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30TH ANNIVERSARY
This year we entered our 30th year as an organization. The Psi Symposium began at the UUA General Assembly in Boston in 1969. We began as an ad hoc gathering of "Unitarian Universalists Interested In ESP" called together by our Founder, the Rev. Robert Slater from Lynn. Out of that gathering a Steering Committee was formed. Bob Slater was elected as our first President and I was elected as Vice-President and Newsletter Editor. A year later we changed our name to the U.U. Psi Symposium, borrowing the term "Psi" from the founder of parapsychology at Duke University, Dr. J.B. Rhine. The name stuck and our little organization has lasted for nearly three decades. Bob Slater and I later exchanged roles, I became President and he took over as Newsletter Editor. In 1975 we began publishing an Annual Journal of which I have been Editor ever since with the exception of one year when the Lancaster, Pa. group did it. Past Presidents of UUPS have included the late Rev. Robert Payson, the Rev. Peter Lanzilotta, Isham Peugh, the Rev. Glen Snowden, among others, and once again, yours truly, the Rev. Richard Fewkes.
Since 1969 we have broadened our interest beyond parapsychology and psychic experience to include holistic health and healing, mysticism and spirituality, and related subjects. Over the years we have had some interesting speakers and presenters at General Assembly programs and other conferences: Psychoanalyst Dr. Montague Ulmann, author of DREAM TELEPATHY; Joan Borysenko, Ph.D., author of MINDING THE BODY, MENDING THE MIND; Karlis Osis, Ph.D., author of AT THE HOUR OF DEATH, and researcher of deathbed visions of afterlife experiences; Judith Cressy on "The Near-Death Experience: Mysticism or Madness". Among our own UU ministers we have had Dr. Jeremy Taylor, pioneer dream researcher, teacher and author of DREAM WORK; the Rev. Peter T. Richardson, author of FOUR SPIRITUALITIES: A Psychology Of Contemporary Spiritual Choice; the Rev. C. Scott Giles on the use of hypnosis for the treatment of cancer; and just this past June, we had the Rev. William Metzger, Editor of THE QUEST, the Journal of the Theosophical Society, speaking on "Visible And Invisible Worlds." We even hosted a conference on UFOs and abductee experiences because we felt it important that this anomalous and possibly paranormal experience be considered on its own terms.
We have tried to keep before our fellow Unitarian Universalists and others the importance of considering the intuitive, the mystical, the paranormal, the possibility of both life-after-death(post-mortem survival) and life-before-birth (i.e. past lives and reincarnation), and the healing potential of meditation and prayer. To paraphrase William James, no religious sensibility, metaphysical orientation, or spiritual perspective can be complete which leaves these kinds of experiences unaccounted for or fails to include them in one's understanding of both inner and outer reality. I think we have done this over the past three decades. If we can continue to do so for a few more years I think we can say we have accomplished our goals and objectives even if we should decide to let our organization come to an end. I am happy to serve as your President once again and hope to make the next few years productive ones for the Psi Symposium and the cause of spiritual formation for Unitarian Universalists and others.
(Richard M. Fewkes – President, UU Psi Symposium)
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