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The Rt. Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, who gained national attention when she directly addressed President Trump during a 2025 prayer service and asked him to have mercy on transgender children and immigrant families, will deliver the Ware Lecture at General Assembly 2026. General Assembly (GA) is the annual meeting of the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA).
The Rt. Rev. Mariann Budde, who will deliver the 2026 Ware Lecture on June 20.
Each year, the UUA president invites a prestigious guest speaker to GA as the Ware Lecturer. Imara Jones, an award-winning journalist and trans rights activist, was the 2025 Ware Lecturer. Previous lecturers also include Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.; Cornel West; Stacy Abrams and Desmond Meade; and Dr. Imani Perry.
The 2026 Ware Lecture will take place on Saturday, June 20, at 8 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. CDT/6 p.m. MDT/5 p.m. PDT. GA studio site registrants may watch the lecture in person at the Galt House Hotel in Louisville, Satellite Sites, and Community Gatherings can watch the livestream together in shared spaces, and fully online registrants can watch live from wherever they are. All registrants will have access to the video on demand when it becomes available.
Budde, an Episcopal prelate and the first woman elected to serve as Bishop of Washington, D.C., spoke at Washington National Cathedral during the National Prayer Service, a traditional gathering of leaders to pray for the nation. Addressing the president, who was in attendance with members of his family and administration, Budde said, “In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country.”
She continued, “The vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors … Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land.”
In a post afterwards on Truth Social, Trump called Budde “nasty in tone” and called the service “very boring and uninspiring.”
Budde was among the hundreds of multifaith clergy who gathered in Minneapolis on January 22 and 23, 2026, after an ICE agent fatally shot Minneapolis resident Renée Nicole Good. MARCH (Multifaith Antiracism, Change & Healing), a pro-queer group of multiracial clergy and faith leaders, put out a call to clergy nationwide to bear witness to Good’s shooting and to the ongoing targeted violence against immigrant communities around the country. Thousands of clergy and others, including Unitarian Universalists, were part of protests there. On January 24, ICE agents fatally shot another Minneapolis resident, Alex Pretti, prompting more protests there and around the country.
In an interview with UU World in Minneapolis on January 22, Budde said, “I am keenly aware that what is happening here is happening across the country … so I feel it is important for us to have a national witness.”
UUs “are here in large numbers relative to your size, and your faith tradition has such a history of commitment to social justice, and that is well represented here,” Budde continued. “I think [UUs] would feel a combination of both heartbreak at what’s happening [and] an incredible sense of honor and pride to be a part of people of faith and goodwill, who are doing lots of things, large and small, to keep the fabric of society woven together.”
General Assembly 2026, Meet the Moment: Together Everywhere, will unfold in two parts with a midweek pause. From Sunday, June 14 to Tuesday, June 16, delegates will engage in fully virtual General Sessions focused on the business of the Association. Programming resumes Friday, June 19 through Sunday, June 21 with worship, featured speakers, and Meet the Moment themed programs that can be experienced online; at the studio site in Louisville, Kentucky; or in participating local congregations.