Unitarian Universalist Community of Charlotte: Recent Episodes
Unitarian Universalist Community of Charlotte
A holiday music special service that includes handbell and choir selections, congregational singing accompanied by brass and seasonal readings.
What purpose does religion serve now? What purpose can it serve? With membership declining and ministerial shortages in every denomination, what will the future of religion and Unitarian Universalism be? What could it be? We’ll explore these questions, and how we might learn from our past, those around us, and the moment we’re in to consider a course for the future of religion.
Life is filled with unexpected episodes- wilderness journeys where we leave the safe and familiar to reach new destinations. On Sunday, November 26, the members of the Interim Minister Transition Team will share reflections on times of transition in their lives and insights they have gained on those journeys.
As we officially welcome new members into the community, this Sunday’s service will explore the importance and meaning of belonging from different perspectives.
This year we are working with the theme "Living Into Relationship: Nurturing Loving Community." This Sunday we'll be considering what it means to be a covenanted community - not historically, but in the present. What are the promises you have made to one another and what skills might you use to nurture your relationships?
One purpose of any Unitarian Universalist congregation is to help its members grow spiritually, but many Unitarian Universalists also struggle with how to understand spirituality and are wary of anything woo woo. This morning, the Rev. Dr. James Kubal-Komoto shares a liberal religious understanding of spirituality and talks about how each of us can become a more spiritual person in 15 minutes a day or less!Bio: The Rev. Dr. James Kubal-Komoto has been the Lead Minister at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Raleigh since 2019. He is the author of the recently published A Liberal Religious Path: A Short, Personal Introduction to Unitarian Universalism, which is now available as a paperback or an e-book. He previously served a congregation in the Seattle suburbs and worked on UUA staff. He currently lives with his wife and teenage son in Cary.
Finding community starts with shared values and a shared history. UUs, Humanists, Freethinkers, and Atheists have so much in common. There are many opportunities for all to grow together and support one another.
Community Sunday Worship will consider the 2023-24 annual theme, Living into Relationship: Nurturing Loving Community. When we talk about “living into” things, we mean that we give more than a nod to them. When we live into them, we engage with them fully, including wrestling with the uncomfortable parts. The origins of “relationship” tell us that we are creating or shaping connections. So, living into relationship is engaging fully with our creation or shaping of connections. From this space, living into relationship with intention will lead to nurturing loving community.
UUCC's vision calls us to personal, societal, and environmental transformation - that means that a primary reason we gather in this religious community is to engage in our own spiritual development and self-actualization. Religious education, or faith development, isn't just what we teach our children. It's how we learn and grow as Unitarian Universalists - it is what we teach to all ages and stages. In times of transition, one of the important tasks is to renew our understanding of how we accomplish our mission and vision - and get clear on the tools we have at our disposal to do so.
Are you in touch with your generation? Other generations? When we gather on Sundays (without children or youth) we typically still have at least FOUR different generations in the room. Come join Paula Gribble, Director of Lifespan Religious Education, for this engaging service. We will explore not only the characteristics of different generations but also what brings them into our community.
Ingathering, or water communion, is an end-of-the-summer tradition in many Unitarian Universalist congregations as we prepare for the beginning of the new church year and the start of school. Come one, come all – all are welcome to participate in this multigenerational ritual engaging our minds, bodies, and hearts. Like rivers that run to the sea, each of us holds our own cup but in community, our waters are intermingled and together we are stronger than we are alone. Bring a little bit of water with you, or we’ll have plenty to share. Featuring music from the summer choir.
Respect one another, support one another, bring your gift to the world and receive the gifts of others, and there will be enough for all. ~ by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Many people have long lamented the constant and frantic pace of life in the United States. Wistfully, we wish for things like adequate bereavement and parental leave. Valiantly, we struggle to keep our work and family life balanced and are admonished to leave more time for self-care. In an age when technology leaves few places unreachable by wifi or cellular service, everything can be presented as urgent. Nicole Hersey, the Nap Bishop, calls us to consider that true rest is more than simply taking a nap, that human beings do not exist simply to produce, and that grind culture is harming us all. The usual solutions presented put the responsibility on the individual, when, in fact, the way out of this figurative hamster wheel may just lie in our communities. Bass soloist George Washington III sings selections by Vaughan Williams with John Herrick accompanying on piano.
Don’t miss this Sunday’s welcome extravaganza for Director of Lifespan Religious Education Paula Gribble. We’ll begin with a multigenerational service in which we reflect on roller coasters, think about what it means to make a home, sing together, and more.
As Unitarian Universalists, we belong to a vibrant state-wide movement for justice, united by the belief that a new North Carolina is possible. Our state currently faces an onslaught of attacks on our democracy, LGBTQ rights, abortion access, public education and more. This Sunday, we will explore how the moon offers us wisdom into the courage, faith, and joy that we are called to in this moment.
Bio: Rev. Lisa Garcia-Sampson serves as the Executive Director of UU Justice NC, The Unitarian Universalist Justice Ministry of North Carolina. In this role, she has the pleasure of working with over two dozen UU congregations across the state on a range of intersectional justice issues.
Most psychologists will tell you that resilience or grit or perseverance is one of the strongest skills you can have. But what does it mean to be a resilient person, a resilient congregation, or a resilient movement? Join us this Sunday as our guest speaker, William Williamson explores how in order to be more resilient, Unitarian Universalism should be more inefficient!
Members of the Worship Team will lead our July 16, Community Sunday service. The 10 a.m. shortened service, will affirm the gift of being together in community and precede several session offerings for all ages...
As Unitarian Universalists, we are called to be the weavers of a Multiracial Tapestry of Accountability. To be such weavers takes courage. Join us as we explore how being the weavers of such a tapestry might transform our faith, community, and ourselves. Where might we still need some work, and where might we find the courage to continue the work? Join us as we explore this path together.
One of the UUCC’s goals, as it appears in our first Ends statement, is to be a community of people who are deeply connected to each other, and where people are heard, included, and respected. Members of the Membership Team will explore the all-important opportunity of helping guests, visitors, and members feel more welcome and included in our community. Join us on Sunday to learn more about how each of us can contribute to a welcoming atmosphere. Our special musical guest is award-winning ragtime/jazz pianist Ethan Uslan.
It is a tradition here at UUCC to dedicate our children and celebrate their bridging to adulthood in the same service at the end of the congregational year. Both important rites of passage in Unitarian Universalist congregations, these two rituals bookend the time our children and youth spend among us learning and growing.
This Sunday we’ll explore one of Unitarian Universalism’s superpowers. Human beings are conditioned to think in binaries - that most every issue can be reduced to an either-or. Male and female, winner or loser, oppressed or oppressor. As UUs who accept a broad range of disparate beliefs and theological positions, we have lots of practice accepting complexity and paradox.
This Sunday, please bring a flower - from your garden, one you found growing wild, or store-bought - to share as part of our communal bouquet. UUCC will join UU congregations across the country as we honor the Centennial of the Flower Ceremony originally created by Rev. Norbert Čapek. On June 4, 1923, Rev. Čapek created this ritual and shared it with his burgeoning Unitarian congregation in what was then the brand-new country of Czechoslovakia as a reminder of the hope found in community after the devastation of war. We will also honor the service of UUCC's many dedicated volunteers.
In the Christian tradition, Pentecost marks the moment when the Holy Spirit came down “like tongues of fire” and was revealed to many people, when previously it had only been known to the 12 disciples. A small fire sits at the center of our flaming chalice symbol and is an elemental representation of commitment and transformation. What can we learn from the intangibles of “spirit” and “fire”? And how might we invite transformative power into our own lives?
Gopal Dayeni, climate justice organizer, passed on the wisdom that 'what the hands do the heart learns'- suggesting the imperative to put our values into our bodies. When it comes to earthcare ourselves and our communities, we are so intricately linked. We have worth and dignity which means so does the Earth! But what does that mean in our bodies?
Mother’s Day is a time to celebrate those who nurture, while we also acknowledge the varied experiences of being and having mothers. Whether your mothering relationships are close or challenging, there is room for you at this service. Whether your experience of being a mother is fulfilling or unrealized, there is room for you at this service. Join together in a supportive environment on this holiday full of varied experiences and complicated feelings. Musical guests Kinsey Fournier and Daniel Martinec on clarinet will play works by Valerie Coleman, Copland, Gordon Goodwin, and Mozart.
Poets challenge and inspire us with prophetic words that bear witness to humanity's joys and sorrows, their works often suggesting paths to living fuller and more compassionate lives. Our UUCC musicians celebrate these "prophets and saints" in this special Music Sunday service, lifting up the voices of Wendel Barry, Ariana Brown, Emily Dickinson, Eve L. Ewing, Amanda Gorman, Jordan Jace and Walt Whitman. The Rev. Lisa Bovee-Kemper, Director of Member Relations Kelly Greene, and Director of Music John Herrick are joined by the Adult Choir, Collaborative Pianist Kaarin Record and UUCC instrumentalists Dale Allen, Kathy Allen, John Burns, Tristan Burns, Ben Schomp, Charlie Schomp and Paul Wilson.
This multigenerational worship service celebrates the UUCC’s past, present, and future.
James Luther Adams advocated “radical laicism,” a term he coined to express the responsibility of all persons—not clerics only—for the religious community. This idea of the priesthood of all believers is central to who we are as Unitarian Universalists. Here at UUCC, we are gathered to enact and serve the mission of this community, created and voted on democratically by the congregation. Professional clergy, staff, and laypeople all have different skills and expertise to contribute. Ultimately, the mission of the congregation belongs to you. What might it look and feel like to share the work of this community in new and different ways?
This Community Sunday, the UUCC GreenFaith Circle will lead the opening service to honor our Mother Earth in community.
This Sunday, we'll engage the story of Jesus' death and resurrection from a Unitarian Universalist perspective.
The book Deep Survival by Laurence Gonzales explores why some people survive trauma and crisis and others don’t. So many people live in ongoing crisis, and the role of spiritual community is to support life and wholeness. What can we learn from the science of survival, and how does it dovetail with our spiritual lives?
Our middle school youth will share their words and talents with our community—on the challenges they face, where they find joy and hope, and how adults can support them in building the world we all want to live in.
On this Sunday, we focus on imagination, creativity, and the many pathways that bright ideas open up. Did you ever have a very bright idea, one that started to ignite inside of you? Sometimes ideas grow brighter and brighter, others join in collaboration, and off you all go! We will highlight Emilio's Very Bright Idea, a story for all ages that benefits No Child Goes Hungry (www.nochildgoeshungry.net).
Poet Laureate of Rock Hill Angelo Geter (www.angelogeter.com) performs recent works with lay leaders Rebekah Visco and Kelly Greene. As a nod to Women’s History Month, the service will pay tribute to the resilient women in our lives and throughout history. Music by the Adult Choir, Sheila Lay, Kaarin Record, and John Herrick.
Part of our spiritual task as Unitarian Universalists in congregations is to come together, to bring together ignored parts of ourselves, and live into the reality that all are connected on this interdependent web of life. This Sunday, we look at the practice of relationship building and solidarity as a way for us to fulfill this task of becoming whole together.
Mystics and Prophets usually spend time in the wilderness - either by choice or because they are forced by circumstance. What can we learn from their experiences?
The Greeks had four types of love (or was it seven? No, eight?). The Bible tells us of three (spoiler alert, they're based on what the Greeks said!) and so does Howard Thurman. There are five love languages. Buddhism also suggests five types of love. Dr. Cornel West connects love with justice - as does Otis Moss, III. We probably won't identify a definitive answer this Sunday, but we will certainly explore some of the many possibilities.
The fourth principle speaks of a "free and responsible search for meaning," but we don't often talk much about how to actually go about the search. Methodist John Wesley's teachings provide an intriguing entry point for this conversation.
In order to know where we are going, we must start with where we came from. Join speakers Gwynne Movius, Will Schropp, Loyd Dillon and Tom Nunnenkamp, on a tour of significant events and people in the history of this community. We'll also be welcoming new members into the community.
When we find ourselves facing adversity, there are many different ways to respond. And when organizations face times of change, the same is true. Different kinds of change require different strategies and solutions. This Sunday at 10 a.m. we'll explore stories of adaptation and consider how to engage changes in our own lives with equanimity and curiosity.
This Sunday, we will honor the legacy of modern prophet Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr as we reflect on the state of the world today. Join in this multigenerational service which is not simply a history lesson but a remembering of history for the specific purpose of renewing our personal commitments to working for Justice.
Join Rev. Lisa, Director of Music John Herrick, and Lay Service Leaders Laura Hamilton and Shelagh Gallagher for a service of festive holiday music, congregational singing, and seasonal readings. Musical offerings will feature the Adult Choir, Women's Vocal Ensemble, Handbell Ensemble, and Brass Trio.
Our religious pluralism means that Unitarian Universalists hold many different beliefs and understandings of the sacred, and we sometimes get tripped up by words whose meaning we don’t know or agree on. Good thing we all have a Universal Translator we can use to help out! With special music from Jessica Borgnis, Harley Quinn, and Eric Wilhelm.
The winter holidays can be particularly challenging when you or your family are experiencing grief due to a recent loss, or to the anniversary of a loss. This meditative service will provide an opportunity to honor the complexity of grief at the holidays. Whether you are experiencing grief or not, let us come together and hold for one another a circle of caring that makes room for all of us to be present and find connection.
Members of the UUCC Worship Team share readings and reflections on gratitude. Special music by guest violinist Sabu Yamamoto and Director of Music John Herrick.
Many of us find inspiration, calm and connection in nature, but aren't able to fully access the natural world in our day-to-day lives. This Sunday we explore what it means to be connected to place and consider ways to increase our personal awareness and connections.
This Sunday, we will create a community altar during this special multigenerational service in which we will remember our dead. There will also be special music from the Adult Choir and a ritual of remembrance.
Last Sunday we learned about the 1961 consolidation - the creation of the Unitarian Universalist Association we are a part of today. This Sunday, we'll learn about the Principles, Purposes, and Sources of our living tradition, central statements in our denomination.
In 1961, the American Unitarian Association and the Universalist Church of America joined together and became the Unitarian Universalist Association. It was not an impulsive decision. It was a significant moment in our collective history, one event on the historical timeline leading to our current time and place. This Sunday we will consider some of the main threads of belief and values that have remained constant and will carry us forward into the future.
At Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, our Jewish siblings blow the shofar, a trumpet made from a ram's horn, as part of their religious observance. Historically blown on every new moon, on important occasions, and as a call to battle, its role is now more ceremonial and symbolic. The shofar is a crying voice, an announcement, a praise, a call to attention. What are the multiple shofar sounds calling us to imagine for our shared work in repair of the world? What are the things we each can do, here and now, in our own little places in a world of others?
Last week's exploration of the history and practice of covenant is only one part of the picture. The relational promises that undergird our Unitarian Universalist community are maintained and repaired when we practice accountability. But what does true accountability mean, and how does it apply to a religious community?
At the age of seven, Barbara learned she was born into religious conflict. Today, she can admit she is a nontheist with an interest in comparative religion. A member of UUCC since moving to Charlotte in 2016, she’s been involved with Senior Connections (now Seniors Share), coffee service and the Covenant of Right Relations drafting team. She’s been a member of four UU congregations across the country and has gone through several interim ministerial periods – all for the good.
Unitarian Universalism is a covenantal tradition rather than a creedal one, which means that we are held together not by our beliefs but by our relationships. A covenant is a promise and a practice, a living document, and an invitation to participate. As UUCC is in the final stages of implementing our covenant of right relations, being in covenant is a concept that we all must learn and practice.
There are many ways to work for justice, equity, and compassion in our world, not just one role to play. Here is one model for how to frame and engage in the work. Special musical guest Emma's Revolution will add their voices to the conversation.
Now that school has started and the pumpkin spice displays are out, we gather this Sunday to begin a new congregational year. UUCC’s mission statement invites us to cultivate courageous connections. Consider the meaning of this phrase and how it fits into the work we are called to do together.
UUCC members reflect on the many ways this community has impacted and changed their lives.
Ingathering, or water communion, is an end-of-the-summer tradition in many Unitarian Universalist congregations as we prepare for the beginning of the new church year. Come one, come all – all ages are included in this multigenerational ritual honoring journeys of the mind, body, and heart. Bring a little bit of water with you, or we’ll have enough to share. Featuring music by the Katz/Greene Family!
Rev. Lisa and Melissa Vullo explore the principles of emergent strategy, the creative complexity of the natural world, and new ways to think about organizing and gathering in community.
This week, Rev. Lisa and Lay Service Leader Megan Van Fleet explore some of the nuts and bolts of the interim process.
This Sunday marks the beginning of the interim period. Rev. Lisa will share her reflections on being present to new beginnings as we begin to get acquainted with one another.
So often I have come before you with one reminder and another about life’s transience. On this day, the truth about impermanence will have a particularly personal meaning on a day when I will bid you my final farewell as your minister. ~ Jay Toward the conclusion of this Sunday’s service, we’ll be invited to affirm: Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime; Therefore, we are saved by hope. Then, we’ll attest: Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; Therefore, we are saved by love. And so it ends (and continues) . . . with hope and love.
Over the years, our minister, Jay Leach, has been joined by his wife, Melissa, in a series of services they have called “A Poetic Celebration of . . .” For Jay’s penultimate service, they’ll be together one last time, this time offering “A Poetic Celebration of Endings.” It will be an opportunity for them to acknowledge both their impending departure from our community and their collective deep gratitude for their many years together here.
As he has done so many times over these years, one final time Minister, Jay Leach offers the reminder that everyone we meet is carrying some kind of burden—often unseen, frequently unmentioned—and yet profoundly difficult. He celebrates one of his primary learnings from decades of ministry: we are a remarkably resilient species. And he invites us one more time to allow the awareness of these challenges to inspire us toward gentleness with one another.
On this July 4th weekend, minister, Jay Leach offers a deeply personal story, one that has served to remind him of the immense complexities in his own history and in our national history. It offers an opportunity to explore what it means to face contradictions and hypocrisies within each of us and among all of us.
Growing up in a faith that encourages me to find my own truth, I have searched through a number of sources to try to define that truth. I found solace in philosophy and moral/ethical ideas of the past, including ideology, world views, personal intuition, and experiences. Reconciling these sometimes contradictory ideas formed how I view and process the world. Arbitrating between conclusions based on intuition and instincts and conclusions based on sound logic and presuppositions has been at the foundation of my truth. This process has helped me believe and accept some long-accepted beliefs.
Celebrate Juneteenth with UUCC! Join service leaders Jolena James-Szanton, Kelly Greene and Jay Leach, along with dynamic guest singer Catrina Reese. Hear why this traditional African American holiday is a time for honoring ancestors, committing to liberation and celebrating Black Joy. Whether Juneteenth has been part of your tradition for years or if this will be your first Juneteenth experience, we invite you to this joyous celebration
This special Music Sunday service draws inspiration from the Langston Hughes poems “The Dream Keeper” and “I Dream a World.”
After the regrettable hiatus of these past two years, with our return to in-person services we are able to celebrate our graduating high school seniors as a gathered community again. We’ll hear reflections from three of them, will have the opportunity to commemorate their journeys to this point and will express our support as their lives continue unfolding in the service on this Sunday.
You’re invited to join in an opportunity . . . to tell the truth . . . to experience relief . . .
This month’s Credo presentation is by Rich Greene on May 22. He warns: There will be music. There will be the Mandelbrot Set. There will be Humanism. There will be Carbon Fee and Dividend. Rich was raised in a liberal Presbyterian church but sang in the Episcopal choir. This had a profound effect on his theological development. He will also discuss the problem of compartmentalization of the religious words while singing the great music of the past.
On May 15, the participants in the 2021-22 Coming of Age program shared their personal credos during an evening celebration.
In our gathering for this Sunday’s service, we’ll include Maya Angelou, Béla Bartók, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Mary Oliver, Buffy Sainte-Marie, and Pete Seeger along with the late Palestinian poet Taha Muhammed Ali, a traditional Buddhist meditation and a particular focus on the German artist Franz Marc (1880 – 1916).
Dr. Christena Cleveland invites us to explore “ . . . who is sacred and what is profane . . .” In this Sunday’s service, we’ll accept her invitation, seeing, hearing about, reflecting on the many ways we humans have imagined (imagined!) the Divine. It will offer us yet another reminder that religion has much more in common with art and poetry than with history and science.
When we look back over our life to reflect on experiences in our past, we often find that significant endings in our life turned out to be the seedbeds of meaningful new beginnings-- a new learning or relationship or opportunity we would not have had otherwise.
This Sunday, as Minister Eve Stevens’ time with us comes to a close, she’ll join Lay Service Leaders, Chip Dickerson, Tom Nunnenkamp and Melissa Schropp in a farewell service that explores the unfolding gifts often hidden in goodbyes.
Meaningful struggles take time. Whether it’s the struggle to grow personally, to pull ourselves out of unhealthy, damaging and deeply ingrained patterns or the collective struggle of dismantling the oppressions created and fortified by the dominant culture. Meaningful struggles take time. Author and teacher, Alex Elle suggests that if we are going to sustain ourselves through the meaningful struggles long enough to experience growth, new life and new possibilities, we have to learn when and how to take care of ourselves. This Sunday, we explore the complexities of how to “…pour into others and not be depleted…”
Our presenter for April will be Sage Brook, who has been attending the UUCC since 1993. Church has always been an important part of her life and was the biggest influence on her to reach out in service to others, especially those who needed help. As a teen, she taught Sunday School, sang in the choir, was a youth group leader, and even considered a career in ministry. She attended college determined to work with young children, especially teaching in an impoverished area. But after the birth of her 3 children, she discovered her “real” passion – nurse-midwifery. For 35 years she devoted her time and energy to empowering young women to be their “best selves.” Now her life seems to be taking a new direction. Being a midwife to senior citizens through volunteering with Charlotte Village Network, and volunteering with Congregational Care at UUCC have introduced a new commitment to her life. Helping men and women in the last years of their lives has brought her new life. She gets to hear life stories as she transports folks to medical, hair, and nail appointments, grocery shopping, social gatherings and inviting people into her home to play games together. Attending births as well as attending deaths have been spiritual experiences for her. Come on April 24 at 10:30 in the Bernstein room to hear more about how Sage’s work has brought her spiritual development.
On a Sunday when, with greater intention, we attend to spiritual stories that are sources for our own liberating religion, we’ll listen for and hear again that same truth embedded in each mythic tale: “let go.”
On a Sunday marked as the beginning of “Holy Week” for our Christian family members and friends, we’ll consider Forrest Church’s “dual reality,” acknowledging our individual and collective awareness of our mortality. But the tone of this service will not be somber or morose. We’ll begin celebrating our opportunity to gather and will conclude with our own version of Claribel Alegría’s resolve, enjoying the moments we have together.
In these thirty-minute sessions, the presenters share their spiritual journey and speak about what they give their hearts to. Gwynne Movius joined the UUCC in early 1992, along with her husband and daughter, and has been an active participant ever since. Having grown up unchurched, however, there is a story behind how she found her spiritual home when she wasn’t necessarily looking for one. Her journey to the UUCC began in her hometown of Berkeley, CA, in the 1950s and ’60s, with a number of interim stops before arriving in Charlotte, NC, in 1975.
Aided by the presence and energy of our UUCC House Band—live in our Sanctuary at last!—we’ll consider both the gift and the challenge of our commitment to trust experience. And while that will be the topic for this upcoming Sunday, the real intention for this time will be to offer . . . an experience, one we’ll create together by our presence.
This Sunday’s service will not deny the realities of what we’ve experienced. It will not ask us simply to forget and move on. Rather, it will offer us the opportunity to acknowledge the pain we have felt and the pain we still feel and will invite each of us to those experiences able to make us “whole” again, to be . . . “healed.”
In celebration of International Women’s Day, we’ll hear excerpts of powerful letters written by women and explore how their message resonates today.
This Sunday we welcome back to our Sanctuary the celebrated Ocie Davis Trio—Troy Conn, Guitar, Ron Brendle, Bass and Ocie Davis, Drums along with special guest, newly-arrived jazz Vocalist Lauren Munsterman. In conjunction with their return, the service will invite us to consider what it means to live an improvised life. Ocie Davis will not only contribute music but will share with us what is going on when he and his trio (and, of course, other jazz musicians) are improvising.
In these thirty-minute sessions, the presenters share their spiritual journey and speak about what they give their hearts to. Our Credo presenter on February 27 is Jane Kusterer. She has been a member here since 2008, and during these past years has performed in the Follies, worked with Room at the Inn, and Discovery Groups. Most recently, she served on the Congregational Care Team for several years and loved that experience. Before COVID hit, Jane started an affinity group whose members perform Cold readings of plays, and it continues even now via zoom. In her Credo presentation, Jane will share her passion for stories, games, music and theater, and she hopes many folks will join in the fun!
Educator and researcher, Pauline Boss coined the term “ambiguous loss” in the 1970s. Ambiguous loss applies to situations when we experience something for which our society has not traditionally had words or frameworks to help us express or process our grief. Examples that Boss gives include, when a child goes into foster care or someone starts a life in another country, there are not established and widely recognized rituals for acknowledging and honoring what they have lost or their grief.
This Sunday’s service looks at racial justice through the lens of ambiguous loss. In the wake of oppression from the dominant white culture, people who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color weather daily personal losses as well as communal and generational loss.
While complete closure eludes us after profound loss, acknowledging and honoring grief in community helps us heal, make meaning and move forward with cause for hope.
Minister, Eve Stevens and Lay Service Leader, Sheila Lay will offer reflections while a quintette, Director of Music, John Herrick and guest musician, Sabu Yamamoto offer warm and comforting musical selections.
We can each draw on experiences we’ve had of loving others and feeling loved. It is our loving relationships that help us feel seen, heard, valued and resilient. Author and activist, bell hooks, celebrates our ability as human beings to channel love toward one another, creating a vital and sustaining sense of connection and belonging in our lives.
hooks calls us to consider love from another perspective as well. She argues that we need not feel personal affection or passion toward others in order to ground our thoughts and actions in love’s inherent values, among them “care, commitment, knowledge, responsibility, respect, and trust.”
This service will explore hooks’ notion of a “love ethic” and invite us to expand the power of our love out beyond our beloveds and into the greater web of life.
We are barraged with messages—external and internal—about “velocity,” about how fast or slow things should be done/we should be moving/others should respond/etc. We bemoan things that don’t happen quickly enough while decrying the pressure to produce something quickly. We’re frustrated with personal awareness that we are “slowing down” and frustrated too with some changes that seem to happen far too quickly. (There’s even the old George Carlin quip: “Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?”)
In this Sunday’s service, our minister, Jay Leach, and Lay Service Leader Jolena James-Szanton will reflect on the admixture of all of these messages about “velocity.” In part they’ll remind us that not all messages are heard the same way by everyone and will point up how history and culture have had different expectations about “velocity” for different people.
Interwoven through this service, John Herrick will offer a lovely composition by Beethoven that will itself demonstrate a variance in “velocity,” a theme offered with varying aspects of complexity and tempo.
Many thanks to all who are making and keeping generous pledges to our shared community. It is your generosity that makes what we offer possible.
We are increasingly aware of the ways that white supremacy culture and patriarchy, for example, have shaped how our cities and neighborhoods were planned and built, how our prison system is maintained, and what material does or does not make it into our schools’ textbooks.
The deeper we bring ourselves into the work of dismantling oppression, the more we realize that the ideals and norms of the dominant culture have shaped our interior lives as well as our external lives.
As part of our ongoing quest toward spiritual and societal transformation, this Sunday’s service will take stock of the ways that our imaginations have been shaped by the dominant culture while celebrating those seeking to decolonize the sacred space within each of us that allows us to imagine what’s possible.
Join Minister Eve Stevens, Lay Service Leader, Joe Hoff along with music from our Director of Music, John Herrick, our own Mike Raible and two of our talented High School youth.
We are struggling to find our ways through days during which we are barraged by stories of people behaving badly. We hear regular accounts of those who have abandoned any standard of truth as they echo such utterly absurd assertions. We see frequent reports of individuals, groups and whole nations resorting to savage forms of violence. Selfishness and self-centeredness seem to guide so many personal and collective decisions while denial and magical thinking imperil the health and wellbeing of others.
Under this unrelenting barrage, we sometimes forget that . . . this is not the whole story. In fact, it is not even the assessment worth our most concerted attention.
This Sunday’s service will serve to remind us that, for all of our failures and foibles, we are a remarkable species. Nowhere is that more evident or obvious than in the ways human grandeur gets expressed through scientific pursuits.
So, we’ll celebrate: celebrate science and scientists and the utterly remarkable ways we humans continue to search and find, explore and learn, correct and revise and discover anew.
We’ll be treated to some wonderful music, hear from Lay Service Leaders Vivian Brenner and Dick Kistler and remind ourselves not to overlook some really good news.
In these thirty-minute sessions, the presenters share their spiritual journey and speak about what they give their hearts to. Our Credo presenter was Rita Heath-Singer on January 23. Rita has been an active member of the UUCC since 1988. Since Rita was raised Catholic and from Buffalo, NY, and her late husband, John Singer was from NYC and raised Jewish, the UUCC felt like the perfect fit for them. Their daughter, Samantha Singer grew up in the community and is a first-generation UU. Rita has participated greatly in the life of this community over the years. Her biggest honor has been receiving the 2019 Sybil Bernstein Cup for Outstanding Generosity and Service to the UUCC. She helped to establish the Congregational Care Committee, served on the UUCC Board, and has done both teaching and mentoring in CYRE. She has led our Hiking Group since 2003. She will talk about her spiritual journey and why the UUCC is and will always be HOME for her!
Many artists and composers have written about the act of creation, providing insight into their process and the lows and highs of wrestling something into existence that wasn’t there before.
The act of making something new requires an initial leap of courage, whether we are making a work of art, starting a relationship, or building a life in a new city.
The fear of not knowing how a new endeavor will turn out or fear of what people will think of our final product sometimes keeps us from even attempting to cross the threshold of beginning that new routine, commitment, or memoir for a long time.
On Sunday, Minister, Eve Stevens and Lay Service Leader, Helen Fowler will celebrate the ways humans continue to find the courage to create accompanied by original compositions by some of our congregation’s beloved musicians.
Hope? Really? In this dystopian age? With the planet in peril, the pandemic so pernicious and the political scene plagued by a plethora of problems? What would it mean to have hope in the here and now?
Whether or not we figure that out in the course of but an hour on a Sunday morning in a sanctuary and through a livestream, we’ll give it our best shot aided by a soundtrack sure to set our toes tapping. We welcome The Carport Band, featuring our own Lisa Lackey, guitar and vocals with Parker Foley, bass, Tom Hanchett, fiddle and Diana Wade, guitar and vocals.