Back in the early 2000s, I had an online friend who was a member of a Unitarian Universalist church and an extremely active member in that church’s Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans (CUUPS) group. As I didn’t have much of a Pagan community at that time, I decided to look up my local (at the time) UU church and check them out. They had no CUUPS group, but I decided to check out a couple Sunday morning services.

I met some delightful people at that church and enjoyed talking with them. I found we shared a lot of values in common. i found the same thing when I decided to check out the UU church in Rochester when I moved up here. At both churches, I concluded that the people I met were amazing people I could sit down and have a great conversation with over coffee and even join with to work towards political causes we shared in common. But the services at those churches did not speak to my soul. So in both cases, I quite going after a couple of Sundays.¹

These memories and other like it came to mind as I was reading chapter nine of Changing Paths by Yvonne Aburrow, which is titled “Arriving in a group.” In this chapter, Yvonne talks a lot about the importance of finding a group that shares your values. And I absolutely agree that shared values is absolutely important. I don’t think that I could stay in a group where I had an awesome spiritual experience, but found their values morally concerning. So checking out the values of a group first makes absolute sense.²

And if I’m looking for a group that’s mostly inclined toward social, educational, or advocacy purposes, shared values might remain the only thing I care about. But if I’m looking for something more spiritually fulfilling, I feel there are more things I need to have. For example, I need ritual that’s steeped in the mythology and cosmology that speaks to my soul. Similarly, I need a group that explores the mysteries and the aspects of the numinous that I feel called to explore.³ I may love the people in both of those UU churches and share their values, but we clearly speak different spiritual languages, making communal worship with them less than ideal for me. And that’s okay.

And this is where I note that it’s important to consider that we’re allowed to have more than one group membership, just like it’s possible to follow multiple religious traditions in some cases. Even if I were to limit myself to just Pagan groups, I think this is pretty normal, reasonable, and even arguably expected. For example, I can attend both my local witch’s meetup and have coven with whose members I’m more closely knit. And obviously, my level of commitment to each of those groups would differ based on the reasons I’m a part of them and the level of commitment required to be a contributing member of them.⁴

Footnotes

1. Okay, full disclosure time: When I went to the church in Rochester, I was motivated by more than just wanting to find a new spiritually minded group. There was a guy involved. And how things turned out with that guy probably also played a part in why I quit going. Though I’d like to think that if I had found the services spiritually fulfilling, I would have kept going regardless. ↩︎
2. And lest this post come across as being too critical of this chapter of Yvonne, I will note that the title is “Arriving in a group.” Yvonne dedicates chapter 13 to beloved community and finding that. So one could reasonably argue that I’m jumping the gun here and should save these thoughts for that chapter. To which I say, “Maybe, but that’s not what I decided to do.” So nyah! (I never said I was mature.) ↩︎
3. Also, a service that is centered around sitting and listening to a sermon or lecture just doesn’t really work for me. Even when I might agree with the sermon. ↩︎
4. The idea that different groups require different levels of commitment is something Yvonne covers in this chapter as well. In fact, they encourage people to consider the commitment level required by any group they are considering joining and whether they are able and willing to meet it. ↩︎