Sunday Service: In-person and Online Sunday at 10:30am
This is not meant to be a complete description, just a note to let you know what was discussed. Please look for the minutes from the previous meeting which are posted each month after they have been approved. To view the minutes for the previous month, go to the Board Page on the UCE website.
If you want to contact the Board, our e-mail is BOT@ucevanston.org.
Dear Friends,
As we are transitioning back to being in-person while maintaining virtual options, I have been thinking a lot about hospitality and how we engage and communicate with each other. You will soon be receiving emails and calls from me about our Hospitality Teams, which will have roles for volunteering in-person and online. I look forward to connecting with you as we phase into being back in the building together.
We will be returning to the sanctuary for our worship service at 10:15 am on Sunday, September 12, 2021. Our return to an in-person worship service will be accompanied by our adherence to the following COVID-19 community mitigation protocols:
In addition to these four items that each of us can do as we strive to keep our community healthy, we have long range air purifiers throughout the building and are adding high quality filters to our furnace system. The lower level has a special dehumidification and air purification system and the sanctuary exhaust fans above the ceiling panels will run continuously while we are in the building.
We invite you to join us for worship in the sanctuary, where we have spaced chairs to accommodate 100 people. If the crowd gets too large for your comfort, the service will be livestreaming in room 6, where a maximum of 20 people can gather. The service will also be livestreaming in room 3, where our children, including our children under the age of 2 years who will not be masked, and their friends and family are invited to gather if they need a break from the sanctuary. Returning to our sanctuary will require us to listen to each other, accommodate each other, and interact with patience and grace.
If you are feeling anxious about returning to in-person worship or have a day when someone in your family is not feeling well, please stay home, knowing that you may still participate remotely. Thanks to a generous endowment grant and the expertise of Adam Gough, we will be livestreaming the Sunday worship service indefinitely.
In this time of transition, listen to and trust yourself regarding your anxiety about how our community is transitioning into a multiplatform (in-person and online) worship service. We are moving forward with the information we have, knowing that new information could change our plans before September 12th. Just as we have over the past 17 months, we will continue to find creative ways to maintain our connection with each other.
In faith,
Rev. Susan
We will host an online worship service on Sunday, August 29th at 11:15 am.
Living Our Mission Through the Arts: Visual Arts
Nurturing the Human Spirit and Making the World Whole Through the Arts: living our mission through the arts. The creative endeavor is more than the fluff of life. It is essential to our humanity to create, express, and process our struggles through the arts. This August we will explore five modes of artistic and creative expression and their centrality in making meaning in our lives. This Sunday, we will discuss building community through the tactile/visual arts. Worship participants include Johna and Will Van Dyke, Eleanor Boyer, Jean Durkin, and Maggie Wilson.
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 there will only be 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 Black Lives of UU.
Interfaith Action of Evanston operates a monthly Produce Mobile, year-round, providing free groceries and toiletries to around 250 families. 
For the September 14th Produce Mobile, they are in need of the following items:
Please limit your generosity to the items requested.
In addition to providing groceries, the Produce Mobile tries to fill in the SNAPGap for families by requesting donations of specific items to also be distributed to families through the Produce Mobile. SNAP is the government program that helps provide people living under the poverty line with groceries. SNAP does not help with essential toiletries, so there is a GAP in needs.
Here is the information if you would like to help:
DROP-OFF LOCATIONs & DATES
ITEMS NEEDED – Please limit your generosity to the items requested.
You may buy one kind of product or mix and match. They are grateful for donations both small and large.
ONLINE ORDERING
You may order online or buy from your favorite store – their brands, or your favorites. If you order online, you may have the items shipped directly to:
Thank you for your generous responses to our pandemic-time projects to help alleviate the suffering of our neighbors.
Toni Rey and Betty Walker, Food and Shelter Team
Parent/Volunteer Conversation – Based on the feedback from the Family Engagement Survey so far, there is a need to get more information out to you so that you can make the decision on how your family participates this year at UCE. You are invited to one of two virtual gatherings for this purpose:
Monday, August 30 from 7-8 pm OR
Thursday, September 2 from 7-8 pm
Come hear about the format for Sundays at UCE for worship and the faith formation hour. Bring your questions and share your ideas! Those who are considering whether to volunteer this year are invited too!
Family Engagement Survey – Parents, please fill out this short survey regarding your family’s participation at UCE this fall. It should take 5 minutes or less!
Registration for Faith Formation begins! This year more than ever, it is important that parents register their young people, so that we can plan according to current guidelines. Please complete the form here for all young people, 0-18 years old.
Worship and Faith Formation this Fall – If you haven’t seen the video about our worship and faith formation format for this fall yet, check it out here. And if you missed Kathy’s article about this you can find it here.
Playscape Steppingstone Event – September 25 and October 2 – Families are invited to help make steppingstones. For more details and to register, click here.
UCE Fiction Book Group meets Friday August 20 at 7 pm by ZOOM to discuss Circe by Madeline Miller.
“A bold and subversive retelling of the goddess’s story,” this #1 New York Times bestseller is “both epic and intimate in its scope, recasting the most infamous female figure from the Odyssey as a hero in her own right” (Alexandra Alter, The New York Times).
The nonfiction book group won’t be meeting in August to discuss books but we look forward to selecting books for the coming year at our Zoom meeting at 2 pm on August 22nd.
We’re hoping that everyone who has a nonfiction book they recommend and, perhaps, would like to discuss with others at UCE, will add the title to this google document. We’re hoping that this document will encourage UCErs to share their love of books by recommending titles. The nonfiction book group will consider all titles added to this google doc and we hope that many people who submit titles will join us at the August 22nd meeting and then continue with us throughout the church year.
Greetings,
There’s lots of excitement building around opening our doors to our beloved congregation on September 12. At the same time, there is much to be done in the building. We are considering every option to ensure that everyone’s comfort and safety is a priority as we re-enter. I’m in touch with Administrators and Executive Directors through the AUUA (Administrators) and have shared with them steps we are taking and I’m hearing from them about what they are doing. This is a useful exchange and lends support and guidance throughout the UU community. We have purchased air filters which are located throughout the sanctuary and the building. We will run the exhaust fans that are located in the upper ceiling of our sanctuary. We will provide masks for those who may forget theirs and stations for hand sanitizing will be set up in the lobby, wing, sanctuary and lower level. Our lower level has a dehumidification and purification system built into the furnace system. I am currently working with our furnace contractor to determine best filter system and am meeting with an air quality firm to gain a second opinion. We feel confident in the quality of our air, yet are taking every step possible to ensure everyone is as safe as possible throughout the building.
Here’s what’s happening next Monday. The Intergenerational Playscape & Ramp Project begins. Yay! After a long-awaited permit construction begins.
Ramp construction will be first, followed by pathways and then plantings. Once done, furniture and features will be installed. Our hope is that work will be complete during September. This is a big step forward in providing space outdoors for our congregants of all ages. It will be a safe and beautiful place to play, meet, and to contemplate throughout the week. This area will provide a new space for activities outside and we are thrilled. Stay tuned for photographs and more information as we go through this construction phase. The Alma and Dave Woods Memorial Ramp will be dedicated once the ramp is installed and the garden is complete. The family generously donated for the construction of this project which was so near and dear to Alma’s heart.
On Sunday, September 19, the Kitchen renovation will be celebrated. There will be a recognition in the worship service followed by a gathering and tour in the kitchen and outer area guided by Carol Nielsen and me. Coffee and cookies will be served outside following the indoor gathering to celebrate our new, beautiful hospitality facility. Our kitchen has always been and will continue to be a warm and welcoming gathering place before, during and after events for our congregation. This improvement will also be a benefit for rentals at UCE.
Rentals are beginning to return to UCE, although a few workshop groups have decided to continue online for now. Our summer PedalHeads camp was a great success. This was a good rental for UCE as it provided income with low impact on the building and staff. Children of all ages learned to ride bikes and had fun learning bike safety on our new parking lot. My hope is that we can proceed with several rentals we have contracted with assuming that the variants do not prevent that from being so. Rentals, as you know, provide an important stream of income for UCE.
Sandra Robinson, Executive Operations Director
After almost 18 months of virtual gathering we will all be newcomers when we return to our building in September 2021. We will be starting anew, learning how to be together again – to connect in new and different ways, embracing our mission and working to build an even stronger, more vibrant community to “nurture the human spirit for a world made whole”.
The Membership Engagement Task Force has been meeting since February to learn more about what we do well in welcoming and engaging members and where we could improve our efforts to facilitate meaningful and satisfying participation in the life of UCE. Having reached out for input from congregants, shared anecdotal information, and discussed our own experiences, the Task Force identified three major opportunities for encouraging a deepening of connection among our members and friends:
The Task Force is ready to generate intervention and program ideas in each of these three areas and develop plans to put these ideas into action. A working group for each of the three areas is being formed. We are looking for volunteers passionate about and dedicated to helping members open the door to more meaningful engagement in the life of the congregation. If you feel drawn to this work we hope you will join one of these working groups.
For more information contact Maggie Wilson at maggiemwilson@gmail.com.
The Membership Engagement Task Force
Maggie Wilson
Carolyn Laughlin
Melanie Kitchner
Susan Carlton
Rev. Susan Frances
Hello from the edge of a blank canvas that will soon fill with color, energy, music, and purpose. We return with eager caution to our brick and mortar home to celebrate familiar creases in the eyes of our masked smiles, and to smash one another in (consensual) hugs.
This is my first year on the UCE board. What a privilege. What a learning curve! There’s a lot of Big Stuff in here/out there. But it’s no bigger than our own small efforts. As I heard long ago: “do your best work and be kind.”
There is more complicated machinery in our goals than simple philosophy, but I trust it completely for engagement with you, and our shared aspirations.
We’ll keep current with news from the board in this newsletter and other touch points, and hope to hear from you as well.
We gather at our annual board retreat August 20 – 21. You’ll learn in short order what topics, urgencies, and goals are addressed or generated then. I hope there are costumes.
In love and service,
Ally Hunter
* SNAP LINE, carpentry: a tool to draw a line between two points, a guide.
We will host an online worship service on Sunday, August 22nd at 11:15 am.
Living Our Mission Through the Arts: Music
Nurturing the Human Spirit and Making the World Whole Through the Arts: living our mission through the arts. The creative endeavor is more than the fluff of life. It is essential to our humanity to create, express, and process our struggles through the arts. This August, we will explore five modes of artistic and creative expression and their centrality in making meaning in our lives. Music is a powerful force for bringing people together, transforming us and inspiring us to change our world. Worship participants include Annette Wallace, Joe Romeo, Vickie Hellyer, Jo Lynn Cotton, Tory Bassani, Robb Geiger, Lynn Kendall, and William Phillips.
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 there will only be 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 Black Lives of UU.
1330 Ridge Ave
Evanston, IL 60201
Directions
(847) 864-1330
uce@ucevanston.org
UCE’s office hours:
Monday: CLOSED
Tuesday – Thursday: 10 AM – 4 PM
Friday: 10 AM – 1 PM
Saturday: CLOSED
Sunday: 10 AM – 2 PM
In-person and Virtual Sunday Service is held at 10:30 am.
Member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association covenant to affirm and promote the Seven Principles of Unitarian Universalism.
The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Evanston is recognized by the Unitarian Universalist Association as a Welcoming Congregation, a Peace Advocate Congregation, and a Green Sanctuary.
