Water Ingathering Ceremony held at the First Unitarian Universalist Church

Nonna Randal, First UU Board of Trustees President and Karen Brown, First UU Clerk of the Congregation, are shown adding their special collected water to the 2014 Church’s water bowl.

The First Unitarian Universalist Church’s congregation held its traditional Water Ingathering Ceremony early last month at its Sunday service. This Ceremony began to be celebrated in the early 1980s to celebrate the start of the new church year.
Members bring to the service a small amount of water from a place they visited over the summer. Water comes from sources across the world and in our backyards. This year some of the water came from the Rhine, Danube, Mississippi, and Colorado Rivers, Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, the Great Lakes, and Yellow Creek State Park. During the appointed time in the service, members, friends, and visitors one by one pour their water together into a large bowl. The combined water is symbolic of our shared faith coming from many different sources. It is then blessed by the congregation, and used as the congregation’s “holy water” in child dedication ceremonies, burials and similar events. This is one of two unique holidays celebrated at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Indiana and recognized by the world-wide Unitarian Universalists faith community. The second will occur in the spring, The Flower Communion. Both ceremonies celebrate our Unitarian Universalist community and the importance of each individual’s unique contributions to that community.

Unitarian Universalism includes aspects of many of the world’s religions. Holidays from various religions are celebrated together in Unitarian Universalist (UU) congregations including Christian and Jewish. In addition to these traditional religious holidays, many UU congregations also honor secular holidays including Earth Day, Martin Luther King, Jr. Sunday, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day, and Thanksgiving. While these are not traditionally spiritual holidays, Unitarian Universalism finds spiritual meaning and affinity with our Principles in the ideas behind these and other secular holidays.