Viewpoint: Jackie and Carl

UUSGS strives to create spiritual and physical spaces where people from different backgrounds
can unite, finding community along with our own voices. Jackie and Carl’s story together started
in our congregation, where they arrived from quite different paths.

Jackie’s path

Jackie landed in Springfield in 1976 after living in the Midwest and California. She grew up in a
Unitarian Universalist fellowship. It was a good fit for her religiously eclectic family, with parents
of Jewish and Methodist backgrounds. Jackie joined UUSGS with her two young children’s
religious education and community involvement in mind.

Jackie found her own deep sense of community here. That was important to her after moving
away from home. Her family grew both metaphorically and literally at UUSGS, where she met
Carl, her husband of 37 years and counting.

Carl’s path

The son of a Baptist preacher, Carl spent his childhood in Oklahoma steeped in that tradition.
He says he began looking for “soulful purpose” in other places as a teenager. While serving in
the Navy, Carl met people of many different religious affiliations. And he experimented with
several throughout his young adulthood.

When Carl came to the Springfield area in 1985, he sought a community that could offer his son
an empowering religious experience. He decided UUSGS was just the place. And Carl would
ultimately find his own empowerment here.

Jackie and Carl married at UUSGS in 1987. They’ve developed a shared love for our
congregation, expressing it in their own ways over time.

Community, comfort, and challenge

Jackie’s involvement has changed throughout the phases of her life, from being a young mom in
her 20s to now a grandmother in her 70s. She helped conduct services as a worship associate
for many years. She was a programming assistant on staff. She served on national and regional
UU boards. And for several years, she’s led a monthly group called Conversations on Aging.
Jackie contributes in these and other ways because she sees the congregation as her extended family. She appreciates our support systems, like the meal trains and the group of members who connect with families needing extra support.

The community is like-minded in ways that matter, which doesn’t mean everyone has identical beliefs, Jackie says: “We're all searchers, and we're not dogmatic.” It all makes for “a really comfortable community, but also people who can challenge one another to continue to learn, to continue to be active out in the greater community,” she says.

Finding your voice

Community activity became Carl’s passion. He served on the social justice committee and co-led a Social Justice Hour group, educating members about different issues. He fondly remembers when congregants drove community members to the polls one Election Day, saying “it was a perfect role for a congregation to take.”

Carl, who also led our governing board for one term, credits UUSGS with helping him realize he has something to say. “It helped me find my voice. I’m using that term a lot more these days … to help other people realize that what they think is important,” he says.

UUSGS is honored to be a place where people like Jackie and Carl can extend their families and find their voices.

Learn more about the Power of Possibility.