Photo credit: Nancy Pierce/Unitarian Universalist Association
To travel 2,273 miles from RGV to Spokane Washington is a long way for any first-time air traveler.
Yet in mid-June, Weslaco young adult trans-woman Aspen Basaldua, a San Juan-based Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Hidalgo County (UUFHC) member, is headed that way. In January UUFHC agreed to sanction a Unitarian Universalist Association Foundation scholarship request for attendance at the Spokane 2019 Unitarian Universalist Association General Assembly.
Tom Nieland, UUFHC Board of Directors President, observed: “When Aspen and Membership Chair Rachel Corsi brought this up, we thought -- cautiously --- ‘sure, let’s try it.'" In nearly seventy-years of operation, the RGV’s small UU fellowship, now with 44 members, had never sent UUA GA a voting delegate mainly due to the expense.
In March, Basaldua sent her application. Funded for over 20 years via individual UUA-member grants handled by UUA’s Boston Massachusetts national office, 80 scholarships to fully cover conference registration and some incidental costs were made this year out of over 200 applications. Additional travel finances are up to UU congregations or scholarship recipients themselves.
When the Jerry and Denny Davidoff Fund for Lay Leadership scholarship came April 25th, UUFHC’s board agreed to advance an added $700.00 in expenses. (Abramson, an RGV Winter Texan back in Madison, Wisconsin, will also represent UUFHC this year at his own expense.)
“It’s an honor to represent my church and reaffirm my Unitarian Universalist beliefs” said Aspen.
A passionate member of UUFHC’s Worship Committee, Outreach Committee Co-Chair, and church musician, she leads an outreach effort to engage RGV LGBTQ people (among all other curious seekers) to experience Unitarian Universalism as a welcoming spiritual community. She also plans special fundraising events in the near future to repay UUFHC for added GA expenses.
General Assembly (GA), the Unitarian Universalist Association annual meeting, is held in a different United States city yearly. Member congregations send delegates and attendees for 5 days of plenary sessions, workshops, regional gatherings, public witness events, and worship services. A Synergy Bridging ceremony congratulates individual churches' Religious Education program graduates. In recent years, attendance at each Assembly has reached over 5,500.
General Assembly keynote Ware Lectures are highly anticipated, a confab centerpiece since 1922 in honor of Harriet E. Ware. This year’s Ware Lecturer is Richard Blanco. Selected by President Obama as the fifth inaugural poet in U.S. history, Blanco is the youngest and the first Latino, immigrant, and gay person to serve in such a role.
Previous Ware Lecturers included Martin Luther King, Jr., Jesse Jackson, Kurt Vonnegut, Sister Simone Campbell, and Brittany Packnett, a vice president for Teach for America, a co-founder of Campaign Zero, and a member of President Obama's 21st Century Policing Task Force.