Karen Fisk became the UUCC's Director of Religious Exploration in March, 2006, after serving the congregation as the acting DRE since August. She is also a Family Small Group Facilitator and a Ministerial Associate. Karen was the Religious Exploration assistant the previous year and the president of our congregation the two years before that. She has been an active member of the church since 1997 when she and her family moved to Maine.

Karen is currently working toward the Unitarian Universalist Association's Religious Educator Credentialing Program, attending educational meetings on subjects such as multicultural religious exploration and worship for all ages. She has hopes of fostering a profound, rich, multi-dimensional lifelong religious exploration program, meeting the needs and curiosities of all our friends and members from infants through sages.

Particularly interesting to Karen is promoting a multicultural perspective in religious exploration through storytelling.  She tells stories from many world religions and philosophies. The stories she chooses emphasize what we as human beings have in common while acknowledging and celebrating our uniqueness.  She also chooses stories of reverence for the Earth and the animals; stories that tell of Unitarian and Universalist heroes and histories; stories of secular as well as religious wisdom. Because we are Unitarian Universalists seeking our own spiritual paths, Karen draws from her stories the messages that flow easily within Unitarian Universalist principles.

Karen believes connection is the key to success for our church community (and for all humanity). Real connection — meaning interest, empathy, compassion, understanding, forgiveness — real connection is what will help us all build a community of faith which will meet the needs of its members in a multitude of ways. Karen's hope is that her religious exploration program, as facilitated by the ministry and the community, will foster real connection that will prove both transformative and infinitely comforting.