WHY ARE YOU YOU?

Hank Peirce’s name came up at the very beginning of this project as someone we should consider talking to.
He tells the story of how the name Young Religious Unitarian Universalist, with the acronym YRUU came to be.  But listen closely because he doesn’t take credit for coming up with the idea but rather was the messenger to the group.
Later on in the process we received an email from someone who remembers a young woman had presented the name YRUU during the first Common Ground session.  It wasn’t until the second Common Ground session that they decided on a name. It is unclear if that young woman was even in attendance then.
Hank of course has many amazingly fascinating anecdotes. So buckle up! 
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Lindsay ended up doing a solo trip to Washington DC where she met with a few folx for interviews.  Sam Ames was one of them.  They met in a strange hotel right by a busy highway. Sam was so trusting of Lindsay to be in this weird place with framed pictures of squirrels and a small circular cushion that Lindsay sat on to listen to them.
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In the summer of 2023 Lindsay traveled with her family to SUUSI.  Southeast Unitarian Universalists Summer Institute.  Her goal was to have some fun but also to meet and interview a variety of voices.  This episode we will hear from Dana Taylor.  After we looked through her photos and old t-shirt collection we sat together on a rainy day in North Carolina to hear her YRUU stories.  
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This episode we have a special person to both Dawn and Lindsay. Nan Moore was one of their youth advisors and continues to this day to be an important person in their lives. 
Nan represents one of those safe adults that they could turn to as youth. 
Nan wrote a testimonial at the beginning of this project but we never had a chance to interview her until recently. One of our favorite lines from that testimonial was, “My life has become more conscious because of the years I spent in YRUU as an advisor, chaplain, DRE, advocate, and friend. I say to all those YRUUers out there - Thank you, thank you, thank you. YRUU is where I learned about me.”
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Our featured person for this episode is Anna Sale.  You may recognize Anna from her podcast Death, Sex and Money. Anna was a participant of YRUU but not necessarily a leader in YRUU.  But what was so exciting about Anna was her story of how she uses her media work now based on her upbringing in the Unitarian Universalists faith in West Virginia. 
Lindsay and Naomi traveled to the west coast to meet with Anna at another one of our interviewees' homes, Laila Ibrahim. It was great capturing them talking briefly about their upbringing while looking through old Mugbooks. 
A big thanks to Marc Loustou who guided us towards asking Anna to be interviewed.
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This episode features Brian Schorr who came into this project by sending us a beautifully written email that got our attention. Strangely enough we happened to be driving to Brooklyn, NY that coming weekend and when we asked Brian where Brian lived it happened to be in NJ!
So, we took a detour to Brian’s beautiful lake house home and with the warmth of a lit fire we interviewed Brian after a lovely prepared brunch that was laid out for us. 
Please take note of the mention of suicide at 10:36 and 19:19
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For this episode we are starting our first podcast with the first interview we recorded with Julie-Ann Silberman-Bunn.  Lindsay and Naomi drove to Springfield, MA on a beautiful snowy day and met Julie-Ann.  
Julie-Ann has really been the glue to this whole project as she herself produced a documentary called We All Benefit - about YRUU and the Youth Office in Boston, MA. She helped lead us to many of the folx you will hear on this podcast.
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Host, Lindsay Caddle LaPointe welcomes you to the new WHY ARE YOU YOU? podcast launching April 1, 2026.
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