Boston Unitarian leader Monroe Husbands had a unique way of evangelizing in the 1950s. He advertised for members to get new fellowships going.
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The Unitarian Universalist Church in Augusta will soon celebrate their 50th anniversary.
Michael Holahan/Staff
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One such ad drew a small group of Augustans, who became the founders of today's Unitarian-Universalist Church of Augusta.
The church will mark its 50th anniversary with a potluck dinner and fellowship at 6 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 7, and a service at 11 a.m. Sunday, Aug. 8, at the church, 3501 Walton Way Extension.
The Rev. Kate Rohde of Palm Beach, Fla., a former pastor in Augusta, will be the guest speaker Aug. 8.
The congregation has grown to about 190 adults since Mr. Husbands first met with the fledging membership, including Peggy and Donald Kelly.
Unlike Mrs. Kelly, whose maternal grandparents were Unitarian ministers, most of those who answered the ad were not familiar with the noncreedal Unitarians. The Unitarians, formerly the American Unitarian Association, merged with the Universalist Church of America in 1961.
Mrs. Kelly was exposed to many churches growing up in Asheville, N.C., but she did not experience a Unitarian service until her family moved to Atlanta.
"That was the church I really felt I belonged to," she said.
In the early years, the Augusta Unitarians moved to various locations, including a ballet studio and a music academy, until they bought their present site on Walton Way.
Mr. Kelly, an architect, designed the initial building, which contains the common room and the Sunday school room. The sanctuary was added later.
The congregation, established the same year as the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, chose as a founding principle that it would be open to blacks.
"(Unitarians) in a practical sense have been very affirmative of women in leadership," said the Rev. Dan King, the church's minister. "We also have been very much in the forefront of endorsing and blessing unions of same-sex couples, recognizing that they don't have legal status, but for us, they have moral status."
Each Unitarian-Universalist congregation is autonomous. Although there is not a required set of beliefs, members do subscribe to common precepts, such as the inherent worth of each person. Members also urge one another in the search for truth.
The denomination is not known for ritual, but the Rev. King has started "a covenanting process" within the Augusta fellowship "for mutual support" and to encourage members in their "search for greater spiritual truth."
"It is an implicit part, and I was trying to make it explicit," he said.
Mrs. Kelly said that "generally everybody believes in the same values and ethical values but that there is a wide divergency about the Bible and Jesus and whether they accept a personal God or not."
Unitarian-Universalists use the Bible as a reference point but they also use other sacred texts and traditions.
"No one church has the answer. There is good in every church. You have to search for the viable answers for 'what makes me a good person' and the proper way to approach life," she said.
For more information, call 733-7939 or visit the church's Web site, www.uucsra.org.
Reach Virginia Norton at (706) 823-3336 or virginia.norton@augustachronicle.com.
50th AnniversaryWho: Unitarian-Universalist Church of AugustaWhat: 50th anniversaryWhere: 3501 Walton Way ExtensionWhen: 6 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 7, service 11 a.m. Sunday, Aug. 8Phone: 733-7939
