with Maria Hayward
Recorded at Auckland Unitarian Church 3 August 2025
Refugees: People like you and me. A picture show and commentary about New Zealand’s Refugee Reception Centre at Mangere (Te Āhuru Mōwai). What does it look like, which agencies are based there and what happens during the 5-6 week stay for former refugees.
For more information see https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/the-refugee-reception-centre/
Speaker:- Ron Ahnen
Worship Leader:- Viv Allen
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 24 November 2024
As you all know, we just finished an election in the U.S. with so many different candidates—not just presidential ones—putting forth many competing claims about what “the truth” is. The good news is that we’ve got fact-checkers and journalists all trying to help us sort out exactly what is and is not true. You might think it’s easier to find the truth these days, given that you can Google just about anything in a nanosecond. It turns out, finding out the truth is not so easy. In fact, it’s often really, really hard.
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/listening-for-your-own-truth/
with Barbara Thomborson
Recorded at Auckland Unitarian Church 17 November 2024
Ageing and death are two timeless themes, universal to our human experience. Our culture’s near phobia about death has created unneeded anxiety and irrational fear about “passing on, passing away, kicking the bucket, giving up the ghost, breathing your last, losing your life, expiring (like a use-by date), or just plain croaking”. That’s a small sample of the euphemisms English has for dying. In her book The Coming of Age, Simone de Beauvior says, “The vast majority of humankind looks upon the coming of old age with sorrow and rebellion. It fills them with more aversion than death itself”.
For more information see https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/ruminations-on-ageing-and-dying/
with John Maindonald
Recorded at Auckland Unitarian Church 10 November 2024
Today, no business of any size uses paper based accounting. The move from paper based systems started in the late 1950s when large corporations started using computer mainframes, as they were called, for basic operations. In the 1980s personal computers made computer-based accounting systems widely available.
For more information see:- https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/the-age-of-the-machine/
Speaker & Worship Leader:- Rachel Mackintosh
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 3rd November 2024
Barbara Kingsolver, in her novel Demon Copperhead, has Demon say this:
“… she looked at me in the eyes, and we were sad together for a while. I’ll never forget how that felt. Like not being hungry.”
Like not being hungry.
She looked at me in the eyes, and we were sad together for a while.
I’ll never forget how that felt.
Like not being hungry.
Have you ever been seen like that by another person? Have you ever shared such a deep understanding, be it of sadness or of some other emotion? Do you know that feeling, of not being hungry?
Will you ever forget how that felt?
I will never forget how that felt.
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/a-year-and-a-day/
Speaker:- Randolph Hollingsworth
Worship Leader:- Viv Allen
Recorded at Auckland Unitarian Church 15 September 2024
With scarce documentary evidence, one might be tempted to relegate to the sidelines any efforts to examine the political ideologies of Annie Jane Allen Schnackenberg (1835-1905) of Auckland, New Zealand. A national leader who oversaw the petition campaigns of the Women's Christian Temperance Union of New Zealand, culminating in the world's first self governing nation's right for women to vote, Schnackenberg rarely arises beyond a note or two in secondary sources focusing on New Zealand women's history.
Speaker:- Peter Lineham
Worship Leader:- Ruby Johnson
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 28th April 2024
Ralph Waldo Emerson knew how to upset Unitarians, for he had been one of them. Emerson was from a Unitarian family, trained at Harvard College, and his brother William was educated at Gottingen and was a minister. Waldo became minister of Second Church Boston in 1829. But he took a break, after the death of his wife, and headed to Europe. Returning he wrote this extraordinary essay, Nature, from which I read. He was a mystery to his fellow Unitarians. In 1838 he spoke to the Divinity Class at Harvard, in words that caused a huge controversy...
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/the-american-transcendentalists/
with Karn Cleary
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 21 April 2024
I titled today’s service “Remembering Anzac Day”, purposely. It disturbs me to see or hear references to “celebrating” Anzac Day, when I believe it should always be a day of mourning for all those who died so futilely at Gallipoli, and all the others whether they returned or not, who have gone off to war from New Zealand.
The 24th April, the day before Anzac Day is the anniversary of the death of my father, Bror Muller, who died in 1967. This talk is really about my father’s experiences during the Second World War as an enemy alien and, in his words, 100% committed pacifist. I’ll also talk about how those experiences affected his life after the war, and the impact on his family, or at least on me, growing up in the 1950s and 60s.
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/remembering-anzac-day-2/
With Rachel Mackintosh & Betsy Marshall
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 14 April 2024
Unitarians are a mixed metaphor. Roots from flora, wings from fauna.
There is no exact Greek mythical creature to represent this idea but perhaps we can think of a dryad or tree-nymph, maybe combined with a phoenix, the bird who rises.
We are a mixed metaphor and a mixed faith, one that values pluralism and whose hymn book is called Singing the Living Tradition.
For more information, see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/roots-hold-me-close-wings-set-me-free/
Speaker:- John Maindonald
Worship Leader:- Shirin Caldwell
Recorded 7 April 2024 @ Auckland Unitarian Church
From the time when he returned from his five year journey around the world, Darwin thought long and hard, not just about the relationships between living things, but also about life and living. He moved from relatively orthodox Anglican to an agnostic who never ceased to wonder at the world of nature and the place of humans in it. While he never identified as a Unitarian, he was exposed to multiple sources of Unitarian influence.
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/charles-darwins-religious-life-journey/
Speaker & Worship Leader:- Rachel Mackintosh
Recorded 31 March 2024 @ Auckland Unitarian Church
I preached in this church last year on Easter Sunday. My theme was resurrection — I spoke about the power of love over hate. In the words of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, “Knowing that when life is gone, love is left for shining.”
Since then, as most of you know, I have become a widow. My husband and your minister Clay Nelson died last November. In preparing for this year’s Easter Sunday service, I have read all eight of the Easter sermons he preached here in this church. I have seen that he talked about the necessity of experiencing Good Friday if we are to experience Easter.
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/the-empty-tomb-holding-lament-in-one-hand-and-joy-in-the-other/
Speaker & Worship Leader:- Rev. Sally Mabelle of Taupo Unitarian Universalist Fellowship
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 24 March 2024.
During my 12 years as a member and lay worship leader at Auckland Unitarian church, we sang that ‘Spirit of Life’ song hundreds of times, to begin nearly every Sunday service. Today, I’d like to draw our attention directly to that same Spirit of Life, which is intimately with us in every moment – I’m talking about our very breath – literally our IN-spiration – and our EX-spiration…a free gift that we receive at birth and is our closest and most constant spiritual companion throughout our whole life. For more information see:-
Speaker:- John Maindonald
Worship Leader:- Shirin Caldwell
Recorded 17 March 2024 @ Auckland Unitarian Church
Charles Darwin, who lived through the middle years of the 1800s, is familiar to most of us as the man who laid the foundations of the modern theory of evolution. His ideas have had dramatic continuing effects on our view of ourselves and of the world of which we are part. The idea that living things shared a common evolutionary heritage was not new. What was new was the mechanism that Darwin, along with Alfred Wallace who came up with very similar ideas at the same time, proposed. Darwin worked his arguments into a book of almost 500 pages that was widely read and finally carried the day in the world of science. It is a careful assembly of evidence, from animal breeding, from geology, and from the way that different life forms are distributed across different continents and islands.
For more see https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/part-of-nature-or-separate-from-nature-charles-darwin-and-evolutionary-biology/
Speaker & Worship Leader:- Rachel Mackintosh
Recorded 10 March 2024 @ Auckland Unitarian Church
I have recently watched all three seasons of Ted Lasso.
I had been aware of the show for some time but had been put off by the moustache, and the fact that it seemed to be about sport. Though I admire physical grace, I really don’t care about all the winning and losing and fighting over a ball.
I had been missing out. Ted Lasso is a gift.
It is a gift that slowly unwraps. When one of the characters, Danny Rojas, says, “Football is life”, I like his joy but really don’t connect. Football isn’t my life.
Turns out though, that in Ted Lasso, football is a metaphor for life. Turns out that Ted Lasso himself really doesn’t care about all the winning and losing either. He cares about community and people being their best selves. He’s probably a Unitarian, though that doesn’t get mentioned in the script.
For more see:- https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/constrained-and-sustained-and-still-we-rise/
With Karn Cleary
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 3 March 2024
Our speaker planned for today had to drop out at the last moment due to illness. Karn Cleary has thankfully stepped up to fill in and is going to lead our service with a reading, with a few minor changes, of “The liberal church finding its mission: It’s not all about you”, an article by Rev Peter Bullata in the US. Here’s his web page and blog, which is very interesting in itself: https://peterboullata.com/about-4/
For more information, see:- https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/the-liberal-church-finding-its-mission-its-not-all-about-you/
Speaker & Worship Leader:- Viv Allen
Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church 25 February 2024
I had intended to read one of Clay’s talks entitled, Why should we learn another language? From Sept 2020 in its entirety but after I read it I realised that a lot of it was about Clay’s personal journey. I have experience with my own journey regarding this topic so I’ve added some of my own thoughts and picked out parts of Clays’ speech that are relevant and added some from other sources,
What has this topic got to do with any of our Unitarian principles? A lot.
For more info, see https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/why-should-we-learn-another-language/
Speaker:- Laurie Ross
& Worship Leader:- Shirin Caldwell
Laurie Ross © 18 February 2024
A Call to the people of New Zealand, as a Nuclear Free Peacemaker nation, to withdraw from Militarisation and Warfare. It is time for Humanity to end the barbaric practice of war to work for Peace and Justice.
‘Love’ is the foundation of Unitarian fellowship and the quest for ‘Truth’ leads to liberating our minds from warfare doctrines threatening destruction of Life on Earth.
Humanity must end War before War ends Humanity.
For more information see:-
https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/peacemakers-unite-for-a-world-beyond-war/
Speaker & Worship Leader:- Rachel Mackintosh Recorded @ Auckland Unitarian Church, 11 February 2024
Why do we repeat this ritual every year? It isn’t just to brag about our travels. When we share our water in the common bowl, it reminds us that while we are separate people, we are also part of an interdependent community.
You probably know about the water cycle.... For more information see:-
Speaker & Worship Leader:- John DiLeo
Recorded at Auckland Unitarian Church 4th February 2024
At the end of October, I travelled to Washington, DC, to present training at and attend the OWASP Global AppSec Conference. On the Sunday before the conference, I had the opportunity to attend the first ThreatModCon, a one-day mini-conference focused on threat modelling.
At that event, I was privileged to hear a presentation by Avi Douglen. Avi is a leader of the OWASP Israel Chapter, and a member of OWASP’s Global Board. He’s a security consultant and threat modelling practitioner, and is one of the signatories of the Threat Modeling Manifesto, created and published in 2020.
Avi’s presentation is titled “The Threats to Our Community,” and I’m going to share with you much of the content from that talk.
As I listened that day, it became clear to me that the threats he spelled out – and the countermeasures he recommended – would apply to any community that relies on mutual trust and respect to function. Communities like ours. So, I asked for a copy of his slide deck, to use in a future talk at my church – he was surprised by the request, but agreed immediately.
In October, Avi spoke for an hour – I’m going to try to do his ideas justice in less than 20 minutes. We’ll see how that goes.
Before I begin, I need to provide a general content warning. While I won’t be going into details of any, I will be naming many abusive behaviours. If this could be triggering for you, I welcome you to remove yourself from this space to protect your well-being.
For more information see:-https://aucklandunitarian.org.nz/the-threats-to-our-community/