Sunday, May 10, 2020

“Motherhood changes everything.” – Adriana Trigiani

This Sunday, John Hall will be doing a service celebrating Mother’s Day!

We are forgoing meeting in person during the coronavirus epidemic. We experimented with a Skype video call on March 15, which allowed use to share music, readings, and hymns, on our usual presentation slides, and share joys and sorrows, as well as a virtual “coffee hour” discussion. We are continuing to do that. If you would like to participate, please email westforkuu@gmail.com for details and a link.

If you are a regular attendee, we have added you to our Google Group if we had an email address. If you have not gotten a group email already, please email westforkuu@gmail.com so that we can add you to the group, which we will be using for staying in touch with each other during this time. Public announcements will continue to be posted here on the website and on our Facebook page and Twitter account, as usual.

Sunday, May 3, 2020

Those who stand at the threshold of life always waiting for the right time to change are like the person who stands at the bank of a river waiting for the water to pass so they can cross on dry land. – Joseph B. Wirthlin

This Sunday, Cricket is going to lead a UU History service that will focus on those who crossed thresholds.

We are forgoing meeting in person during the coronavirus epidemic. We share music, readings, and hymns, on our usual presentation slides, have a story and a talk, and share joys and sorrows, as well as a virtual “coffee hour” discussion, starting at 10:30, with the service at 11. If you prefer not to be seen, video is optional. If you would like to participate, please email westforkuu@gmail.com for details and a link, or for help with using Skype.

If you are a regular attendee, we have added you to our Google Group if we had an email address. If you have not gotten a group email already, please email westforkuu@gmail.com so that we can add you to the group, which we will be using for staying in touch with each other during this time. Public announcements will continue to be posted here on the website and on our Facebook page and Twitter account, as usual.


Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more information or write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Flower Ceremony: Sunday, 12 April 2020

We will have our Flower Ceremony, which was created by Dr. Norbert Čapek for the Liberal Religious Fellowship he founded in Prague, then Czechoslavakia, in 1925, and which became the largest Unitarian Church in the world. He sought a ceremony that would celebrate love and community and the interdependent web of life and love among a new and diverse congregation drawn from many backgrounds, and which would be a celebration not tied to any older religious ceremonies, which many of his congregation had rejected. Nearly a hundred years later, it is celebrated by many Unitarian Universalist congregations everywhere.

If you have flowers in your yard, or can pick them elsewhere safely, please put some on view when we meet. Also, please email a flower image to be shared during the service to westforkuu@gmail.com

We are forgoing meeting in person during the coronavirus epidemic. We share music, readings, and hymns, on our usual presentation slides, have a story and a talk, and share joys and sorrows, as well as a virtual “coffee hour” discussion, starting at 10:30, with the service at 11. If you prefer not to be seen, video is optional. If you would like to participate, please email westforkuu@gmail.com for details and a link, or for help with using Skype.

If you are a regular attendee, we have added you to our Google Group if we had an email address. If you have not gotten a group email already, please email westforkuu@gmail.com so that we can add you to the group, which we will be using for staying in touch with each other during this time. Public announcements will continue to be posted here on the website and on our Facebook page and Twitter account, as usual.


Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more information or write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Sunday, 5 April 2020: Sublime Liberation

Phoebe Durst will lead the service and Lillie will provide live music.

We are forgoing meeting in person during the coronavirus epidemic. We share music, readings, and hymns, on our usual presentation slides, have a story and a talk, and share joys and sorrows, as well as a virtual “coffee hour” discussion, starting at 10:30, with the service at 11. If you prefer not to be seen, video is optional. If you would like to participate, please email westforkuu@gmail.com for details and a link, or for help with using Skype.

If you are a regular attendee, we have added you to our Google Group if we had an email address. If you have not gotten a group email already, please email westforkuu@gmail.com so that we can add you to the group, which we will be using for staying in touch with each other during this time. Public announcements will continue to be posted here on the website and on our Facebook page and Twitter account, as usual.


Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more information or write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers today: Sunday, 29 March 2020

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers today,
and give us not to think so far away
as the uncertain harvest; keep us here
all simply in the springing of the year.

A Prayer in Spring by Robert Frost

Living in the present is harder, but even more vital, in a time of fear and uncertainty about the future, even about tomorrow. Lisa deGruyter will lead the service.

We are forgoing meeting in person during the coronavirus epidemic. We share music, readings, and hymns, on our usual presentation slides, have a story and a talk, and share joys and sorrows, as well as a virtual “coffee hour” discussion, starting at 10:30, with the service at 11. If you prefer not to be seen, video is optional. If you would like to participate, please email westforkuu@gmail.com for details and a link, or for help with using Skype.

If you are a regular attendee, we have added you to our Google Group if we had an email address. If you have not gotten a group email already, please email westforkuu@gmail.com so that we can add you to the group, which we will be using for staying in touch with each other during this time. Public announcements will continue to be posted here on the website and on our Facebook page and Twitter account, as usual.


Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more information or write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Sunday, March 15, 2020

We are forgoing meeting in person during the coronavirus epidemic. Sunday, March 15, we will be experimenting with a virtual discussion while we determine how best to meet and worship virtually. If you would like to participate, please email westforkuu@gmail.com for details.

If you are a regular attendee, we have added you to our Google Group if we had an email address. If you have not gotten a group email already, please email westforkuu@gmail.com so that we can add you to the group, which we will be using for staying in touch with each other during this time. Public announcements will continue to be posted here on the website and on our Facebook page and Twitter account, as usual.


Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more information or write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Sunday, March 15, 2020

“I celebrate myself, and sing myself.” – Walt Whitman

“The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.” –Arthur C. Clarke

Join us for Worship: This week John Hall will present a service titled, “The Power of Spiritual Mash-Ups: Innovate and Celebrate!”

Our services are Sundays at 11 a.m. at the Progressive Women’s Association Event Center, 305 Washington Ave. in downtown Clarksburg, behind the Courthouse. There are classes for children and adults 10 to 10:45 am, and a coffee gathering before the service. More about us.

Classes and worship are replaced by Spiritual Outings on the first Sunday of each month during the summer, with brief worship, a potluck picnic, and outdoor activities. The schedule is in the sidebar.

We would love to have you come worship with us.

Children are welcome.  There is childcare and an activity for young children during the service.

The building is wheelchair accessible, with an accessible restroom.

Map

The schedule for the current adult religious education class is here.

Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more informationor write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Sunday, March 8, 2020

“Music once admitted to the soul becomes a sort of spirit and never dies.” – Edward Bulwer Lytton

Join us for Worship: This week our youth will present a service titled, “Music fuels spiritual practice”

“Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination and life to everything.” ― Plato

Our services are Sundays at 11 a.m. at the Progressive Women’s Association Event Center, 305 Washington Ave. in downtown Clarksburg, behind the Courthouse. There are classes for children and adults 10 to 10:45 am, and a coffee gathering before the service. More about us.

Classes and worship are replaced by Spiritual Outings on the first Sunday of each month during the summer, with brief worship, a potluck picnic, and outdoor activities. The schedule is in the sidebar.

We would love to have you come worship with us.

Children are welcome.  There is childcare and an activity for young children during the service.

The building is wheelchair accessible, with an accessible restroom.

Map

The schedule for the current adult religious education class is here.

Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more informationor write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302

Sunday, March 1, 2020: Dissent, Heresy, and Toleration

Dissenter of Sidmouth

Tolerance is a social rather than a religious virtue. A broad-minded view of the private belief of others undoubtedly makes for the happiness of society; but it is an attitude impossible for those whose personal religion is strong. For if we know that we have found the key and guiding principle of Life, we cannot allow our friends to flounder blindly in the darkness.

— Steven Runciman, The Medieval Manichee: A Study of the Christian Dualist Heresy

Unitarianism and Universalism were both born in heresy, challenges to the beliefs and mores of the world around them.

Welcome before prelude

Good morning and welcome to West Fork Unitarian Universalists. I’m Robert and I feel blessed to serve this congregation as a lay leader. I’m glad to see all of you here today.

Thank you for joining us.

Let us use the prelude for centering. We are about to enter sacred time. We are about to make this time and this place sacred by our presence and intention.

Please silence your phones… and as you do so, I invite us also to turn down the volume on our fears; to remove our masks; and to loosen the armor around our hearts.

Breathe.

Let go of the expectations placed on you by others—and those they taught you to place on yourself.

Drop the guilt and the shame, not to shirk accountability, but in honest expectation of the possibility of forgiveness.

Let go of the thing you said the other day. Let go of the thing you dread next week. Be here, in this moment. Breathe, here.

Prelude Belief – John Mayer

Continue reading