This recorded webinar gives tips on how to work on your own congregation’s history.

By Stefan Jonasson (first published in The Icelandic Post)

From the editor:

Most UUs know that Spaniards, Italians, Transylvanians, French, Poles, and other groups had a hand in shaping our tradition. Here in North America we should also look at the Icelanders and their descendants. Emil Gudmundson, a Canadian, had crucial roles in both tracing the Icelandic influence and in organizing Unitarian Universalism in the Midwest. I never met him, but did find a typewritten letter of his in the archives of the Prairie Star District. It was in Icelandic, so I have no idea what it said.

From the author’s preface to the Facebook version of this piece:

Emil was one of the people who encouraged me to study for the Unitarian Universalist ministry. He taught me that ministry was, first and foremost, about presence – simply being with people in times of joy and in times of sadness – and that ideas were important, but not more important than relationships. And Emil reassured me that the love of things Icelandic might be rare, but it wasn't odd.

A Sometimes Shadowy Figure

Leona Handler Light (1915-1992[1]) is an impressive and puzzling figure in the history of twentieth-century Unitarian Universalism. She capably served the Western Unitarian Conference in Chicago from the mid-1930s to the early1940s and then did hazardous duty in Hungary and Transylvania before and during the outbreak of World War II. In Lawrence, Kansas, she revitalized the historic Unitarian society. She then abruptly dropped out of sight for over two decades and apparently re-emerged to take a prominent role in the Black Empowerment Controversy in the late 1960s.

And with raised eyebrow you ask, “Apparently re-emerged?” Ministry candidate and research sleuth Jon Jasper Coffee is almost certain that the “Leona H. Light” of the 1960s was the Leona Handler active in the 1930s and 1940s, but recognizes that more digging needs to be done. All the same, he has uncovered enough information, most of it from primary sources, to sketch a fascinating portrait of someone whose career should pique the curiosity of anyone interested in the history of women—or anyone—who capably served liberal religion. The following condenses his findings.

Origins and Early Work

Probably born to a Baltimore family, Leona Handler studied at Tufts College, Tufts Theological School, Boston University, Northwestern University, and the Unitarian Collegium in Kolozsvar, Transylvania. Before becoming office secretary for the Western Conference of the American Unitarian Association (AUA) in Chicago, she worked as an assistant in Massachusetts congregations.

Unitarian Universalist Society of Geneva
102-112 South Second St.
Geneva, IL 60134

This church was a transplant of the staunchly liberal Christianity from New England Unitarianism. Their first minister, Augustus Conant, served from the very beginning in 1842 until 1857. He, his wife Betsy, and nineteen others wrote the church covenant in 1842, which is still used at every morning service:

“Being desirous of promoting practical goodness in the world, and of aiding each other in our moral and religious improvement, we have associated ourselves together - not in agreeing in opinion, not as having attained universal truth in belief or perfection in character, but as seekers after truth and goodness.”

Conant was followed by fourteen more ministers, including four women, between 1857 and 1926. During these years, the congregation experienced conflict when movements like Transcendentalism and later humanism caused some Unitarians to change their beliefs—and others to resist change. By and large the members honored their original covenant, but doing so at times required an effort. An example is in the ministry of Dr. Charles Lyttle, a humanist who was called in 1926 and remained minister until 1964. He wrote the song and Doxology, still used, to unite the theists and the Humanists among the members. [1]