The Reverend Stephen Sinclair has served our congregation since August 2010. Rev. Sinclair brings to UUI his passion for Unitarian Universalism, his warm personality, his thoughtful spiritual nature, and his strong commitment for social justice. He has been active in such causes as AIDS, affordable housing and voter registration. It was through social action that he was introduced to our religion. “The first Unitarian Universalists I ever met were those with whom I shared a police van after being arrested for civil disobedience at an anti-war rally in Chicago at the start of the first Gulf War.”
He decided on a career in ministry in his 40s, drawn by a longstanding desire to help people and to grow spiritually. This feeling intensified in 2001, while living in Manhattan, when he witnessed the collapse of the World Trade Center towers, an experience that horrified and transformed him. “It was then that I knew that I wanted to make a difference in people’s lives, which meant that I began to think about finally answering my call to ministry,” he said. He began his ministry studies soon afterward.
Rev. Sinclair, age 58, grew up on a dairy farm in the north woods of Wisconsin. As a boy, he was active in 4-H and Methodist Youth Fellowship. Before entering the ministry he was involved in a variety of people-oriented occupations. He worked his way through the University of Minnesota as a nursing assistant, earning a bachelor’s degree in sociology. After graduation, he moved to the East Coast and began working in the hospitality industry, while training for the theater. He soon began to perform in plays, musicals, concerts, films and television. For many years, he had a small business, planning social events for people. He also worked at Fordham Law School where he conducted simulated client interviews with students.
Rev. Sinclair received a master of divinity degree, with honors, from Meadville Lombard Theological School, a UU seminary in Chicago. During that time he worked as a chaplain at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and at Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago. Later, he worked as a chaplain at the Cleveland Clinic. He served his internship at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Rockville in Rockville, Maryland and was asked to stay on as their summer minister. He served as interim minister of Second Unitarian in Omaha from 2008 to 2009, a process that resulted in the successful calling of a new settled minister. He is currently a recruitment consultant for Meadville Lombard and a community minister with an organization called InCommon, as well as filling pulpits in the UUA’s Prairie Star District.
While Unitarian Universalism is his dominant theology, he has been influenced by Judaism, Christianity, Raja Yoga and the philosophy of Vedanta. He describes his theological orientation as follows: “I believe in a divine source that is present in all things and that creation is an ongoing phenomenon. We can choose to personalize that source and to relate to it in such a way that we feel kinship to it, something which can assist us in our daily lives and to make meaning of the larger life events.”
