delivered at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin. Our minister is Rev. Meg Barnhouse. Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community. We are an inclusive liberal religious and spiritual community. We support each individual's search for meaning and purpose and join together to help create a world filled with compassion and love. All are welcome without the distinction of race, class, gender, sexual orientation or creed. Please visit us on the web at austinuu.org. A complete listing of over 850 archived sermons can be found by clicking the sermon index link on every sermon.
, this end encourages us to both embrace difference and celebrate unity in order to do so.
s service delivered on August 2, 2026. This Sunday we worship a little bit differently, there is no sermon. Instead, members were offered six intergenerational activities to do throughout the church. This podcast samples one of the activities - Songs of Resistance led by singer/songwriter Sarah Bentley.
s service delivered on July 26, 2026. Whether we are talking about an authoritarian crisis or a physical crisis, all of us need each other to survive and thrive. This Sunday Rev. Carrie explores this topic and prepares us for an emergency response. As part of the service, we will all participate in a fire drill, which will be rewarded with great music from Parker Woodland, popsicles, and (possibly) firefighters.
s service delivered on July 19, 2026. Join us as some great folks from our social action team discuss the effective allyship that is so vital to living out our values and mission.
Service delivered on July 12, 2026. Join our First UU Youth Group as they share their thoughts and perspectives on topics that concern them as part of their bridging ceremony into adulthood.
s service delivered on June 28, 2026. What do Care Bears, Pride, spirituality, and UU theology have in common? According to Rev. Carrie, a lot. Join her to see how she makes that argument.
s Day to explore the impact of patriarchy on men and how we might use our understanding to help us do the work of liberation.
s service delivered on June 14, 2026. Building the Beloved Community and living into our full potential as individuals are far from exclusive pursuits - each requires the other. Our ability to flourish as individuals is bound up in creating communities and societies rooted in a fierce love that recognizes our sacred interdependence.
s service delivered on June 7, 2026. Join Rev Chris, Sol, and our Chalice Camp participants for this much-loved Unitarian Universalist ritual where we bring flowers to add to the large bouquet we create and take a different flower with you, symbolizing both the unique, sacred beauty of each of us and the even greater beauty we create when we share that sacred uniqueness with one another.
Rev. Carrie explores what it means to expand our capacity to hold what we are working for while also holding reality, especially the realities that are living in so much suffering.
s service delivered on May 24, 2026. The board of First UU Church of Austin has been listening to the congregation about your dreams for the church and the differences it might make in our community and our world. Join us as the board president Karen Neeley and the Rev. Chris talk about your exciting vision for what comes next.
What if curiosity can feel risky, but actually holds the key to both individual and collective liberation?
s Day were a cry for peace and an attempt to acknowledge the work of nurturing that goes unrewarded in a patriarchal society. While the day has become about the physical act of bearing and/or rearing children, the origins speak to something more radical, the transforming power of nourishing and providing care. Rev. Carrie unpacks this holiday and any gifts it might have for us.
s service delivered on May 3, 2026. If we hold values such as equity, interdependence, and justice, what are we obligated to do when we encounter situations that violate those beliefs? And what do we do when we feel overwhelmed by the number of situations that violate our beliefs? Can we do anything? Rev. Carrie explores these questions through the lens of May Day using our UU values.
s, is still virtually limitless? What if, through all the chaos, we are being lured toward possibilities that we have not yet dared to dream? What if we are being called to create something new?
s service delivered on April 19, 2026. This Sunday we celebrate all our volunteers who keep our church alive in a million different ways and make it possible for us to live into our mission. Our theology teaches us about the inherent worthiness of all and the beauty of our interdependence. In this church, when we put those beliefs to work, we generate beautiful things both inside and outside the church. Together we nourish each other, we journey with each other through transformation, and we do the work of building the beloved community.
s service delivered on April 12, 2026. Dr Ortega explores how the Love Ethics of our Universalist tradition extends a radical welcome to a world marred by deep divisions, conflict, and growing uncertainty. Our shared Unitarian Universalist tradition invites us to choose Love as our guide in our relationships with one another and the world. This is a daring faith. A faith of a radical welcome where justice-seeking and justice-making lead to healing, transformation, and community.
s service delivered on April 5, 2026. Rev. Chris and Rev. Carrie challenge each other with questions about this time that is so sacred to so many. Join us as we seek to understand and experience Easter in a Unitarian Universalist theological context.
s service delivered on March 29, 2026. The early warning alarms of genocide directed towards transgender people are starting to sound blaringly loud. How do we turn anger against transgender, nonbinary and intersex people into love? Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt and LB Lomeli are offering a special Trans Day of Visibility worship service. Can we collectively challenge the systems of oppression by strengthening our spirituality?
ll pause to notice these beginnings and to appreciate them for getting us where we are.
t it feel like the past many present moments (years?) have been filled with drama, trauma, and a constant deluge of factors vying for our attention? How might we develop the spiritual resources and practices that will help us direct our attention toward that which centers us and brings us love and joy?
s service delivered on March 8, 2026. What do you do when the onslaught of bad news floods our nervous system and causes us to feel shaky in our faith? Rev. Carrie explores that question and leads us through a spiritual practice of lament.
s published stories. Invited guests who shared their personal stories include: Rev Chris Jimmerson, Rev. Dr. Sofia Betancourt, Rev. Tandi Rogers, Rev. Jake Morrill, as well as her two sons, Ned and Sam Durrett. Rev Kiya Heartwood performed songs.
s service delivered on February 22, 2026. Infants begin to develop their brains in the context of a mothering matrix, which involves the important relationships of their early years. Internalized relational patterns gradually establish expectations and structures for how babies think. Their novice experiences also distort who mother is and why she exists. These distortions mirror the ways humans construct their relationships with the Divine.
Recently, the Texas UU Justice Ministry (TXUUJM) joined 30 partner organizations in a procession to the ICE family detention center outside of Dilley, Texas. Join TXUUJM Intern Minister Bis Thornton for a journey through the events of that day. Together we will explore what it means to hold love at the center of all things.
s service delivered on February 8, 2026. Fear is the reason we are here. It is a tool for survival but it can also get in the way of living into our values and meeting the moment. Rev. Carrie explores how we might honor our humanity, listen to our body, and live in alignment with our values.
Joy that nourishes us and joy that sustains us. In that spirit, please join us to bless the beloved animal companions in our lives. In these challenging times let us honor our animal companions who are such a vital source of our joy and resilience.
s service delivered on January 18, 2026. Rev. Walter will hold space this Sunday through the words and music of the Rev. Meg Barnhouse, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, and more. Join us in community as we hold the joys and sorrows of the world, the nation, and our own hearts.
s faith, of differences between polar perspectives and where they might coalesce, and of how UU principles may prompt action rather than remain just words. It tells stories that provoke, explore, and suggest.
s service delivered on January 4, 2026. As we enter a new year, we enter a liminal space. A time in which we are between the known and the unknown. All the joys and sorrows that we faced in 2025 have changed us. Sometimes those changes have been good or enriching, and sometimes they have not. During our burning bowl service, we contemplate what we would like to let go of so that we may more easily find our center as we move into the new year.
s service delivered on December 28, 2025. Storytelling is a powerful way to connect with one another, to understand ourselves and the world around us, and it just feels really good. Rev. Carrie explores the power of a good story.
s service delivered on December 21, 2025. We join together for this annual tradition of retelling the Christian Faith Story through song and holiday merriment.
s the season of peace or so they say. What does peace mean when there is so little of it in the world? Where do we find our peace? Rev. Carrie explores peace and how we might think about it in times of chaos.
s service delivered on December 7, 2025. What if hope is not the same as an optimistic belief that things will turn out the way we imagined? What if hope is grounded in the stories we tell ourselves about the past and present, and an unwavering belief that what matters most is how we show up in the present moment?
ll explore how our experiences of transcendence can lead to personal growth and transformation, and paradoxically, how working to transform ourselves and our world can lead us into transcendence.
s service delivered on November 16, 2025. We are people who have beautifully joined ourselves to the work of building the Beloved Community, but what does that look like in a fractured world where some have more than they will ever need and some will never have enough? Rev. Carrie explores the role of solidarity in our work and in our lives.
s service delivered on November 9, 2025. Courage and Community: These are two of our religious values at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin. How do our values of courage and community intersect and interact? In what ways do they call us to be and act in our world? Rev Chris explores how these values bring our religious community alive to meet the challenges of our times.
s service delivered on November 2, 2025. Loss is an inevitable part of the human experience, and yet we often give ourselves so little time to acknowledge it or to spend time with our grief. This Sunday, we will spend some time acknowledging the loss we have experienced and the grief that has shown up in its place. Rev. Carrie Holley-Hurt leads us through a ritual of acknowledgement.
s service delivered on October 19, 2025. Each year, we make celebration a spiritual practice. We celebrate the differences we make in our world together, the joy that comes from being a part of and supporting this religious community, and our gratitude for all life has to offer.
s service delivered on October 12, 2025. Anger, like all our emotions, can be a powerful tool for awareness, motivation, and value creation, but it has also been misused and abused. So what do we do with all this anger? And how do we disentangle it from all its baggage? Rev. Carrie explores anger and how we can cultivate a healthier relationship with it.
s service delivered on September 28, 2025. This church has often stood against the societal tides of dehumanization and marginalization. We have been a soft place to land for those of us who did not fit in and have felt alone. This church has been and will continue to be needed by those here now and by those to come. But what does that say about our role and responsibility to one another and to those we will never meet? Rev. Carrie explores who we are, what we are about, and how living love can help us.
. What might these beautiful abstractions look like in the concrete world of our daily lives? What if love is not just a feeling but is also something we do? How might we make love a verb?
s service delivered on September 14, 2025. When we work towards justice we are building a world of belonging. But what does that look like in our community, and what do we need to do? Rev. Carrie explores how we might build belonging and how our religious roots can help us.
s service delivered on September 7, 2025. Water Communion is a special day when we all come back together after the summer bringing with us water that symbolizes something meaningful to us. We will engage in a ritual together through which we share with one another that symbolic meaning as we blend and mingle the waters to remind us of our shared faith.
s service delivered on August 31, 2025. Every generation in our church brings something beautiful and unique to our living tradition. This Sunday, we will explore how the youth have helped shape our faith and how those of us who are older can encourage and provide space for them to grow and contribute.
s service delivered on August 24, 2025. Rev. Chris and Rev. Carrie will answer questions about the church, life, the universe, and everything (though neither will pretend to have the answers to all that).
ll pay tribute to some of the musical greats and examine the spiritual messages and legacies they have given us.
s service delivered on August 10, 2025. Our world can feel challenging, if not downright scary these days. Add to that the challenges and losses in life we will all encounter, and it can feel as if renewal, hope, and change for the better are no longer possible. And yet history and human resilience have shown us over and over again that there is a wellspring of love that makes hope, peace, and joy always still available to us.
s celebrate Pride in community as members of our congregation share the ways they experience pride in their own lives.
s most transformative ways of deeply connecting with fellow church members and experiencing profound spiritual growth is by participating in a Chalice Circle or Wellspring ministry group. Join us and hear four participants share their experiences and the real differences they make possible.
s sermon delivered at our annual Unitarian Universalist General Assembly. She examines how our ancestry, heritage, and religious values have prepared us for the challenges and opportunities of our time.
s service delivered on July 13, 2025. Over the past decade, First UU Church of Austin has twice offered immigration sanctuary to immigrants fearing unjust detention and deportation. What might being a sanctuary church look like, given the racist, police state tactics we are currently witnessing under the intentionally deceptive guise of national security and immigration enforcement?
, yet many UUs have remained relatively quiet on the subject of Palestine. What do our values tell us about what is happening in Palestine? Join AJ Juraska as we explore how our UU values help us move past silence into solidarity.
s service delivered on June 29, 2025. Join Rev. Carrie as she explores how our UU history and values help us meet the moment we find ourselves in.
s service delivered on June 22, 2025. Putting Love at the center. How centering love can help us build bridges during polarizing times.
s service delivered on June 15, 2025. For individuals, feeling a part of something larger than oneself can increase happiness, enhance well-being, create a greater sense of purpose and meaning in life, give us a sense of belonging, and improve mental health in a variety of areas. First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin is a part of our larger UU faith and an even larger effort to build Beloved Community. Might fully engaging this larger belonging confer these same benefits to us a religious community?
s service delivered on June 8, 2025. We often think of freedom as an individualistic act of escaping that which limits us. And that may be a part of the whole. What if a more complete understanding of freedom involves a communal embrace of our interdependence and the choices we make in order to live love?
s service will be our last with Rev. Michelle. Join us as we celebrate the good work we have done together and wish each other well with blessings for the journey.
s service delivered on May 25, 2025. Rev. Michelle and Rev. Chris will answer questions about the church, life, the universe, and everything (though neither will pretend to have the answers to all that).
s service delivered on May 18, 2025. Theology, as well as its scriptural sources, tends to come with a lot of baggage, both personal and cultural. How might we unpack, or set aside, this baggage to reclaim lost sources of spiritual wisdom? What new insights might we gain? Let's bring our sense of imagination out to play in the spiritual realm.
s service delivered on May 11, 2025. Join with us in this much-loved Unitarian Universalist ritual where we bring flowers to add to the large bouquet we create and take a different flower with you, symbolizing both the unique, sacred beauty of each of us and the even greater beauty we create when we share that sacred uniqueness with one another.
s service delivered on May 4, 2025. Unitarian Universalism recently centered our faith in love. But this is not an abstract, overly sentimental love that allows us to linger in a liminal space, feeling it only from the sidelines. It is a love that calls us to action - to engage in our world, grounded in a self-love that empowers us to boldly create and demand even more love and justice. It is a fierce love that has the power to bring about the revolution our world so desperately needs.
s worship theme (joy) by exploring the role of hope and pleasure in movements for climate justice. Join Rev. Erin Walter in a service that shares some of the latest strategies for Climate Justice and invites us to bask in the beauty of the earth and the possibilities of a thriving planet.
s service delivered on April 20, 2025. Join us as we celebrate Easter. The service includes joyful music, a child dedication, and Rev. Michelle LaGrave's retelling of the Easter Story.
s service delivered on March 30, 2025. On the eve of Trans Day of Visibility, Rev. Erin Walter and Bis Thornton bring wisdom and beauty from diverse trans leaders, within and beyond Unitarian Universalism, as well as reflections and learnings from the recent All In For Equality Day and Texas UU Justice Ministry day at the Capitol.
s service delivered on March 23, 2025. Join us for a restful service full of stories and music about finding Holy Ground. Rev. Michelle LaGrave weaves together a tapestry of stories accompanied by the atmospheric/symphonic stylings of music guests Thor and Friends. Take some time for rest and reflection in the midst of an increasingly chaotic world.
s sermon delivered on March 16, 2025. Rest has long been a spiritual practice or even a religious mandate of many people. Yet, life can feel so busy that we imagine there is no time to rest. How might we come to a better sense of balance in our lives that honors the need to rest?
s sermon delivered on March 9, 2025. Trust is an important component of beloved community. How are communities of trust built? kept? restored? What does it look like when a community leads with trust in each other and the greater community?
s theme of inclusivity and what this means for our mission of doing justice. So often we think about doing justice so that all will be included. But what might it look like to include ALL in doing justice?
s explore the practices that help us create healthy, successful romantic relationships and how many of those same practices might also enhance our love for family, friends, and others - and might even lead us to Agape - selfless, unconditional, divine love.
s sermon delivered on February 9, 2025. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught inclusion so rooted in love that it would become liberatory for all. Perhaps reclaiming the collective love and liberation that is at the heart of our UU Christian heritage is how we best counter an ideology of exclusion that has arisen in our state and our country.
s sermon delivered on February 2, 2025. Join us for an all-ages service to bless the beloved animal companions in your lives. All friendly, well-behaved creatures, young, old, great and small, furry and scaly, are invited to this cherished annual tradition. In these challenging times, let us honor our animal companions, who are such a vital source of our joy and resilience.
Join Rev. Carrie as she explores transformation and how it plays into our goal of a more just, loving, and compassionate world.
ll examine how we might develop the spiritual resilience to keep the dream alive through a time when it seems so threatened.
s service delivered on January 12, 2025. As humans, we make sense of our world by creating stories. Essentially, both as individuals and as groups, we construct ourselves through constructing narratives about ourselves. And those stories not only determine how we feel about ourselves and our world, but they also drive who we are, what we do, and who we are becoming. In effect, they are self-perpetuating. But what if the story we are telling ourselves is harmful and untrue? Can we rewrite or at least reinterpret it in order to create a more life-fulfilling, whole-hearted narrative?
May 26, 2013 service. The Senior High Youth Group holds its annual youth service and bridging ceremony. The featured speakers are Audrey Lewis and Max Wethington. Bridging is a rite of passage celebrating the movement of our high school seniors into adulthood.
Rev. Meg Barnhouse's sermon delivered on October 21, 2012. Using a story from an ancient Hindu text, we'll talk about how a faithful bitterness toward a person, a place or a religious tradition can keep you as connected as you would be if you loved that person, place or tradition.
Rev. Meg Barnhouse's sermon delivered on April 15, 2012. Our seventh principle is that we affirm and promote "Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part."... What does it mean to respect that web, to be a part of it?
Meg Barnhouse's sermon delivered on February 19, 2012. Susan B. Anthony was a Unitarian during the days of fighting for abolition and women's suffrage. She was fierce and complicated, and her life is an inspiration.
Rev. Meg Barnhouse's sermon delivered on November 20, 2011. Holidays crank up the expectations for food, decorations, family time, and perfectionism rears its ugly head. How do we deal with not having the perfect life, the perfect home, the perfect job, with Aunt Millie asking us again when we're going to be married..?
Rev. Meg Barnhouse's sermon delivered on November 6, 2011. How do we forgive? Do we have to forgive and forget? Does it make us more vulnerable to be forgiving?
Guest minister Rev. Mark Skrabacz's sermon delivered on October 23, 2011. Widening our circle of compassion, opening our hearts, embracing life, and living large... these are expressions of growing out, the theme of today's examination of maturing.
Rev. Meg Barnhouse's sermon delivered on October 16, 2011. The third in the series on the seven UU Principles. We talk about acceptance, spiritual growth, encouraging one another. What is "spiritual" for Unitarian Universalists?