Unitarian Universalists dedicate new sanctuary in Mt. Lebanon

More space needed as membership grows

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Members of the Unitarian Universalist Church of the South Hills on Sunday dedicated their new sanctuary and education wing, a project that was decades in the dreaming and years in the planning.

The church, on Washington Road in Mt. Lebanon, had met in the former living room of a mansion called Sunnyhill, which it had acquired in 1971, soon after its founding. But even after one expansion in the 1990s, they found there was never enough space and that some attendees would drop out, frustrated by the tight quarters.

Now it has dedicated a new, purpose-built sanctuary, with a simple pitched wooden ceiling and large windows that flood the room with light.

The $2.6 million project also includes new classrooms and office space.

The gabled facade of the new structure blends with that of the existing mansion, whose rooms are still used for classes and other functions. As the full name of the church is a mouthful, members often informally call their church Sunnyhill.

The church has grown by at least a quarter to 221 members in the past few years, and it especially received a bump after last year’s presidential election, said its pastor, the Rev. Jim Magaw.

That began with a service of vespers held a couple of nights after the election, which drew people who felt “a lot of the values that are important to them and to a lot of Americans had just been left behind,” he said.

Unitarian Universalists are part of a movement dating to the birth of the republic and have always