I understand that there has been considerable discussion and distress over what was published in a newspaper article recently.

I am writing to share with you what happened, to address your concerns, and to assure you that I share many of the concerns you have expressed.

Here is what happened. This past Sunday (1/12) I preached a sermon entitled "The Language of Faith" at First Jefferson UU Church in Ft. Worth, Texas. I also addressed this issue in the column I wrote for the upcoming March-April issue of UU World; this article has been posted on our website at http://www.uua.org/president/030115.html and I encourage you to read it.

Following the service, I did an interview with a reporter from the local newspaper, an interview which covered a number of issues including the points about religious language I made in my sermon and magazine column.

The reporter published a story that reported things I did not say, and drew conclusions that I did not reach. In particular, the reporter's first sentence read, "A former atheist who is now president of the Unitarian Universalist Association will push to put the word 'God' into a new statement of principles."

Let me be very clear: I spoke of the need to periodically revisit-that is, to read and reflect upon-our foundational language. I did not call for the Principles to be rewritten. I spoke of the need for individuals to consider supplementing the language of the Principles with religious language in describing their own faith. I did not call for the inclusion of the word "God" in either the Principles or in anyone's individual descriptions of their personal faith.

I understand the alarm and genuine distress that many of you felt on reading the news story and accounts of it. I would be similarly alarmed if any UUA president presumed to do what the story suggested I had done.

You need to know that I did not in fact make the statements reported in the Ft. Worth paper. Here is the text of what I said in my sermon at the Ft. Worth church about God language and the Christian tradition:

But "religious language" doesn't have to mean "God talk." And I'm not suggesting that Unitarian Universalism return to traditional Christian language. But I do feel that we need some language that would allow us to capture the possibility of reverence, to name the holy, to talk about human agency in theological terms-the ability of humans to shape and frame our world guided by what we find to be of ultimate importance.

I have learned from these events that I need to exercise greater care in addressing the broader world, including reporters, about Unitarian Universalist language and beliefs. I mistakenly assumed that the reporter would understand my remarks with the same level of nuance and clarity that I had intended them. That did not happen, and on reflection I see that it was unlikely ever to happen. I should have better anticipated how someone not steeped in our tradition might easily draw the erroneous conclusions he drew.

That said, I still believe that it is time for us to have a conversation about our foundational language. Indeed, we have a bylaw requiring that the Board of Trustees review the Principles and Purposes every 15 years (see Article XIV, section C-14.1 of the UUA Bylaws). My hope is that both the sermon and the World column will serve as a stimulus to get this conversation going.

I ask your help in moving past this misunderstanding, and I ask your further help in redirecting our energy to where it can do the most productive good. If you speak with someone not on this e-mail list who is concerned about what they have heard, please forward this e-mail so that they can read what actually happened.

Unitarian Universalism today is strong and vibrant. We are increasingly claiming the Good News of our liberal faith. Let's use our energy to make Unitarian Universalism even stronger, and to share our Good News with a world that badly needs it. This incident has the potential to lead us into a rich discussion of who we are and how we describe ourselves. I welcome that discussion.

In faith,

William G. Sinkford