Sermon Archive
"A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood” Ryan Saari, Director of Development and Relationships at Cultivate Initiatives
Cultivate Initiatives is an East Portland nonprofit walking alongside neighbors navigating houselessness to move from survival to stability. Through three core pillars—Workforce Development, Housing & Homemaking, and Supportive Sheltering—we offer low-barrier support like paid work opportunities, showers and hygiene, housing navigation, and safe village communities. Rooted in East Portland/East Multnomah County, our team (many with lived experience) builds trust, dignity, and real pathways to jobs and long-term housing—so every neighbor can find belonging, purpose, and hope close to home.
Ryan Saari is the Director of Development and Relationships at Cultivate Initiatives, a nonprofit in East Portland working alongside marginalized neighbors to build stability, dignity, and opportunity. Drawing on a background in community organizing, storytelling, and relationship-building, Ryan leads fundraising, donor engagement, and partnership development to sustain and grow CI’s impact. Ryan is passionate about connecting people—housed and unhoused alike—through creative initiatives that foster belonging, hope, and long-term community transformation.
Special Collection: Cultivate Initiatives
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"Spiritual Practice: Healing with our Ancestors” Rev. Stephani Skalak
Throughout history humans all over the world have included their ancestors in their spiritual practice. This week we are going to reflect upon the gifts and burdens we share with our own ancestors. You are invited to bring a small object for our temporary altar that represents your ancestor(s); when choosing, please feel free to consider familial ancestors, community/cultural ancestors, or spiritual ancestors.
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"What We Choose” Rev. Leslie Becknell Marx
When the news is full of unimaginable decisions and Portland awaits possible federal troops, how do we choose to respond? We will explore how to stay true to our vision of love at the center rather than let others define the “rules of the game." Join us for accompaniment, solidarity, and grounding in these tumultuous times
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"Centering, De-centering, Re-centering" Rev. Mitra Rahnema
You have heard the terms about centering in all sorts of contexts. Today we explore what this actually means in practice as Unitarian Universalists.
Rev. Mitra Rahnema is a lifelong Unitarian Universalist and has served congregations in Missouri, Michigan, and California. Rev. Mitra is the editor of Centering: Navigating Race, Authenticity, and Power in Ministry (2017), a UUA Common Read that explores the complexities of identity and power within Unitarian Universalist ministry. Most recently, she completed a successful two-year interim ministry in Grosse Pointe, Michigan. She is committed to nurturing vibrant, engaged, and counter-oppressive communities. Outside of her ministry, Mitra enjoys cooking and makes her home in Portland, Oregon.
First-Sunday Monthly Potluck after Service!
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"The Current State of Immigration Policy & Advocacy in Oregon” Isa Peña, Director of Strategy at Innovation Law Lab
We kick off our “We Are Stronger Together” Social Justice speaker series with Isa Peña the Director of Strategy at Innovation Law Lab and a look at the current state of immigration policy and advocacy work in Oregon. Innovation Law Lab is a nonprofit organization that leverages law, technology and organizing to fight for immigrant and refugee justice. It is one of many organizations on the frontlines supporting immigrants and refugees across our state. They will cover updates on what immigration enforcement looks like in Oregon now and what you can do to support our immigrant neighbors and friends.
Isa Peña is the Director of Strategy at Innovation Law Lab. Isa has been a long-time organizer and leader in the immigrant justice movement. She is a daughter of immigrants from Jalisco, Mexico. In her work she leverages her strengths and skills in relationship building, fundraising and policy advocacy to help advance immigrant justice. Isa serves on the Executive teams of Oregon Worker Relief (OWR) and Oregon For All, two statewide coalitions who lead the charge in providing direct assistance and stewarding critical narrative change and statewide coordination to protect immigrant Oregonians.
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"Balance and Breathe” Rev. Stephani Skalak
This week Day and Night will stand in perfect balance. As we close out summer and prepare for the darker months ahead, the Autumnal Equinox reminds us that life is a dance between light and dark, abundance and scarcity, celebration and introspection. What is our spiritual harvest this year, both individually and collectively? What do we wish to learn during the fallow winter? This Sunday we will explore these themes together through ritual, reflection, and conversation.
Biography: Rev. Stephani Skalak is a hospital chaplain working for Providence Health System. She was the Intern Minister at the UUC at Willamette Falls in Oregon City for two years. Before that, she spent 15 years as a film-maker who taught media literacy and documentary film production to youth in first San Francisco and then Portland, OR. She is a co-founder of the Portland Women’s Film Festival (POW Film Fest). Stephani has experience in small group ministry within the UU tradition and was a board member of the European Unitarian Universalists. She has a Master of Divinity from Meadville Lombard Theological School and a BA in International Relations from The American University. She lives in Portland, with her love, Mark, and their two young-adult children, Ukiah and Seneca.
Listen to the Service Recording
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"The Power of a Word” Rev. Tania Y. Márquez, UUA Congregational Life Staff for Pacific Western Region
In this recorded sermon, Rev. Tania Márquez of the UUA Congregational Life Staff, Pacific Western Region, explores the power of words to help bring the invisible to life. Tania highlights the adversities of poverty in a society that has taught us to fear this reality, and the power we have to change our fear once we are able to identify how it operates. She lives in the San Diego area and has lived in that region for most of her life, on both sides of the border, and her ministry is influenced by her fronteriza and immigrant experience. She believes in the healing power of words, rituals, and community.
Tania joined the UUA staff in 2024, with previous experience in parish ministry and hospital chaplaincy. She has a Master's Degree in Spanish Linguistics and Literature from San Diego State University, and a Masters of Divinity from Meadville Lombard Theological School. Tania was ordained into the Unitarian Universalist ministry in 2017. She is excited about all the different ways in which we express our humanity, and loves the company of friends, family, the natural world, poetry, music, and Spirit.
Listen to the Service Recording
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"Waters of Renewal: Ingathering and New Beginnings" Rev. Leslie Becknell Marx
As the seasons turn and September brings the spirit of new beginnings, we begin a new “church year” together. On this special Sunday, we join in our annual Water Communion and Ingathering—bringing a small amount of water from your summer travels or from where you are on your life’s journey. Together, we will pour our waters as symbols of our shared story, our shared hope, and our shared belonging. We will also welcome a new member into the covenant of this beloved community and our new Religious Educator into our staff team. Come, in person or on Zoom, as we refresh our commitments and joyfully begin again. Service led by Rev. Leslie Becknell Marx.
Special Congregational Meeting after the Service to affirm revised budget!
First-Sunday Monthly Potluck after Service!
Multi-Platform Worship (both in-person & online)
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833
"5th Sunday Day of Service: A Day of Rest”
Each church year there are 4 or 5 months that have a 5th Sunday. For the last two years as part of our lay-led ministry, we have been using these Sundays to offer an alternative to traditional worship. In lieu of holding a service, either in-person or on Zoom, we have organized a variety of group service projects we can do together instead.
This final day of August in 2025 is not only a 5th Sunday, but is also the Sunday of Labor Day Weekend. Your worship team invites you to spend it in rest and restoration so that you may enter the new church year revived and ready.
We will launch our new church year on Sunday, September 7th, with an In-Gathering and Water Communion Service followed by a special Congregational Meeting and Potluck.
There will be NO regular service (either in-person or online) this Sunday.
"Life at the Frontier: The Conversational Nature of Reality” TED Talk by David Whyte
In this TED Talk by the poet/philosopher David Whyte, he encourages and inspires us to engage with life, rather than to miss out on all the wakening opportunities it presents. Whyte does this through his vibrant poetry, which he invites us to become grounded in, and illuminates with memorable stories.
(from Wikipedia): Whyte's mother was from Waterford, Ireland, and his father was a Yorkshireman. He attributes his poetic interest to both the songs and poetry of his mother's Irish heritage and to the landscape of West Yorkshire (in England). He grew up in West Yorkshire and has commented that he had "a Wordsworthian childhood", in the fields and on the moors. Whyte has a degree in marine zoology from Bangor University (in Wales).
During his twenties, Whyte worked as a naturalist and lived in the Galapagos Islands, where he experienced a near drowning on the southern shore of Hood Island. He led anthropological and natural history expeditions in the Andes, Amazon, and the Himalayas. Whyte moved to the United States in 1981 and began a career as a poet and speaker in 1986. From 1987, he began taking his poetry and philosophy to larger audiences, including consulting and lecturing on organisational leadership models in the US and UK exploring the role of creativity in business. (He currently resides on the Olympic Peninsula.)
Online (Zoom) Only Worship
Sunday at 10:30 AM
Click here to join the virtual service on Zoom
Meeting ID: 275 194 110
Phone In: (669) 900-6833