In my congregation, Earth Day pretty much qualifies as a religious holiday. :-/
My Sunday school class is doing the "UU Super Heroes" curriculum, so I taught about Beatrix Potter today, and my reaction was similar to yours. Beatrix Potter may have been technically a Unitarian, but neither she nor her parents were churchgoers. Her paternal grandparents were Unitarians and her grandfather was a Unitarian minister, and that probably had some effect on the kind of education she received. Still, calling her a "UU super hero" feels like a bit of a stretch.
Last time I taught, the "Super Hero" of the week was Pete Seeger, who does in fact belong to a UU congregation--but it's miles from where he lives, he doesn't attend, and he's on record as saying he only joined in order to have a place for his chorus to rehearse. I really think our "UU identity" curricula needs to do better than saying, "Look, this famous and interesting person had some tenuous connection to Unitarian Universalism!"
no subject
My Sunday school class is doing the "UU Super Heroes" curriculum, so I taught about Beatrix Potter today, and my reaction was similar to yours. Beatrix Potter may have been technically a Unitarian, but neither she nor her parents were churchgoers. Her paternal grandparents were Unitarians and her grandfather was a Unitarian minister, and that probably had some effect on the kind of education she received. Still, calling her a "UU super hero" feels like a bit of a stretch.
Last time I taught, the "Super Hero" of the week was Pete Seeger, who does in fact belong to a UU congregation--but it's miles from where he lives, he doesn't attend, and he's on record as saying he only joined in order to have a place for his chorus to rehearse. I really think our "UU identity" curricula needs to do better than saying, "Look, this famous and interesting person had some tenuous connection to Unitarian Universalism!"