Our Essential Fervor

A celebration—in reading, music and reflection—of the life and writings of Kenneth Leo Patton (1911-1994), self-styled mystical humanist and widely-acclaimed poet and prophet of contemporary liberal religion. Patton was a voice for a poetic, naturalistic humanism at a time when most humanists were defining a religion of reason. Singing Patton’s praises, minister and scholar David Bumbaugh asserts, “It was he who taught a monotone rationalism how to sing; it was he who taught a stumble-footed humanism how to dance; it was he who cried ‘Look!’ and taught our eyes to see the glory in the ordinary.”

Our speakers will be Rev. Dr. Kendyl Gibbons, senior minister of the First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis, and Rev. Paul R. Beedle, minister of the Henry David Thoreau UU Congregation in Stafford, Texas.