Sunday November 15, 2015

CZ

This Sunday we will be graced with the presence of the Rev. Donald Rollins. He has served many Unitarian Universalist churches and is currently residing in Ohio. Rev. Rollins plays both the guitar and the harmonica. The sermon this week is a one-man presentation called “Thanksgiving on East Point”. It’s a story I adapted from a colleague that traces one man’s journey to gratitude.

I hope you will join us on this journey.

After the service on Sunday we will be having a potluck dinner at the home of Robert and Lisa. There will be a vegetarian soup made which will be a delicious main course. Please bring a desert, salad, or other side dish to share. If you cannot bring a dish, don’t worry there will be enough to spare.

Namaste

Cricket

Thanksgiving-Quotes-About-Family-1

Sunday November 8, 2015

CZ

RE (Religious Education) will be at 10 am. Adults will continue Building your Theology and Children will focus on Relationships in What do you Stand for?

During our service this week,  we will focus on forgiveness and reconciliation. It has been said that forgiveness does not mean reconciliation and this is true. Our service will focus on the forgiving capabilities of our hearts and the act of reconciliation. Our service leader will be Cricket Hall.

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Have a good week. Hope to see you on Sunday.

~Namaste,
Cricket

A UN EVENT ON STRUCTURAL RACISM AGAINST PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT

CZ

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The racial profiling, police brutality, voting restrictions, and mass imprisonment of African Americans and other people of African Descent not just in the United States, but around the world, is a moral outrage. As Unitarian Universalists, our dedication to global justice, equity, and dignity leads us to join hands across lines of race, class, age, and geography and work for an end to the injustices faced by black people in our communities, so that every person is treated equally.

This UN Event is important to us all. For those who cannot go there is a link on the page to Live stream on Tuesday November 3, 2015.

~Namaste

Cricket

2015 Collaborative Leadership Audio Program – Lifespan Religious Education Week at Star Island

CZ

Exploring themes related to our changing world, the changing nature of church, the critical role of great collaboratie teams in navigating these changes, and religious education as a growth strategy, this program features talks and panel discussions with Carey McDonald, Patricia Infante, Starr Austin, Andrea Lerner, Patricia Hart, Cathy Seggel, and Pat Humphries & Sandy O. of Emma’s Revolution, plus a wrap up conversation with Carey McDonald and Peter Bowden. Full show notes including speaker bios and mentioned resources may be found on the pages for each of the 9 program audio tracks listed below.

http://starreweek.com/2015program/

How an Austin church agreed to offer an immigrant sanctuary | UU World

CZ

“The call for sanctuary for Sulma Franco came to First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin, where I’m senior minister, because we have the reputation of being welcoming to LGBT folks, and because the Rev. Marisol Caballero, minister of religious education and congregational engagement, had been doing antiracism work within the congregation and beyond. Word had gotten out in the immigrant community.

Could we help?”

http://www.uuworld.org/articles/deciding-offer-sanctuary?utm_source=f

Courage leads to change in this world.

This congregation lived out the first and second principles.

~Namaste
Cricket

Building Your Own Theology Class

LdeG

Schedule, Readings, and Worksheets

“And to use the classic UU Building Your Own Theology curriculum as an example, the starting point is not studying traditional theologies from the past (that comes at the midpoint). The starting point is autobiography: owning more fully how your life story and your firsthand experience affects, shapes, and informs how you construct theology. And perhaps I should also clarify that Building Your Own Theology — at least as far as Unitarian Universalism is concerned — does not require theism, a belief in God. In contrast, there is much potential benefit for both theists and atheists, Buddhists and Pagans, Christians and Jews in doing the hard work of articulating what you do (and don’t) believe about God (or reality), human nature, religious community, ethics, and the future of our species and the universe — and doing all of that in conversation with your religious community.”

From a post by The Rev. Dr. J. Carl Gregg (D.Min., D.A.S.D., M.Div., B.A.), minister of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Frederick, Maryland.

Starting November 1 we will have a Building Your Own Theology class at 10 am, before coffee and the worship service.  The class will probably run through March, depending on how long we take for discussions each week.

The class won’t teach you what to believe, but to think about what you already believe in a systematic way, how your beliefs have changed, learn what others believe and why, and build our community.

There is homework! Brief (two or three pages) readings every week or two and some exercises to do on your own to prepare for discussion.  By the end of the class, you will have written your own creed.

The discussion is a lot of the learning, so being there for most of the classes is good, but the readings and worksheets will be available online so you can keep up when you can’t be there.

Lisa deGruyter is facilitating; she took the class, and then taught it twice, at First UU Austin years ago. She’s looking forward to seeing how her beliefs have evolved since then (and hopes they have!)

Schedule and materials

Democracy as a Religious Practice

LdeG

You have to learn how to pray. You might spend years trying to master meditation–or coming to understand that meditation isn’t something that you master. The same is true with democracy. In order to practice it, you have to learn it. To meditate you need to learn how to breath, how to sit, how to unfocus your mind. To practice democracy you need to learn rules of order, how to run a meeting, how to bring silenced voices into the conversation, when to speak and when to keep still.

Colin Bossen: Writer, Preacher, Organizer | Blog | Democracy as a Religious Practice

http://colinbossen.com/the-latest-form-of-infidelity/14182745/democracyasreligiouspractice