Who Is UU?

Phoenix joined UU Meriden earlier this year, but for them, this isn’t a new experience. They’d attended UU in Springfield, Massachusetts “for as long as I can remember.” After moving to Connecticut five years ago, Phoenix briefly attended UU Meriden until COVID-19 disrupted services. Then, the presidential election in 2024 deeply upset Phoenix. They tell it best: “I was feeling a lot of things. I was feeling scared and alone. I was like ‘okay, you can feel scared, but there’s a community out there. You know where it is. Go find it.’”

Phoenix grew up in Agawam, Massachusetts, next to Springfield, where they attended church. As a child, they attended religious education services. They remember how much fun they’d had doing service projects and learning through social justice. They participated in a coming-of-age ceremony at UU Springfield. As an older youth, they went on to help teach the younger kids. 

Phoenix also had positive things to say about the sexual health education they’d received through the “Our Whole Lives” program at UU Springfield. As a kindergartener, they learned about consent and inappropriate touch. As they got older, the lessons became about healthy sexuality and contraception. Phoenix laughed when recalling one lesson – “we took a condom and put, like, four apples in it.” 

Phoenix stopped attending church regularly as a university student. They attended Western New England University in Springfield, MA, to study mechanical engineering. Phoenix and their boyfriend, who have been together for 12 years, moved to Connecticut, first to Rocky Hill in 2019, and then to Berlin in 2024. Phoenix now works for CYIENT doing outsource work for Pratt & Whitney. Phoenix works with the Pratt non-destructive testing team, more specifically the Ultrasonic testing (UT) team.  The UT team scans parts for defects and then the non-defective parts can still be used after testing. 

Phoenix wasn’t attending UU, but the lessons from the OWL program would go on to be an asset to Phoenix as a young adult, as would their childhood exposure to people of a wide variety of sexualities and gender expression attending church. Phoenix realized that they are bisexual about 5 years ago and that they’re non-binary two years after that. “I was grateful to have the foundation of UU,” recalled Phoenix, “because then you don’t learn to hate yourself.” 

Phoenix says that as a queer person they found the 2024 election to be terrifying. They keep up on current political threats to the trans community by reading the Erin in the Morning substack, but they try not to engage in what they call “digital self-harm”. Phoenix says that they “try not to just go on a news site and just start scrolling.” They instead try to engage in some healthier hobbies.

Phoenix does a lot of fiber arts – cross stitching, crocheting, diamond painting, usually while listening to audiobooks. They particularly like listening to young adult books, but have recently enjoyed “Everything is Tuberculosis,” a non-fiction book by John Green. They also like listening to metal music. They particularly like Sabaton, who write metal songs about historical events, and Rammstein. 

Phoenix has been watching Star Trek TV shows in release order. They’ve finished the original series and have more recently been watching the last seasons of The Next Generation interspersed with Deep Space Nine. They also enjoy watching old episodes of *M*A*S*H*.

Phoenix also enjoys video games – in fact, they played a character named Phoenix in a video game before choosing their name. Phoenix and their friends have played a variety of MMORPGs – Massively Multiplayer Online RolePlaying Games – and have lately been playing Guild Wars 2. Phoenix also enjoys cozy video games, like Stardew Valley and the aptly named “PowerWash Simulator.”

Unitarian Universalism has been part of Phoenix’s whole life. They’ve learned our principles, learned skills, and learned to be ready to accept themselves. They knew that this church would be a community they could find when they encountered challenging times. Phoenix really found value in Unitarian Universalism in the past, and, if we work together, UU Meriden can be a place where Phoenix finds that same value in the future.