A note from Rev. EB: this is one short telling of our church’s history. I recognize that no one history is complete: even people who have lived through the same events can tell quite different stories about them. A fuller picture of our church’s history would emerge from hearing many stories, creating something more like a collage or a tapestry than a painting by one artist. I encourage you–us–to tell the stories we know and to receive them, to be curious about what the church has been like for the thousands of people who have shaped and been shaped by this institution.

We are on the unceded territory of the Massachusett people, who have lived in reciprocity with the land for thousands of years. Our church building sits at a junction of roads that were once Indigenous trade and travel routes. First Church’s Puritan ancestors are responsible for the theft of these lands and for cultural and physical violence against Indigenous people. 

The Puritan Third Parish in Roxbury

Ours was the first “church” in Jamaica Plain, founded as a Puritan church before the American Revolution. At that time this land was part of the colonial town of Roxbury; there were already two existing parishes, Second Parish to the west and the original First Parish to the east. On December 31, 1769, the families that would eventually become the founding members of our congregation met in an unfinished building on the site of our current church. After many votes of the two existing parishes in Roxbury, this Parish was incorporated by an act of the Massachusetts Great and General Court on May 8, 1772. We know that at least three of the church founders enslaved people of African descent.

The church building stands on land once owned by Rev. John Eliot (1604-1690), described as the “Apostle to the Indians” by white settler colonists, and a perpetrator of cultural genocide by indigenous scholars. Eliot bequeathed 75 acres to support a school in this area. (This is now the Eliot School.)

Unitarian Church in Jamaica Plain

In 1805 our church was among the first Massachusetts “Standing Order” congregations to be identified as Unitarian and did not split during the Unitarian Controversy.

The church was financially supported by merchants profiting from the unpaid labor of enslaved people and the commodities they produced, including Benjamin Bussey, a sugar, coffee and cotton merchant who was a church member and is buried in our burying ground. (Bussey also left Harvard an estate of $320,000 when he died in 1842.)

Present building erected in 1853

In 1851, upper Roxbury seceded to form the Town of West Roxbury with its downtown in the more populous Jamaica Plain, and in 1853, the wooden church building was replaced by today’s stone church. Boston annexed West Roxbury in 1874, making JP part of Boston proper.

First Congregational Society of Jamaica Plain & First Church in Jamaica Plain, Unitarian Universalist

The congregation was large and active for another hundred years, but during the late 1960′s, it dwindled and for 14 years went without a minister. The pulpit was filled by visiting ministers and students. Then a group of younger people started coming, and by 1983 the congregation of a few old-timers and the newcomers were able to bring in The Reverend Terry Burke.

Rev. Terry Burke was the minister until June of 2014. Under his leadership and in the changing demographics of Jamaica Plain, the church grew in membership and vitality. The old leadership and new membership collaborated to support rapid membership growth in the mid-1980s, including the creation of a thriving Sunday School. Ellen McGuire was the church’s musician for forty years, beginning as organist and continuing as choir director and Music Director. Ellen and Terry were married in 1982 and raised their children at First Church. During this period, the congregation had a reputation as a Christian-leaning UU congregation, with a cross displayed in the Sanctuary and the Lord’s Prayer recited every week. A significant ministry of this time was responding to the AIDS crisis; Terry helped lead an AIDS ministry with services at First Church and other area churches, weekly recognition in our prayers, and assistance to the HIV/AIDS program at the Shattuck Hospital. The church officially became a Welcoming Congregation for gay, lesbian, and bisexual people in 1999. In 2014, Terry resigned due to grave illness; he died in 2015. 

Rev. Tracey Robinson-Harris served as an intentional interim minister for three years, leading the congregation in mourning and careful discernment about its identity and future.

Rev. Elizabeth Bukey Saunter was called as minister in 2017, the congregation’s first settled minister to be female and to be openly queer. In 2022, the congregation led a wildly successful capital campaign to fund urgent repairs to the building, including replacing the slate roof. In 2023, the Board voted to establish the Monument Square Meetinghouse foundation to assist in raising funds for building maintenance and its use for non-religious community activities. In January 2024, the congregation voted to welcome Nehar Shalom Community Synagogue to make 6 Eliot St their home, creating a more permanent partnership in sharing sacred space together.