August 5, 2018
Beloved Conversations – Moving from Lament to Intention to Commitment – Beloved Conversations is a program developed by the Fahs Collaborative of Meadville Lombard Theological School. Three groups of UCE members have participated in this transformative experience. Beloved Conversations are designed to transcend politeness and civility and to build true Beloved Community through loving, honest, and brave dialogue. By engaging in these conversations, we recognize that every conversation between two people is a cross-cultural conversation and we commit to the challenging work of growing a thriving multicultural community of faith. Join us this Sunday to hear about Beloved Conversations within our church and our movement.
Rev. Eileen and members of Beloved Conversations will lead the service.
Spirit Map Congregational Survey Update
An Update on the Spirit Map Survey
Thanks to everyone who participated in our Spirit Map survey last spring. We now have a report that summarizes the results and you can read it yourself to learn more. The survey offers us insights about what our members view as their spiritual strengths and possible areas of improvement as well as an evaluation of experiences here at UCE.
The Board wanted to gauge how members feel UCE is doing with attaining our Ends. These Ends statements are guiding principles that help us remember who we would like to be in the world and the impact that we’d like to have in our community. The majority of respondents felt that we are doing quite well working toward our Ends. The End that received the highest rating was: We act for peace and for social, economic, and environmental justice through study, advocacy and outreach. The End that in most people’s minds could use a little more attention is this: We are a people of diverse beliefs united in covenant. We develop relationships that open us to the lives of people in our congregation, community and world. Please feel free to read more about members’ assessments of the Ends in the report, starting on p. 54.
Another aspect of the report summarizes how respondents reacted to several statements about their spiritual well-being. Of 44 possible statements that were rated, our congregants valued these statements very highly and felt that they were doing well at them:
- I act with integrity.
- I seek opportunities to learn and grow.
- I believe it matters what I do.
- I take responsibility for the consequences of my actions, even those that are unintended.
- I act in an authentic manner.
These are called “signature strengths” by the consulting group that created the survey and they help to describe our congregation’s spiritual identity or who we are at our core.
These strengths are contrasted with the following Key Opportunities. Key Opportunities are statements that we also value very highly, but ones where we indicate there’s room for improvement:
- I make good decisions about when to act.
- I have a clear purpose to my life and am able to articulate that purpose to both myself and others.
- I see beauty all around me.
- I am able to adapt when things do no turn out the way I want.
- I delight in experiences both great and small.
- I give to others fully and generously.
The consultants share that some churches have taken these insights and used them to enhance programming or to guide strategic planning. These insights can help us as we engage in broader conversations within the church about who we are and who we want to be. Board members and staff will be reading through the report and trying to make sense of what it might mean for us at UCE. We’ll be discussing this at our board retreat in August, but also throughout the year. Our new interim minister may also find ideas that are helpful as he gets to know us better. We encourage you to spend some time with this rich resource to see if it sparks any ideas for you. Many thanks to the anonymous donor who sponsored the survey.
Jeanne Kerl
she/her/hers
July 29, 2018
Considering the Unimaginable
Crisis situations are all around us. How can we engage the realities of disasters and traumas without being overwhelmed by them? This sermon will address this question as well as how the UU Trauma Response Ministry supports congregations in the aftermath of critical incidents.
Rev. Julie Taylor specialized in critical incident response, trauma and disaster spiritual care. A Unitarian Universalist community minister in final fellowship, Julie serves as the president of the UU Trauma Response Ministry, chaplain with the New York Air National Guard and is the Senior Director of Contextual Ministry at Meadville Lombard Theological School.
Our Worship Leader will be Rev. Julie Taylor and our Worship Associate will be Alice Swan.
Rev. Julie Taylor specialized in critical incident response, trauma and disaster spiritual care. A Unitarian Universalist community minister in final fellowship, Julie serves as the president of the UU Trauma Response Ministry, chaplain with the New York Air National Guard and is the Senior Director of Contextual Ministry at Meadville Lombard Theological School.
Our Worship Leader will be Rev. Julie Taylor and our Worship Associate will be Alice Swan.
Organized for What?
Lately I’ve found myself in several different conversations where folks have begged off of coming to church because they don’t believe in “organized religion.” I’ve laughed and shrugged this off with a line I’ve heard since childhood – that Unitarian Universalism is “disorganized religion.” Pretty good joke. I’ve certainly been to my share of committee and congregational meetings where this appears to be the case. Sometimes it seems like it takes forever for us to get on the same page because, perhaps, we haven’t even been looking at the same book. It brings to mind a joke wherein some UU newlyweds go on their honeymoon, and the groom discovers that the bridal nightgown has been made with 40 yards of fabric, the punchline being: “for UUs, the joy is in the search.” Unitarian Universalism isn’t about coloring in the lines, or painting by numbers – it’s about finding your own way, your own truth, choosing your own palette and canvas of understanding and spiritual practice. Our principles are straightforward in utterance, but highly complex in practice. There is a great deal in our search for truth and meaning that cannot be considered organized.
That said, the months of June and July have taken me for the first time first to UU General Assembly (GA) in Kansas City, MO, and then to the Midwest UU Summer Assembly (MUUSA) in Potosi, MO, where UUs did actually manage to gather in large numbers, hold manageable conversations about policy and practice, hold one another both in love and accountability, worship together, make music and art together, and workshop new ideas together. It feels like a bit of a confession to say it, but the truth is, this was a beautiful thing to see. We managed everything from basics, like registrations and nametags and mic times, to bigger challenges, like ombuds reports and covenantal relations management and harassment interventions and protest marches. We were, undeniably, organized – and I was honestly proud to see it. Indeed, a seed was planted in me, and I began to consider: why do we see it as a good thing for our unions or activist groups to be organized, but not our religious denomination?
In his lecture series, published as Varieties of Religious Experience in 1902, American philosopher and psychologist William James was an early distinguisher between what he called personal and institutional religion, the latter being what we have come to call organized religion. James asserts that institutional religion has the divinity most in mind, while personal religion is focused on “man’s . . . conscience, his deserts, his helplessness, his incompleteness.” James is not himself interested in discussing institutional or organized religion, in its focus on “dispositions of the deity” and other clerical and theological matters. For James, all of this is suspect, in comparison with religion that springs from the individual heart. But what if one’s institutional religion were designed and implemented to support each person in that inward, individual discernment – perhaps of a deity within, perhaps of what else might matter to one in place of a deity? Maybe of one’s more direct relationship with or place in the cosmos? What if one’s religion was organized, not as a way to foment a single idea about the deity, or the divine, or the cosmos, but to support one’s exploration of these? What impact would this have on James’s perception of personal and institutional religion as distinct and separate – one suspect, the other worthy of consideration and exploration?
Indeed, what if one’s religion were organized to support one’s exploration of the immanent, the relational? What if it were organized to support, say, a weekly racial justice vigil? A monthly covenant group? An annual evening of immersion in the arts? What if it were organized to feed the needy, or champion the oppressed, or give expression to one’s own inner strivings? What if one’s religion were organized so that one’s personal reflection could give rise to communal action, and communal action could in turn seed the soul for personal reflection?
I know that many of us have come away from, and all of us live alongside of, religious organizations that seem not to have the well being of their constituents in mind, let alone that of their communities and societies. Some of us have come out of religions organized to tell us we were unworthy, or damned, or that we should not exist at all. This is a crucial danger in organizing – that we will lose sight of our love for one another, our responsibility to one another. It’s true, organizations wield power, and sometimes they wield that power to harm. If we are honest, we must say that sometimes even Unitarian Universalism has succumbed to this misuse of power. This is why holding one another accountable in love is so important to our denomination’s well being. But this danger of abusing organizational power is present whether we are organizing a religion, or an activist group, or a garden party. I believe UUs can be vigilant, hold this danger in mind, and avert it, in order to organize in support of our own personal growth, the communal growth of our congregations, and the growth of our values in the world.
I find myself coming to a place where I can say aloud that I believe that the world could be a better place if Unitarian Universalism were more organized – more willing to grow as a denomination, as well as supporting the growth of our individual members. Coming up in August, I’ll be speaking from the pulpit about some of what is lost when we do not organize ourselves for this purpose. In the meantime, let me thank my congregation for sending me to GA, and for building time for MUUSA and other denominational activities into my job description. It is an empowering thing to see hundreds, even thousands, of Unitarian Universalists coming together in one place to do the work of our faith. I invite each of us to be not only individual, or congregational, but denominational in our thinking, and to consider what it might be that we are called to do to further organize and grow this religion.
© Mary Shelden, July 19, 2018
July 22, 2018
Dwelling in the Tragic Gaps
Community activist Parker Palmer and nature writer Annie Dillard both reflect on the power of “gaps” in their writing. Palmer addresses the tragic nature of gaps between the worlds we live and the world we wish for while Annie Dillard names “gaps” as the dwelling place of the holy. This Sunday will look into the gaps to discover how Palmer and Dillard may be both right about the nature of in-between spaces.
Our Worship Leader will be Rev. Dr. Nicole C. Kirk and our Worship Associate will be Heike Eghardt.
From The Executive Operations Director
Important Building Information…..
For many years we have had a chair restoration program. We are revitalizing that program and hope you will help us identify chairs that need special care. We have sent several for restoration recently. If your chair feel wobbly or unstable, please place it at the back of the sanctuary near the screens and we will move it to our chair repair holding area. If you need help moving the chair, please ask a fellow congregant or staff member present at the worship service.
This summer Liz and Steven have been busy cleaning and organizing after the lift construction. Most of our supplies fit back into the storage room, but some will need to be sorted and thrown away, given away, or a new home found within our building.
Once Beth Emet concludes their stay here the hallway by the kitchen will be more orderly. Beth Emet and UCE have coexisted since June. While it has required additional management on my part and work on the part of our custodial staff, it has gone well.
Liz has trained their custodial and security staff to set up, take down and perform lobby duties while they are here. It has been a satisfying opportunity to provide a place for Beth Emet during their construction which will conclude in late August.
Work on a capital campaign feasibility is in progress. Many building projects are on the list of projects to be funded. The roof project has been accelerated due to the amount of leakage we have been experiencing. The board approved funding, we have hired a roofing consultant and will be moving forward immediately with a plan. The Buildings and Grounds team sought bids, but found that there are so many options for materials and unknown factors about the underlying materials and connections on our roof that we needed someone to guide us through this expensive endeavor.
Bret Asrow comes to us through Architect Mark Miller, who has known Bret for many year. Dick Whitaker, Michael Skilton and I feel confident we are headed in the right direction on a crucial project for the safety and integrity of our annex.
The parking lot drains have been reviewed by a few companies now and bids have been submitted. Because of the cost of the project, which will include paving after repairs, this will be a capital campaign project. In the meantime, potholes will be filled at the entrance and at various locations in the parking lot.
We are excited about the capital campaign as our aging annex needs attention – new flooring throughout, window coverings, lobby ceiling and lighting upgrades. The wing is now more than 30 years old and is showing severe signs of wear and tear. The last capital campaign was in 2006.
If you have not yet taken a ride on our new Lift for Love, please do so. It is convenient, fast accessibility to the lower level.
From The Executive Operations Director
From your Executive Operations Director…The work of the EOD entails
administrative, financial and staff management, rental negotiations and planning,
as well as overseeing our buildings and grounds. In this article I want to share
important updates on our building and grounds.
Lift for Love…..Today two of the three City of Evanston inspections are taking
place. If the City gives us the thumbs up on Monday the lift will be operational.
This is a milestone for UCE. It has taken time, much planning, covenantal
practice among congregation and staff, as well as financial support and patience
toward its completion. But this beautiful piece of equipment will serve us well and
will provide universal access for years to come.
Thank you to all who have made this happen. Dick Whitaker, my Buildings and
Grounds co-lead has walked with me as we navigated this path from beginning to
end. Alma Woods and the Accessibility and Inclusion Team has provided
valuable input and guidance. Mark Miller, Architect and Eric Barton, our
Construction Engineer, have performed a very high level of professional service.
This project could not have happened without the generous support of Mary Beth
and Kinnie Smith whose donation ignited enthusiasm in the project and inspired
others to donate and a gift from Endowment ensued.
A special celebration is planned for the beginning of the fall season. In the
meantime, when the lift is approved it is immediately available for use.
Our Annex (Wing) Roof . . . Repairs have failed after several months and it has
become apparent that a new roof must be done sooner than later. The Board
approved this expense, which will be reimbursed by the upcoming Capital
Campaign. Several bids have been received. Mike Skilton, Dick Whitaker and I
are reviewing each of the bids and are talking with a consultant on best products
and method of repairing so that we can decide which firm to proceed with. We
are working quickly to get the project started as soon as possible.
Our Parking Lot . . . Dick Whitaker, Mike Skilton and I in preparation for writing
justifications and providing bidding for Capital Campaign projects have been
reviewing the parking lot.
As you have noticed, there are a few holes that need to be repaired. The
question is how serious are the drain issues. We asked Cahill to inspect the
drains. All four needs to be repaired and gravel built up before the lot can be
repaved. This is a $25,000 expense that must wait for the Capital Campaign.
In the meantime, we will hire a blacktop company to fill in the holes. We have
been advised that it looks as though we can safely wait on the drains repair.
Two additional vendors are being asked to give a second opinion and bids.
Sharing our Space…..At the end of May Beth Emet began their summer space
sharing with UCE while they are under construction. There are services in our
sanctuary on Friday evening and two services on Saturday morning.
In June there have been two Bar Mitzvahs and a Bat Mitzvah tomorrow. Last
weekend Udumbara, our Buddhist Sangha, UCE and Beth Emet shared this
space, making accommodations with care and respect for one another.
Liz Kennedy and I have been working hard to balance all that is going on. Steven
and Liz have assisted and guided Beth Emet’s team of custodial staff as they
learn about our space and equipment. Please bear with us as we welcome Beth
Emet Congregation into our community