What is family? Family can be something that you are born into. It can be something that you marry into. But family is not limited to that which is created by blood or marriage. You can choose to make anyone that you want a part of your family…for any reason at all. Let us explore together this Sunday morning what family might mean to us.

Viola Abbitt will be our guest speaker this Sunday. For Viola, church and religious thought have always played a large role in her life, and she ultimately found a spiritual home in Unitarian Universalism in 2002. She comes to us from Ballston Lake, NY, near Albany, and is currently serving as the ministerial intern at the Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield (Massachusetts). She is a seminarian at Meadville Lombard Theological School in Chicago, IL and a candidate for the Unitarian Universalist ministry.

Viola’s interest in justice work started when, as a teenager, she saw a peaceful protester wrongly arrested by police on the streets of New York City during a demonstration protesting apartheid in South Africa. Her higher education work led to degrees in economics, information science and law (J.D.). She has worked in the New York State Attorney General’s Office and then in many other legal roles throughout NY. She’s been an intern chaplain at the Albany Medical Center in upstate New York and worked for 20 years to protect and promote the legal rights of youth in the juvenile justice system. She considers that among the most rewarding work she has ever been engaged in.   

For more about Viola, please click here.