Partner Church

For information our 2024 trip, click here.

In 1992, Beacon began a partner relationship with the Unitarian Church of Barot, Romania, in the Transylvanian region where organized Unitarian congregations stretch back to 1568.

Beginning after the fall of Communism, Beacon helped the Barot congregation build one of the first new Unitarian sanctuaries in that country since World War II. Our continuing financial contributions fund university scholarships for Unitarian students from Barot, a jobs program for unemployed Barot members and an after-church coffee hour.

In 2008, the Summit choir and friends made a concert tour of Unitarian areas of Transylvania, visiting and performing in Barot over 5 days.

To celebrate 20 years of our partnership, Beacon members, composed of six teenagers and six adults, were invited to participate in a summer trip to Transylvania, forming warm friendships while staying in homes of Barot members. Since 2012, both congregations have visited one another every year.

Our trip, scheduled for August 2020 with youth of the congregation and designated advisors, was postponed due to the pandemic.

Read more below about our Tri-Partnership with the Unitarian Church in Jowai, India, including our trip there in 2023, and our 2024 trip to Romania.

Beacon and Barót Form a Tri-Partnership with Jowai, in Northeast India! Click here to read more.

Updates

• A Tri-Partnership Trip to Transylvania August 6-17 – Want to Join Us?

  The Unitarian Church in Barót is inviting eight members of our Beacon congregation to travel to Transylvania, Romania, this August, for the second in-person meeting of the Barót-Beacon-Jowai Tri-Partnership. Eight members of the Jowai Unitarian Church in North East India will also travel to the gathering, which will last from August 7 to 17, 2024.

  If you are interested in making the trip, come to a meeting on Sunday, February 4, at 12:15 PM in Fellowship Hall. Or get in touch with Rev. Robin (robin@summitbeacon.org) or Partner Church leaders Erik Solberg (esolberg2@gmail.com) and Jean Crichton (jeancrichton@gmail.com).

  Most Beacon members are aware that we have had a partnership with the Unitarian Church in Barót for 32 years. Since 1992, members of the two Unitarian congregation have traveled back and forth between their very different towns – Summit, a New York City suburb, and Barót, a small former coal mining town in a beautifully hilly countryside. Despite the differences, the partnership has resulted in warm hospitality and close friendships.

  In the midst of the pandemic, the Barót church and Beacon began moving into a unique Tri-Partnership with the Unitarian Church in Jowai, in the North East Indian state of Meghalaya. Meeting monthly by Zoom, the Unitarians from three different traditions learned to know one another. In 2021, the three congregations adopted a joint covenant with the hopes that members of the three areas could begin visiting one another to share stories and traditions and to make personal and theological connections.

  Last March, the Unitarians of Jowai hosted four Beacon members and three Barót members at the first in-person meeting of the Tri-Partnership. Individuals from the Jowai church opened their homes and joined the travelers in visiting numerous churches and tourist sites in the steep, beautiful Jaintia Hills.

  Since then, our monthly Zooms have been devoted to planning joint visits to the other two partner congregations. Besides the visit to Barót planned for this summer, the group is already blocking out plans for a meeting in Summit in October 2025.

  Join us on Feb. 4 to find out more about the Tri-Partnership and the trip planned for this August.

• Beacon visits Jowai Unitarian Church in India in March 2023. Read the reflections from the trip.

• Barót Unitarians Discuss Fears Over Ukraine War at Tri-Partnership Zoom. Members of our Partner Church in Barót, Transylvania, revealed some of their fears and concerns about the war in nearby Ukraine during a recent Zoom meeting of Beacon's Tri-Partnership, which combines Unitarian congregations in Barót, Summit and Jowai in north east India. Transylvania is a part of Romania, which shares a 380-mile border with Ukraine. Thousands of Ukrainian refugees have poured into Romania since the war began, though Barót is about 200 miles from the closest major border crossing and has not seen any refugees. Still, Barót members Andrea Bardocz and Melinda Fazakas both expressed anxiety, since no one knows what the future will bring. The Tri-Partnership group also discussed a possible trip to Jowai in September, provided that Covid conditions continue to improve and depending on the war. September is a good month to travel to Jowai, because several major Unitarian events take place in September, including the celebration of the first Unitarian worship service there on September 18, 1887. We discussed routes from Newark and from Bucharest, Romania. New Jersey travelers could fly direct to Delhi and then to Guwahati International Airport, in India's northeast. The route from Bucharest would be via Istanbul or Warsaw to Delhi and then Guwahati. The last 112 miles, from Guwahati to Jowai, would take about four hours by car or bus because of the narrow, winding roads. Air tickets would probably cost about $800-900 per person round trip. For further information, please contact Jean Crichton or Rev. Robin Tanner.

• On February 10, 2022, there was a virtual meeting of representatives of our three partnered congregations: Beacon UU, Barót Unitarian in Transylvania, and Jowai Unitarian in North East India. Included in the discussion were introductions, the possibility of travel among the congregations as the pandemic recedes, and the Barót congregation's search for a new minister.