Rev. Maureen 'Mo' White -

            Rev. Maureen “Mo” White-Collins, a longtime Boulder resident trained in Buddhist and Christian practice, has been named interim minister at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the Grand Valley, 1022 Grand Ave.  In the 2/3 time position, she will be at the church on the second and fourth weekends of each month for the next year.

            Rev. Marlene Walker, the former minister, resigned in August to accept a ministerial post in Iowa, nearer her grandchildren.

            White-Collins has a wide-ranging background:  extensive experience as a therapist, chaplain, pastoral counselor, youth leader and as a teacher of theology and Buddhist meditation.  She is married, with a stepdaughter.

She received both her B.A. in contemplative psychology and her M.A. in Divinity from Naropa University, Boulder.  There, she administrated programs and taught theology.  She was certified as a Mindfulness meditation instructor by Naropa and Shambhala International in 2004.  

She worked as a grief counselor for HospiceCare of Boulder for two years, and in 2005,  was accredited by the College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy, having completed over 1600 hours of clinical pastoral education. She spent a year and a half as a chaplain in the ICU’s of two hospitals, and at a “Continuum of Care” Methodist retirement community.

She has also taught many youth workshops, including anti-oppression and anti-racism trainings, the UU “Our Whole Lives” curriculum, and awareness and self-differentiation.

White-Collins has also spent several years as a chaplain and speaker at organizations such as Heartbeat and Compassionate Friends since she lost her 19-year-old son to suicide eight years ago, an event which profoundly influenced her decision to become a minister.  Her experience, she says, made her recognize that “suicide is a taboo subject in this country. It’s something we need to talk more about.”

The language often used to describe suicide, she says, is inaccurate. “Crimes are committed and sins are committed.  Suicide is a form of death that is tragic, much like other forms of death, but it’s not a crime or a sin.”

Compassion, for White-Collins, is at the heart of all ministry, and the “glue that binds us.”   “We communicate in so many ways, in so much more than words,” she says.  “It (ministry) is not always what we say or what we do; it’s about companioning people.  It’s about being present to people.  In both the Christian and the Buddhist tradition, this is also referred to as bearing witness.”

She is very much a “systems thinker,” in which she looks at interconnected webs within systems of families, organizations, and a great many structures.  Systems thinking, she says, is happening “in all kinds of areas.  It’s very present in pastoral care and in congregations of all kinds.  It’s scientific because a system has a certain homeostasis to it, a certain balance.  In any system, home, work, community, it’s a way of thinking.  Instead of thinking about the discriminate pieces and parts, it’s thinking about the organic nature and wholism of the entire system.”

As an interim minister, she sees herself representing “the inbetween time.  Between what?  One way of being and doing and another way of being and doing.  One called and settled minister, and another called and settled minister.”

She grew up in the Irish Roman Catholic Church, a tradition which, like Buddhism, she says is so beautiful that it still influences her. “But first and foremost I am a Unitarian Universalist,” she says.  “I think we have a saving message, and that message is:  ‘You are worthy, and you are loved.  There is no need for conflict between spirit and reason.’”

White-Collins notes the recent “big changes” within her new church: the changing of the name this summer from “Uncompahgre Unitarian Universalist” to the “Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the Grand Valley.” “This name is more recognizable, and more representative of the entire valley,” she says. 

Services have also been changed:  on Sundays children’s, youth and adult religious education is offered 9 – 10 a.m., and the worship service from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m.  Three new choirs have been formed:  children’s, youth and adult.

The Grand Valley UU’s are a member congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations, which is a result of a merger in 1961 between the Unitarians and the Universalists, churches which date back to the Reformation. A year ago, the UU congregation hosted the UU Mountain Desert District (MDD) annual meeting at Two Rivers Convention Center in Grand Junction, the first time such a meeting, with thousands of participants from six states, had been held here.   “We are not as isolated as it may seem,” she comments.  “We are a vital part of the whole.”

 Among her tasks will be to help the UU’s work towards “addressing a new identity of a fast-growing congregation,” strengthening its lay leadership, and strengthening the congregation’s denominational ties to both the MDD and its sister congregations in Glenwood Springs and Delta.

Together with the Glenwood Springs UU consulting minister, Michael Corrigan and an MDD executive, White-Collins will co-teach, over the winter, a 20-hour class on “Healthy Congregations,” which will be held here and in Glenwood Springs.

“As a Unitarian Universalist I believe that we are all a part of an interconnected web of existence…Unitarian is one god:  Universalist is love.  I call one god the One Great Reality.  We are all part of that  -- that web of existence, the one Great Reality – and love is everything.  Love is what we are here for, what we are called to be, to do, and to practice.  That’s the heart of being Unitarian Universalist.”

New services will be “dynamic,” she says, “not just static, where you sit and someone’s up there, but where people participate in different ways, by meditating, by playing music, by offering their reflection on a sermon.  I’m pretty big on participation.  

“In this religious tradition,” she says with a smile, “the minister does not have the last word.”