James A. Hobart

James A. Hobart has been a Unitarian Universalist minister since his graduation from Meadville Lombard in 1964. During his ministerial career, he has also served Unitarian Universalist congregations in Massachusetts, Ohio, Illinois and Pennsylvania. He participated in the peace movement, civil liberties and anti-oppression activity. During the 1960s and 1970s he was active in the Civil Rights movement in Massachusetts, Alabama, Ohio and Illinois. He has been involved in efforts for affordable housing, a livable income, and integrated quality education. He has served on the boards of the ACLU in Pittsburgh and Colorado.

Since moving to Chicago�s Hyde Park in 2001, Jim has been an adjunct member of the faculty at Meadville Lombard, regularly teaching Unitarian Universalist congregational polity to students preparing for the ministry. He has also served interim ministries in Chicago�s Third Unitarian Church, and a two-year interim ministry at the Beverly Unitarian Church. During 2005-2006, he was the interim Congregational Services Director for the Unitarian Universalist Central Midwest District.

Prior to moving to Chicago in 2001, Jim and his wife, Nan Hobart, lived in Denver, Colorado, where he served the First Unitarian Church of Denver for eighteen years. For ten years, the Hobarts served as co-ministers of that urban congregation. He was active in Unitarian Universalist denominational work, as well as Denver�s and Colorado�s ecumenical, interfaith, social activist and civic life.

Jim was elected to serve two four-year terms on the Unitarian Universalist Association�s (UUA) Board of Trustees. He was appointed as a member of the Ministerial Fellowship Committee, the UUA�s committee that grants ministerial fellowship. He was elected to a six-year term on the UUA�s Commission on Appraisal, which provides independent studies and reports on the Association�s work. He served two years as its chair. He served a term on and chaired the UUA�s Journey Toward Wholeness Transformation Committee, charged with evaluating the effectiveness of the Association�s anti-racism and  anti-oppression efforts. He was appointed to and served one year as a member of the Association�s Openness Implementation Committee, charged to evaluate and make recommendations regarding  accessibility and the availability of information from the Board and its committees.

Jim and Nan Hobart have a blended family of five children. They are proud grandparents of Ezequiel Hobart Adler, who lives with his parents in Denver.

Jim is a native of Alabama. He grew up in the South where his father, Alfred W. Hobart, served Unitarian Universalist congregations in New Orleans, Charleston, South Carolina and Birmingham. The elder Mr. Hobart was a 1928 graduate of the Meadville Theological School. He entered the school in Meadville in 1924, moving with Meadville to Chicago in 1926.