Replenish Our Funds Potluck and Raffle
We need to feed ourselves, of course, but we also need to feed our Dedicated Funds. So what better than a Potluck and Raffle to fill both needs?
On December 3rd, Music Sunday, following the second service, the Social Justice Council and its associated teams will provide a Potluck and Raffle for the benefit of hungry Unitarian Universalists and for the replenishment of three of our much-used and increasingly depleted Dedicated Funds.
The first of these funds, the Community Action Fund, was used toward membership in Open Communities, covered expenses for UCE’s February overnight shelter (this in conjunction with Interfaith Action), and was used by our intern, Kevin DeBeck, for gift cards to help veterans in need, as part of our Military outreach.
With the second of these, the Marjorie Fisher Environmental Fund, we have established our attractive and environmentally-friendly Rain Gardens. We also recently sent representatives to the Green Team Summit of Faith in Place, a multi-congregational environmental organization and resource for UCE’s Green Team.
With the third fund, the Susan Walker Social Action Fund, we have, as a congregation, sponsored the Race Against Hate. This race, established by Rickie Byrdsong’s widow, family, and friends, helps fight hatred in all its forms. Proceeds from the race are used by the local YWCA for racial justice and violence prevention work.
Funds from the Susan Walker Social Action Fund were applied to the training and curriculum for our Beloved Conversation groups, to costs of racial justice workshops and presentations brought to UCE by the REAL team, and to Rainbow Alliance’s book cart purchases related to LGBTQ issues.
If you wish to help support UCE’s Social Justice work, and you have a favorite dish (main dish, salad/side dish, or dessert) which you would be willing to prepare for this Potluck, please sign up now at the link below.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/15lWRghIKZVm4369_Tlj4qsWjL3ZUdil5jIYUPzVz-Js/edit?usp=sharing
News from the Fair Trade Cart: November 17, 2017
This year your Fair Trade purchases have help fund the “Healthy Eagles Club” at Chute Middle School for another year! The students have, among other things, planted and harvested both flowers and vegetables, turned their potatoes into baked french fries, learned how to make guacamole, and saved the seeds from their crops to plant next year’s garden.
You may have also seen the flowers they planted to beautify the school grounds and the neighborhood. All this in addition to funding gift certificates for selected families at holiday time. May what you give bring you joy!
The Chalice and the Flame
Dr. Mary Lamb Shelden
“In the glare of your mind, be modest.
And beholden to what is tactile, and thrilling.”
~ Mary Oliver, “Flare”
Since starting work at UCE, I have met with my Children and Youth Program Team, I believe, four times. At each of these meetings – and at our K-12 RE teacher orientation — I have attempted to light a chalice, only to have the ritual go badly wrong. In all of these attempts, the candles I’ve used have refused to light: either the flame has not caught, despite repeated attempts, or has caught only to quickly fail. As symbols go, mine in this series have been spectacularly lacking, and it has only been the goodwill and eager assistance of other team members that has gotten me through these early professional embarrassments.
Though I am generally agnostic about the existence of an intervening deity, there are moments and, especially, patterns of moments, that lead me to feel that the universe is trying to tell me something.
The chalice now at my UCE office (which now has, I hope, a better candle in it) is a handmade clay goblet picked up at a Goodwill store many years ago. It has sat on my home altar for a couple of decades, performing generally as a vessel for libations – serving as a vehicle for water, rather than flame. I’ve entertained the notion that there may be some attendant spirit still in it from these previous rituals that resists the fire. I like many things about this chalice: its earthy essence, its rough texture, its particular shade of teal glaze, the fact that it looks like a drinking vessel are all sources of my satisfaction with it. I believe this is the right chalice for this transitional moment in my life – and, indeed, stray notions notwithstanding, I think these initial stumbles through ritual are not the chalice’s fault at all. It is much likelier, in fact, that the error lies with me. If I strain to listen, I seem to discern in moments a voice, as if on the wind: Look to your wicks, Mary, it tells me. Attend to your symbols.
When I first started work as DLRE, I began to ask my UU colleagues, here and at other congregations: where do you get your church? As a lifelong UU, I’m aware that although my faith has not changed, my role with regard to it has. Where once I was served by a congregation, now I serve one. This is not an absolute difference – I have also served my previous congregations as a volunteer and lay-leader, and I now experience many gifts from participating in this congregation. Still, although the change is nuanced, it is also definite. So I am grateful to begin now to find places and ways to get my church. I am grateful for access to the recorded sermons of my gifted colleagues, Revs. Bret and Eileen and Susan. I have joined the Church of the Larger Fellowship, and am grateful for the community I find there, and for the ministry of Rev. Meg Riley. I have been reminded of the other places where I’ve always gotten my church: walking the dog, doing the dishes, watering the plants – and sitting down to a meal with my beloved partner, where we recount to one another the events of our day. During this season of Guest At Your Table, I am making a commitment to daily readings and small rituals – like putting coins in the box and lighting a chalice – that help me to deepen the exploration of this faith I love. Unitiarian Universalism has helped me keep mind, heart, body, and spirit together, through all of life’s challenges, and has led me to this remarkable moment in my life. And when December 4th arrives, I’ll be observing Chalica for the first time ever, seeking to understand more fully the deeper meaning of our seven principles and what they mean for my life. I’ll be keeping my wicks trimmed and my matches dry. I’ll be attending to my symbols.
© November 16, 2017
Sunday, November 19, 2017
“A World Full of Blessings” – 9:15 and 11:00am
Thanksgiving is a time for giving thanks for our blessings. It is a time to reflect upon the universality and complexity of blessings: from being open to receiving or recognizing a blessing in our lives to reaching out and being a blessing in the lives of others. Susan Frances, Intern Minister leading.
Music from Henry Pleas this Sunday
This Sunday, the music will feature guest musician Henry Pleas. Henry H. Pleas, III has appeared as leading tenor in operatic productions throughout the United States and Europe. He has appeared as soloist for Lyric Opera of Chicago, Opera Grand Rapids, Skylight Opera Theater, Chicago Opera Theater and South Shore Opera Company of Chicago. Henry was a finalist in the Lotte Lehman CyberSing competition, and a past participant in the Lyric Opera Center for American Artists. Henry toured with the American Spiritual Ensemble for their 2016 season and received critical acclaim for his performance in Harriet Tubman: When I crossed that Line to Freedom (2016). In 2017 “Come Down Angels!” a recording of Vocal Works by Women Composers was released for the Unveiled Voices Project (UVP). Henry Pleas is the founder and CEO of UVP, an enterprise which seeks to produce and perform quality works by composers deserving performance on world concert stages, but denied based on gender, race, sexuality or other characteristics having nothing to do with achieving musical excellence.
Social Justice Council Potluck and Raffle Coming on Music Sunday, December 3, 2017
Many members and friends of UCE have made donations over the years for special purposes. These donations have been consolidated into a number of Dedicated Funds, including several especially intended to support Social Justice initiatives.
On December 3rd, following Music Sunday Services, the Social Justice Council and its associated teams will provide a Potluck and Raffle to help replenish three of the Dedicated Funds.
These are (1) the Marjorie Fisher Environmental Fund, which supports Green Team efforts including Green Sanctuary certification, efforts to make our building more environmentally sustainable, recycling in the church, organic gardening, Faith in Place sponsorship, etc., (2) the Susan Walker Fund, which is dedicated to projects and initiatives that promote social change, cultural diversity, and economic justice, and (3) the Community Action Fund, which supports activities that alleviate the hardship, suffering, and alienation of homelessness and/or hunger in our community.
More information about these Funds will follow in an up-coming newsletter.
If you wish to help support UCE’s Social Justice work, and you have a favorite dish (main dish, salad/side dish, or dessert) which you would be willing to prepare for this Potluck, please sign up now at the link below.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/15lWRghIKZVm4369_Tlj4qsWjL3ZUdil5jIYUPzVz-Js/edit?usp=sharing
Guest At Your Table Launches November 12
Mark your calendar now to begin your planning for Guest At Your Table (GAYT) this year. An annual program of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC), this program raises crucial funds for UU social justice work in the United States and around the world. The idea is take home a GAYT box and make a small daily contribution, an amount perhaps equal to what we would pay to host a guest at our dinner table.
Whether you sit down to dinner with a large family or on your own, the box is, in a season so often prone to frenetic activity and commercialization, a tool for daily mindfulness about the hope that each of us may bring to address real need and ease suffering in the world, and about the deeper meanings of this holiday season. As we launch and throughout our GAYT season (Sun Nov 12 – Sun Jan 7), we’ll be sharing. via the RE newsletter and Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/groups/520586461667097/), stories and resources for your dinner table reflections and conversations. The boxes will be collected as the season of Epiphany begins, and there will be an opportunity for all to share our collective epiphanies from this daily practice during our first Sunday together in the new year.
Sunday, November 12, 2017
“A Desire to Serve” – 9:15 and 11:00am
The grandfather of Ralph Waldo Emerson — the Rev. William Emerson, a Unitarian, — became the first recognized chaplain of the American Army as he ministered to Soldiers on the battlefield of Lexington and Concord, Mass., in April of 1775. The Unitarian Universalist Military Chaplain Corps now has more UU chaplains in uniform than in the history of our movement. UU military chaplains are resources to their chaplain colleagues; provide comfort and guidance to the soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen they serve; and are reminders of the theological diversity within the ranks for all who seek the holy in its many forms. Rev. Bret Lortie speaking.