As Unitarian Universalists, we work for social justice to create a compassionate, diverse, and equitable world.
What we do with our UU beliefs, how we act on our principles in the world, is the truest measure of our faith.
Indigenous Peoples’ Rights
At UCN Sunday Services and formal gatherings, we often include in our opening welcome the acknowledgement that in the 1700s and early 1800s, the Potawatomi and Ho Chunk Indigenous People occupied the land where we built United Church North. Native Land, an Indigenous-led nonprofit in Canada with an interactive website allows users to input their address and see the Indigenous territories, languages and treaties pre-dating European colonization in the area where they now live.
As Unitarian Universalists, we support the struggles of Native peoples for racial and economic justice. A decade ago, the UUA took a stance against the past and current impacts of the Doctrine of Discovery, an historic international law that allowed Europeans to kill non-Christian peoples and take their land.
Our Social Justice Efforts
Fund for Social Justice
Unitarian Church North
Fund for Social Justice
UCN’s Fund for Social Justice (FSJ) was started by UCN members’ donations in 2000, and is managed by the Greater Milwaukee Foundation. The interest income this Fund earns is donated annually to a non-profit, charitable organization in the Greater Milwaukee area. Any UCN member may nominate a recipient, by downloading and returning the Nomination Form.
Agapé Fund
Agapé Fund
UCN’s Finance Committee gifted the Social Justice Committee with 10% of the church’s cash reserves, after safely managing church finances through the Covid pandemic, and demonstrating confidence in the work of the SJC. The Committee chose the name Agapé Fund, which in Greek means selfless love. Click the button below for a chronological list of donations made from the Agapé fund.
Food Barrel
Donations of non-perishable food items are welcome from all members at anytime, in the food barrel located in the UCN South lobby on the main floor. Social Justice Committee members deliver donations to the designated food bank in the area. UCN has participated in this community activity for nearly 30 years.
Faith in Action
Love is Universal
The original of this LOVE IS UNIVERSAL mural was painted on the wall in Cedarburg’s Webster Middle School by students in its Student Acceptance Team. When controversy caused by its multi-cultural message resulted it its being painted over by the administration, the mural was recreated as a traveling exhibit and UCN was proud to give it its first display for a month in late 2021.
Women's Voting Rights Celebration
On April 26, 2020, UCN members gathered and tolled the church’s historic bell 19 times. We were honoring the 100-year anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Constitutional amendment that gave women the right to vote in 1920. The celebrations also included the names and biographies of some of the Wisconsin women who had been influential throughout the fight for suffrage (despite opposition from the state’s breweries and tavern owners who were afraid of women voting for Temperance!) The women’s groups formed to fight for suffrage became The League of Women Voters.
Community Meals
UCN volunteers, in the row the right, provide the food that they serve several times a year at the monthly Community Meal at Parkside Community Church of Christ in Saukville, WI. The meals are popular and well-attended (see the row on the left in photo).
