The Reverend Rick Hoyt-McDaniels received a Masters of Divinity from the Claremont School of Theology in 1998 and was ordained and fellowshipped with the Unitarian Universalist Association later that year. For 26 years he has served UU congregations in the greater Los Angeles area. He has served on the Board of the Unitarian Universalist Justice Ministry of California, two terms as the President of the Pacific Southwest chapter of the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association, and co-founded an In Care program to assist new ministers in formation that became the model for the UUMA’s national program, the Ministerial Formation Network. He received the Pacific Southwest District Distinguished Service award in 2011. Currently he serves the Unitarian Universalist Church of Studio City as Interim Minister.
More About Me
I grew up in Santa Monica, California. I attended Santa Monica public schools and played clarinet in the bands and orchestras. After graduating from Santa Monica High School (1980), I attended Santa Monica College and UCLA before receiving a Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in music composition from California Institute of the Arts (1985). After graduation, I worked as a musician and at a bookstore in Hermosa Beach.
From 1987 to 1995 at the height of the AIDS epidemic, I worked for the AIDS Project Los Angeles in their Human Resources Department. During this time I served two terms (4 years) as the staff representative to the APLA Board of Trustees.
In 1991, I began attending the Unitarian Universalist Community Church in Santa Monica. Two successive ministers (Doug Strong and Judith Meyer) encouraged me to consider the ministry as a career. In 1995, I enrolled at the Claremont School of Theology and received a Master of Divinity degree in 1998. While in school I served as an intern minister with the UU Church in Studio City (1996 to 1998), and I completed a Clinical Pastoral Education unit at the UCLA Medical Center (summer, 1997). I was ordained and fellowshipped as a Unitarian Universalist minister in 1998.
My first pastorate was with the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Verdugo Hills in La Crescenta, CA (1998 – 2003). While there, I helped to found a new congregation in the Santa Clarita Valley and worked with them for 10 years (2001 – 2010). Toward the end of my ministry in Santa Clarita, I began to consult with the historic First Unitarian Church in Los Angeles, which grew to a full time settled position (2009 – 2017). That was followed by an interim ministry with the UU Church in Long Beach (2018 – 2020), and then a year as a contract minister with the UU Fellowship in Kern County, Bakersfield (2021 – 2022). In August, 2022, I began an interim ministry with the UU Church in Studio City. At the conclusion of this interim ministry, in June, 2025, I plan to retire.
I live with my husband, Jim Hoyt-McDaniels, in downtown Los Angeles.
