Richard Frederick Boeke

The Rev. Dr. Richard F. Boeke, a Unitarian Universalist minister and lifelong advocate for peace and interfaith understanding, died on May 25, 2025, in Alexandria, Virginia at the age of 94. His life journey took him from humble beginnings in the American South in the years following the Great Depression, to pulpits and peace forums across the globe as he pursued his calling of forging unity, meaning, and mutual trust among people across cultures and faith traditions.

Born in Atlanta, Georgia during the New Deal era, Richard came from a family of builders. Though his brother went on to construct skyscrapers that still define the skyline of Atlanta, Richard Boeke chose instead to build bridges of understanding among people of different religious beliefs.

After graduating from Yale Divinity School, he was ordained as a Southern Baptist minister and went on to serve as a Chaplain at Pinecastle Air Force Base in Orlando, Florida. He was on duty when a B-47 Bomber crashed, killing four airmen, including the pilot Col Mike McCoy, for whom the base was later renamed before becoming Orlando International Airport.

Richard visited one of the widows that day. Through her anguish, she asked, "Chaplain, my husband wasn't baptized. Do you believe he's going to hell?" Southern Baptist training had provided him with a clear answer. But it was one he realized at that moment he did not believe. "No, I don't," he replied.

It was a crucial experience. At the same time he found the arms race more and more abhorrent. At the base where he was stationed, he witnessed planes loaded with bombs "fifty times the power of Hiroshima," so big the bay doors couldn't fully close. When he left the Air Force chaplaincy, he left the Baptist Church and "resolved to do what I could as a peacemaker and soon found a home with the Unitarian Universalists (UU)."

Richard immersed himself in the big issues of the mid-20th Century at a time of tremendous change and turmoil in the United States and the world. Following a fellowship serving Unitarian congregations in Reno, Nevada, and Chico, California, he was called as minister of the UU church in Flushing, New York. Living in the parsonage with two Kenyan students sponsored by his church, he was disturbed to hear their experience of local barbers refusing to cut their hair. That prompted him to go hear Malcolm X speak at a community church in New York early in 1962. He later wrote of the experience, "While Malcolm X challenged many of my assumptions, as a universalist I continued to embrace integration as the way towards peace."

His daughters have compared their dad to Forrest Gump (Richard's cousin Jim Boeke even had a bit part in the movie). He seemed to always be in the midst of history. He was sprinkled by Pope Pius XII. Met Errol Flynn poolside in Cuba. Was invited for tea with Jomo Kenyatta, Kenya's first president. Let Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh through his gate at the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley. Drove all night to hear MLK Jr's "I have a dream" speech at the March on Washington. Took his new wife to segregated Mississippi during the 1965 voter registration drives. As a NY delegate to the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, his toddler daughter recognized Daddy on TV as he sang "Glory Glory Hallelulah" on stage alongside actor Theodore Bikel.

His life was similarly shaped by a love of travel. An assignment in 1963 to travel to Kenya as a kind of envoy for a student program led to an epic around-the-world adventure with stops in Germany, Greece, Egypt, Kenya, Uganda, Pakistan, India, Thailand, the Philippines, and finally Japan. He established enduring relationships with religious and civic leaders all along the way, including Japan's Dr. Shinichiro Imaoka--a profound influence on the development of progressive and liberal religion, and many others. These relationships were instrumental in bringing in the organizations of Rissho Kosei-Kai and Tsubaki Shinto Shrine as members of the International Association for Religious Freedom (IARF), an organization which was central to Richard's work.

He met his Dutch wife Johanna ("Jopie"), at an IARF conference in The Hague in 1964 and they married in 1965. Daughter Elinore was born in Flushing, NY. Daughter Diana was born just after the family moved to Florida, where Richard was minister of the St. Petersburg UU church. Meanwhile, after taking classes at Harvard where he met many life-long UU friends, Richard received his MA from Columbia University in 1971. The family moved to California in 1973 when Richard was called to be minister of the First Unitarian Church of Berkeley, where he served until 1995. Richard studied and received his Doctorate of Divinity from Pacific School of Religion in 1982.

A hallmark of Richard's ministry was to involve his churches in the world, while also bringing the world outside into the church. He organized musical concerts with world-renowned musicians such as pianist Andre Watts, lectures by prominent speakers including Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling and theologian Howard Thurman. Discussion groups, social action groups, and creative activities blossomed. Noted religion scholars Huston and Kendra Smith were church members and friends. He took his congregations' concerns for civil rights and inter-church and interfaith activities into local, national and international affairs.

After earning a Master of Divinity herself, Richard's wife Johanna officially joined Richard in the ministry and the couple eventually served as co-ministers of the Berkeley church until she accepted an interim ministry in London, England. Richard soon joined her in England, and the couple later settled in Horsham, England, where they lived until 2019, serving several congregations between them as part-time ministers during much of that time. Richard remained active in interfaith work: He was a vice president of the World Congress of Faiths, and one of the founders of the Peace Garden in Horsham. In 2018, he was presented with the IARF's Distinguished Leadership Award in International Liberal Religion.

The couple returned to the U.S. aboard the Queen Mary II in 2019, a journey that ended with Richard airlifted to a hospital (with Jopie lifted right behind him!) in Ireland after a fall on deck during choppy seas-a final adventure, as he liked to say, in a life full of them.

His assortment of regular spiritual practices, which continued for as long as his body and mind would cooperate, was as diverse as his global friendships: from writing a daily poem, to finishing each shower with a cold blast of water, regular visits to a tree friend, and Monday "banana days," where he would have a banana for breakfast and lunch in solidarity with those who hungered--and perhaps as a way to balance the feasting with friends over the weekend. Above all, he loved life, enjoyed the company of people, and lived a life of purpose and generosity. Few who knew him haven't been treated to a meal or received a whimsical or thoughtful gift from him.

At age 93, he worked with one of his daughters to put out a final book, Fideology, a culmination of decades of thought, sprinkled with some of his poems and stories of remarkable personal encounters.

Richard Boeke is survived by his wife of 60 years Johanna Boeke; daughter Elinore Boeke and husband Jeff Ludwig, grandchildren Zachary, Juliana, and Alex Ludwig; and daughter Diana Boeke and husband Amir Abdelmalek.

A global citizen with a deeply creative and curious intellect, Richard touched lives on every continent with his abiding belief in our shared humanity.

Kansha. (A Japanese word often used as a valediction by Richard, that indicates gratitude and thankfulness imbued with a general aura of humbleness and peace.)

Memorial contributions may be made to:

The International Association for Religious Freedom. https://iarf.net/support-us/

Richard Boeke's last book Fideology: Building Trust through the Shared Experience of Faith at the Root of the World's Religions, is available on Amazon as a paperback or Kindle edition. https://a.co/d/gtPvZIJ