​It's been a journey, to say the least! Not long ago, after our church's 150th Anniversary Celebration, where plates piled high with meat were the norm and plant-based options were non-existent, our Climate Justice group saw an opportunity for change. We made a direct request to the Board: let's make plant-based meals the default for church events, with meat and dairy alternatives available only upon request.
We believed this was a crucial step towards aligning our practices with our values of care for creation. The Board, however, informed us it was a ministerial decision, so we redirected our request to the ministers. And guess what? We were told the policy was adopted!
The reality, as often happens, has been a bit slower than the promise. We haven't seen a full, immediate shift to plant-based defaults across the board. But here's the good news: there are now plant-based options readily available at church events. This is definite progress!
While we're still working towards our initial vision of plant-based as the default, the fact that our voices led to tangible changes is something to celebrate. It shows that persistence and clear communication can move mountains – or at least, introduce some delicious veggie alternatives!
What changes have you seen in your community when advocating for more sustainable practices?

 UU Values Go to Sacramento 
by Brian Kougl

On April 28, I joined a delegation of members from SDOP (the San Diego Organizing Project) on a trip to Sacramento to lobby our representatives on several important upcoming bills that are key in supporting our UU values. In Sacramento, we were joined by about 600 members of our statewide organization, PICO, who came from other local faith-based organizations across the state. It was a fun, informative, and productive whirlwind of a trip, flying out in the morning and returning in the evening. This was a new experience for me and I did learn a lot. The line to get into the office building was long, the line for the elevators was long as the building was packed with people from various organizations. The excitement was palpable. Our SDOP group divided into several smaller groups to meet with our respective lawmakers. My group met with legislative aides for Assembly member Chris Ward, Assembly member David Alvarez (who stopped by personally to greet us) and Senator Akilah Weber-Peterson. We were welcomed by each of them. We discussed with them our support of AB1157, a rent control measure, AB 736, and affordable housing bond, and AB 1231, a bill that offers measures providing resources and support to low-level offenders. In each of our sessions, we received very positive responses. They took notes on our comments and we felt heard. Not only did we express our support for these measures, we asked mindful questions designed to hold representatives accountable, and they gave us thoughtful realistic guidance about how to achieve our goals. One piece of information that I found especially valuable was that whenever we meet with staff in the local field offices, what we say does matter, and that input gets to the lawmakers. After our meetings, there was a press conference and then a march through the streets supporting affordable housing. It was a long, tiring day, but in the end a very productive one. For me, it was a very rewarding experience that I feel privileged to have been a part of!

Brian Kougl is a member of First UU, the San Diego Organizing Project, First UU's Social Justice Executive Team, and a fixture at the South Bay Food Pantry.

 Taste of Hope (2019, directed by Laura Coppens) documents what happens after workers win their fight with multinational giant Unilever to take over the Fralib tea processing and packaging plant in the South of France, near Marseille. In 2010 Unilever announced plans to close down and dismantle the factory, but after 1336 days of resistance, principally by occupying the plant and refusing to leave, the workers at Fralib forced Unilever to turn the factory over to them, and they subsequently resumed production as the Société Coopérative Ouvrière Provençale de Thé et Infusions (SCOP-TI). Taste of Hope observes workers begin to take on the challenges of insuring their product can succeed in an oversaturated, highly competitive market, dominated by giant firms maintaining much greater market power. Major challenges also include doing administrative jobs these workers previously didn't, while learning, from scratch, about marketing, distribution, accounting, and financial management. SCOP-TI also ambitiously strives to make steadily more of their teas entirely from ingredients harvested by local farmers, while manufacturing all organic teas as well as infusions from all natural ingredients. Following our screening of Taste of Hope, on May 8, we discussed examples of other groups of workers who might well be capable of success in owning and managing their own companies, as well as why many people do not recognize these capabilities of theirs. Audience members appreciated SCOP-TI workers and filmmakers honestly depicting the difficulties involved in competing as a cooperative enterprise, founded upon democratic and egalitarian principles, in a capitalist economy, including many disagreements among workers about how best to do so. People appreciated the respect Taste of Hope shows for the dignity of work, for the skill and intelligence of workers, and for the idealism and sacrifice required in order to bring about major changes that sharply depart from 'business as usual'. And we eagerly began to explore the question the filmmakers propose Taste of Hope ultimately poses: 'How do we need to work today so we might live a better world  tomorrow?'

Next in the Social Justice Film Series: From Wounded Knee to Standing Rock

From Wounded Knee to Standing Rock  by Kevin McKiernan
Thursday, June 5th
6:30 to 8pm in Bard Hall of First UU

In 1973, rookie NPR reporter Kevin McKiernan became the only journalist to defy a FBI-imposed media blackout and embed himself with the members of the American Indian Movement who had taken over the historic village of Wounded Knee, South Dakota. From Wounded Knee to Standing Rock tells the story of that 71-day armed occupation through the voices of both the AIM members and FBI agents who lived it and shows how this event continues to reverberate through Native American-US government relations, up through the movement at Standing Rock against the Dakota Access Pipeline.

Free event! Check out the trailer.

Location:
First Unitarian Universalist Church of San Diego
4190 Front Street
San Diego, CA. 92103

Saturday, June 14, 2025
10:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Waterfront Park

On June 14th, Flag Day, the U.S. Army’s 250th anniversary, and Donald Trump’s birthday, Trump is staging a military parade through Washington, D.C.

He says it’s to honor the Army. But in America, that’s not how we honor the military. That’s how strongmen do it.

In a democracy, we don’t blur the line between patriotism and personal power. No U.S. president has ever held a military parade on their birthday, because American leaders don’t glorify themselves or our country with weapons of war.

This is un-American. This is authoritarianism. And we don’t do kings in America.

Monday, June 2nd
6 pm - 8 pm
First UU, Bard Hall

Join us as we welcome Rev. Mary Katherine Morn, President of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, for a conversation about the ways we are responding as Unitarian Universalists to the pressing issues of our times, the hope we find in stories of resilience and power from UUSC partners around the world, and the solidarity that will make possible a world where all people can flourish. Rev. Mary Katherine also looks forward to learning from our congregation about the ways we are in solidarity in our local community as we find synergy and power in our shared work for justice.

Location:
First Unitarian Universalist Church of San Diego
298 W Arbor Dr
San Diego, CA 92103

Friday, May 23rd, 8 pm
Islamic Center of San Diego
7050 Eckstrom Av, San Diego 92111

Islam has a long tradition of caring for the earth and using its resources responsibly.  This presentation (sponsored by the Islamic Center of San Diego and co-sponsored by the Interfaith Coalition for Earth Justice) will feature three speakers–Taha Hassane, Imam of the Islamic Center, Dr. Wael El-Delaimy, Professor and researcher at UCSD, and Brother Yusef Miller of the Islamic Society of North County – who will address the religious, scientific and activist aspects of earth care. This event is in person and FREE of charge, open to the public.  Please join us!! 


For more information, contact [email protected]

Thursday, July 24
5:00 - 7:00pm in Balboa Park

Join us for an evening of exercise and socializing.
Meet at the center of Balboa Park's Museum area

Wednesday, May 21st
​6:30 - 8 pm
MAAC Community Room, 1355 3rd Ave, Chula Vista 91911

As members of the Chula Vista Neighborhood Solidarity team, First UU has teamed up with AFSC to bring our South Bay community a Know Your Rights training. This is an immigrant-focused workshop, but all are invited to attend—the workshop will be hosted in Spanish, with English translation available.

"Uprooted, Not Yet Replanted: The Spiritual Struggles of these Liminal Times"​

It’s been disorienting, to say the least. The volatility of Trump’s second term, the crumbling of norms, the destruction of jobs, lives, and institutions has left so many of us no longer being able to rely on “business as usual.” And with COVID, conflict, ministerial transition, and the open consideration of relocation, “business as usual” at First Church has been in flux for even longer. Living in a liminal time, where one way of being has ended and the “new normal” hasn’t quite taken shape, can be spiritually and emotionally painful. And yet, if we practice discernment, it can also present opportunities for us to live in to who we are truly called to be. Join us for a reflection on how discernment might guide us, as people, and as a community, in these liminal times.
 
Rev. Sarah Gibb Millspaugh is First Church’s primary contact on the UUA Pacific Western Regional Staff. Celebrating her 20th anniversary of ordination this month, Sarah has served as a parish minister, a curriculum author/developer (Coming of Age and Our Whole Lives) and as UUA regional staff. Since 2016 she has lived in San Diego with her family and dog.