Chalice House Success: June 12, 2020
You may have heard about Chalice House from previous articles in the newsletter. It is a house owned by Countryside Church in which asylum seekers will live while they await determination of their application for asylum. The UCE Endowment Committee approved an Immigrant Solidarity Team application for $1,800 to support these efforts. We are very grateful to have had a chance to help with these efforts.
Here is their letter announcing the readiness of the house and thanking us for our support:
Dear Reverend Eileen and Joe,
We are delighted to let you know that Chalice House is now ready for its new residents! While we had hoped to celebrate with you in person, instead please enjoy watching the transformation in this video: Chalice House.
Literally hundreds of repairs and improvements have been made over the past couple of months. As you may know, due to Covid-19 restrictions, we had a smaller team do most of the work, but UCE along with many, many people and organizations also contributed by donating time, talent, furnishings, supplies and funding.
Please extend our gratitude and share this good news with everyone at UCE. Your early interest and enthusiasm for the project helped us build momentum, and the 2020 financial support is greatly appreciated.
ICDI is now taking steps to match Chalice House with a family who needs housing while they seek asylum in the United States. We will share more just as soon as we can.
More information about Chalice House is available here, and as always, if you have any questions or ideas for us, please don’t hesitate to contact us at ChaliceHouse@ccuu.org.
Gratefully,
Laura Mandell and Christine Organ
Co-Chairs, Chalice House
Construction is Starting: June 12, 2020
Our new parking lot and a welcoming sidewalk to the front entrance will be excavated and installed over the next several weeks. So the parking lot will be closed to vehicle & pedestrian traffic starting on June 15 and extend through July 10 due to this construction.
Meanwhile – Inside the Church Building Improvements are Being Done.
New lobby floors are being installed this week. This includes the lobby entry area, bathrooms, lift lobby and floors outside the bathroom.
In the next few weeks the wing hallway, office, and room 3 floors will be done. Lovely new solar shades will be installed in the office, room 2 and room 3. All window sills in the wing and lobby have been replaced as well as the doors in room 3. We are following all COVID protocol in getting this work done. Contractors must wear masks and our custodial staff is cleaning each day.
Our Capital Campaign improvements are moving forward. Thank you to all who have contributed to make these exciting changes happen. If you have questions or need more information email me, please at srobinson@ucevanston.org.
Sandra Robinson – Executive Operations Director on behalf of the Capital Campaign Implementation Committee
VirtUUal RE: Summer 2020
Summertime is traditionally more laid-back in congregational life, as well as in other aspects of life. Enjoying the outdoors and nature becomes a necessity with the warmer weather. With this in mind, individuals and families are invited to our Summer Bucket List Challenge! You can find the Summer Bucket List here!
The family who completes the most items will win a chalice for the family and their picture in the newsletter! The contest ends on August 16, which gives you 10 weeks to do as many as you can. We will honor all participants at a virtual Dinner Church later this summer. Remember to share on social media what you and/or your family are/is doing with the hashtag #UCEBucketList so we can see your beautiful faces and efforts! If you’re shy about sharing on social media, then send me a quick email at kunderwood@ucevanston.org.
Family Fun on the Lawn!
It’s been too long since we’ve seen each other, so we’re gathering in small groups on the lawn to catch up and play contactless games. To keep within our guidelines, please RSVP on the signup below that fits the age group of your kid(s). If you have kids in more than one age group, pick the one that fits your schedule better then. An email will go out a few days prior to each gathering with further info. See you then!
It’s been too long since we’ve seen each other, so we’re gathering in small groups on the lawn to catch up and play contactless games. To keep within our guidelines, please RSVP on the signup below that fits the age group of your kid(s). If you have kids in more than one age group, pick the one that fits your schedule better then. An email will go out a few days prior to each gathering with further info. See you then!
Pre/K – Sign up here!
2nd-5th – Sign up here!
6th-8th – Sign up here!
High School – see below
Summer Opportunities for Young People and Families
Be a UCE Pen Pal! We have about 20 older members who would love to correspond with younger folks this summer, and only 6 young people to do so at this moment. Email Kathy if interested at kunderwood@ucevanston.org.
Soulful Home: Compassion – Tons of Activities, stories, music, and more to explore on our theme this summer! Click here for ways to connect as a family to our faith!
High School Youth
Gathering on the Lawn – August 30, 1-2:30 pm. All high school youth are invited for an end-of-summer gathering on the lawn at UCE! More details to come!
For Adults
The Science of Well-Being – continues at 7 pm Tuesday evenings for those enrolled.
Parent and Family Resources
Check out this living document for resources on anti-racism. Feel free to add new ones that you find! Together, we can nurture the next generations and create an anti-racist society.
Want to take your leadership skills to the next level with a team of other UCE members?
We have our first registrant for the MidWest Leadership School (MWLS) for 2020! Our region is planning an excellent curriculum and is packaging it into an online opportunity spread over 4 Saturdays starting this fall. They suggest we put together a team of attendees to enhance and strengthen the lessons learned. The training is useful for those who want to become more skilled at leadership roles in the congregation or in the community. The cost may be covered entirely by a grant from the Endowment committee. There is only an adult school this year (18 and over). Check out more details here.
Contact Kathy Underwood or Shirley Adams if you want to know more about how this opportunity might work for you this year.
REAL Update: June 12, 2020
This is a time when we are redoubling our efforts to step up in response to continued and increasing police violence against Black people. It is a time when those of us who identify as White need to speak out, act up, and keep on educating ourselves to be effective antiracists.
The UCE Racial Equity (REAL) planning group has been working on several new ways for members and friends to look more deeply into white privilege, into how to speak our truth, into ways to show up, to learn, to donate.
Thanks to our amazing Communications Director Jessica Meis and our leader for Social Action Karen Mooney, there is a section on the website home page that is a UCE statement on the Black Lives Matter movement, and ways to help. Please check it out!
There will be an intergenerational class/workshop on Restorative Justice co-sponsored by the Lifespan Learning Council, REAL, and the UCE Prison Ministry Team. Coming soon – watch for details!
Black Lives Matter signs and buttons are available to all for $10 per sign and $1 per button. Contact Annette Wallace at 847-826-6825 or the church office for information.
We are planning a White Fragility 3-part workshop to take place in the very near future. Watch for details.
REAL is exploring starting a monthly UCE group specifically for BIPOC (Blacks, Indigenous people, and other People of Color). If interested, please contact Shannon Lang shalizhilang@yahoo.com. Also please check out http://www.blacklivesuu.com.
We continue to bring you resources for self-education on racism: books, movies, articles, often through our Member to Member Facebook page so keep checking that page.
We try our best to alert everyone to rallies, events, petitions, UUTheVote activities, and more opportunities to show up or to donate where it will really help.
There will be another series of Movie Discussions on topics related to racism in the coming church year.
We are exploring the possibility of a unique program on white supremacy intended for white people who have covered the basics of white privilege and unconscious bias, to go deeper into personal work.
And more. Join us! If you are a member of REAL, or want to be a member of REAL, look for a REAL meeting invitation soon. All are welcome!
From DLRE: June 12, 2020
You may have seen this poem by Leslie Wright on social media or mainstream news:
What if 2020 isn’t cancelled? What if 2020 is the year we’ve been waiting for?
A year so uncomfortable, so painful, so scary, so raw – that it finally forces us to grow.
A year that screams so loud, finally awakening us from our ignorant slumber.
A year we finally accept the need for change.
Declare change. Work for change. Become the change.
A year we finally band together, instead of pushing each other further apart.
2020 isn’t cancelled, but rather the most important year of them all.
So how do we take this challenge to “declare the change, work for change, become the change” and reach our full potential at UCE? Our covenant states that our purpose is to “nurture the human spirit for a world made whole”. I believe that this applies within our walls as well as in the greater world. We must nurture our spirit to be out in the world helping to make change, and we need to offer that to those who walk through our doors.
This past year, Rev. Karen Gustafson has been doing interim work with us, to enable us to “declare the change, work for change, become the change” within our four walls – to help us learn what it is we want and need to fulfill our mission and to call our next minister. Your valuable input has led to some changes already. And while change can be difficult, we need to continue to “declare the change, work for change, become the change” at UCE.
This summer, I am inviting you to continue the conversation regarding our religious education program that was begun this past February and put on hold with closing UCE in March. How do we prepare our children and youth to become empowered and transformed? What does a robust RE program look and feel like?
And this conversation is not just for parents of children and youth. Having a religious education program that nurtures our young people and builds relationships across generations gives a congregation such energy! Isn’t that what we want for UCE?
And so we continue this exploration beginning June 24 at 5:30pm during the all-church Zoom gathering. There will be more opportunities in July to share thoughts and ideas, so look for these future dates in upcoming newsletters. Together, we will “declare the change, work for change, become the change”!
In Faith,
Kathy
June 14, 2020
We will host an online worship service on Sunday, June 14th at 11:15 am.
“Standing with and standing strong” – Privileged people swim in safe spaces. We are often the ones shocked at the limits placed upon us. We tend to be accustomed that the world is a safe place to move about in. Those whose lives are already unsafe because of racism, sexism, & anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination and violence struggle to find places where they can be safe. This service is created in good faith that every time we gather, we lift up our siblings and cousins who have been seen or treated as “less than.”
Please submit your Joys and Sorrows through this online form. If you submit a message by 11 am, we will try to read it that Sunday. Thank you for your patience as we are adapting to best serve you all! Note the 9:30 and 11:15 services are being rolled into one service time so that we can gather together as a whole community of faith. You can still give to the shared offering through “text to give,” mail a check to the office with “shared offering” in the memo line, or go to our website and hit “give” on the upper right or click here. This Sunday’s shared offering recipient is the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) (click here to learn more).
From UUA President: June 4, 2020
Dear Unitarian Universalists,
| These past two weeks have been ones of incalculable devastation.
From the grim milestone of 100,000 of our loved ones dead from COVID-19, to the horrific murders of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police, Breonna Taylor by Louisville police, and Tony McDade by Tallahassee police, to the subsequent spilling over of rage and pain and grief in the uprisings across the country, to the violent, militarized response of police against our people and communities, the brokenness of our world is overwhelming. On Sunday, I joined the First Universalist Church of Minneapolis for their service. I was grateful to represent UU’s across the country in solidarity with Minneapolis, remembering that we are in this together. Together, we prayed for cities and communities all over this country – a prayer for the safety, well-being, and courage of the people. And earlier this week, over 10,000 UUs gathered for the #WeCantBreathe vigil led by the Unitarian Universalist Association’s (UUA) Organizing and Strategy team. I especially lift in love and prayer Black Unitarian Universalists, and Black people across the United States. Through grief and rage, I pray for your safety, your strength, your life, and your loved ones. May the all-pervading presence of love hold you in power and in tenderness, bringing rest and deep care. And I share this pastoral message for Black UUs from the Rev. Lauren Smith, a member of the UUA’s Executive Leadership Council. I hope you will share it with Black UUs in your congregations. |
| We must find the sources within ourselves to give us courage in this moment. To resist. To risk. To sacrifice for this movement that needs all of us to succeed. |
|
These are frightening, devastating times, but they are also times of true possibility for a new way to be born. I am so moved by the way that Unitarian Universalists across this country are showing up in brave and powerful ways – as leaders, as organizers, as allies and supporters – showing up to support the Movement for Black Lives, showing up to support the uprisings across our country. And I want you to know that I am with you and the UUA is with you.
The realities of policing and anti-Blackness in our country, in our congregations, and in ourselves are urgent for everyone to interrogate and understand. Don’t turn away from the challenge and truth of the uprisings. This week the UUA issued a statement directly addressing issues of policing and anti-Blackness in the United States. and in our tradition. My own understanding of our systems of policing and criminalization in the United States. were deeply changed by my ministry in Phoenix, Arizona. I wrote a special President’s column for UU World sharing how I came to support efforts to defund police and move to abolition. I share this message with all UUs, but I speak from my experience as a white American and address my message especially to white Unitarian Universalists. The prophetic and pastoral needs of our people – in the midst of pandemic and uprising – are real, urgent, and daunting. It is important that we plan for how to make capacity for the organizing and justice work that we are called to and the increasing pastoral and spiritual needs in our communities. I don’t know all of what is ahead, but I know that we as Unitarian Universalists need to be ready to respond with our faith out front and ready to care and lead in ways that are needed and asked for. Reach out to congregations near you, reach out to your colleagues across congregations, reach out to your UUA Regional staff. We are not in this alone and we don’t have to figure it out on our own. It matters that we support the uprisings whose goal is the liberation of Black people and communities who for too long have been crushed by white supremacy, militarism, and capitalism. We must find the sources within ourselves to give us courage in this moment. To resist. To risk. To sacrifice for this movement that needs all of us to succeed. To be midwives for a new era in which all of us will be free. Love bless you all today. Spirit of life and love, that never lets us go, be with the freedom fighters – those on the streets and those organizing and supporting from their homes. Gives us all strength and courage to join this movement. Hold us in love and strength as we work to get free and work for a future that is free and thriving. Yours in love, Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray, UUA President |
VirtUUal RE: June 7, 2020
Welcome to a new month and our new theme of compassion! With all that is going on in our country right now, it seems very appropriate to reflect on and explore this theme.
We traditionally have a “one-room schoolhouse” approach for RE during the summer. Since we can’t meet in person, the Children and Youth Program Team and I are sending out a Summer Bucket List program that families can do at their own pace over the summer. In addition to this, we will have some occasional family game nights too. Look for updates in my weekly UCE Family Email, which will also include other resources, links, and ideas.
Click here for the Summer Bucket List.
High school youth can connect Sunday evening at 7 pm on Zoom. Look for an email from the advisors later in the week with info on how to join.
Rev. Eileen and I would love to see your beacon of light in our worship services! We’re looking for families to light the chalice for virtual worship. How will this work, you ask? She will arrange to meet you at UCE, and video-record your family lighting the chalice and/or saying our covenant together. Social distancing protocols will be maintained too. If you’d like to participate, email Kathy at kunderwood@ucevanston.org or Eileen at ewiviott@ucevanston.org.
Beginning June 16, adults and families with teens are invited to a new program this summer: The Science of Well-Being. This program comes from Yale University, and it’s free! In this 10-week course (you need not attend all, but it is highly recommended), you will engage in a series of challenges designed to increase your own happiness and build more productive habits. As preparation for these tasks, Professor Laurie Santos reveals misconceptions about happiness, annoying features of the mind that lead us to think the way we do, and the research that can help us change. You will ultimately be prepared to successfully incorporate a specific wellness activity into your life.
We invite you to watch the online sessions at your convenience, and then join us Tuesday evenings at 7-8 pm on Zoom to share what we’ve learned. The online sessions usually involve short videos, plus exercises you do on your own, for a total of no more than 2 1/2 hours weekly.
For more details, and to sign up for the video series, click here.
To join our discussions, email Kathy Underwood at kunderwood@ucevanston.org by Saturday, June 13.
In Faith,
Kathy