Global Belly Laugh Day encourages people across the world really laugh out loud on January 24. In fact, the Belly Laugh Bounce Around the World suggests that at 1:24 p.m. local time you give yourself over to a great big belly laugh, no matter where you are. If people are confused, that’s okay, because they’re sure to start laughing too. Even if you don’t explain it to them, you’ve all had a good laugh (and they’ll probably laugh more later when they tell their friends about the wacko laughing at nothing!). More Here
In our quest for truth we often stick to fact-based reality over emotionally driven idealism, but in our shared human experience we witness the power of the imagined.What is the role of radical imagination in collective liberation? How can we intentionally create the future for which we long and dream?
Or Check out the Book – The Radical Imagination: Social Movement Research in the Age of Austerity By Max Haiven and Alex Khasnabish of the Radical Imagination Project “The idea of the imagination is as evocative as it is elusive. Not only does the imagination allow us to project ourselves beyond our own immediate space and time, it also allows us to envision the future, as individuals and as collectives. The radical imagination, then, is that spark of difference, desire and discontent that can be fanned into the flames of social change. Yet what precisely is the imagination and what might make it ‘radical’? How can it be fostered and cultivated? How can it be studied and what are the possibilities and risks of doing so?
This book seeks to answer these questions at a crucial time. As we enter into a new cycle of struggles marked by a worldwide crisis of social reproduction, scholar-activists Max Haiven and Alex Khasnabish explore the processes and possibilities for cultivating the radical imagination in dark times.
A lively and crucial intervention in radical politics, social research and social change, and the collective visions and cultures that inspire them.”
“We are in an imagination battle. Trayvon Martin and Mike Brown and Renisha McBride and so many others are dead because, in some white imagination, they were dangerous. And that imagination is so respected that those who kill, based on an imagined, radicalized fear of Black people, are rarely held accountable.
Imagination has people thinking they can go from being poor to a millionaire as part of a shared American dream. Imagination turns Brown bombers into terrorists and white bombers into mentally ill victims. Imagination gives us borders, gives us superiority, gives us race as an indicator of ability. I often feel I am trapped inside someone else’s capability. I often feel I am trapped inside someone’ else’s imagination, and I must engage my own imagination in order to break free.” – adrienne maree brown, Emergent Strategy
What happens to a dream deferred? Or all together denied? What happens when an entire nation, already reeling from a pandemic, witnesses a murder before “its” very eyes? Does poetry have anything to say in such a situation? Might a piece of art console us? Might a poem begin to tell a story that we are finally ready to hear? Might that new story heal us? Might new dreams arise?
There is an edge Beyond which we cannot grasp the scale Of our universe. That border, That outer boundary Is imagination. The only known edge of existence The only one we can prove by universal experience –
We can imagine so much! We can only imagine so much.
If perhaps it is a function of our collective minds A dream of our endless nights Then there will be abundance so long as we can imagine it – Abundance on earth If we can imagine it Or abundance of earths A sphere for every tribe And every combination. And to have it all All we need is to remember there is an edge And grow our dreams beyond it.
I walked up to a counter in Antalya Airport to tell a disbelieving airline employee that our flight would shortly be canceled because the tanks being reported in the streets of Istanbul meant that a coup attempt was under way. It must be a military exercise, she shrugged. Some routine transport of troops, perhaps? If so, I asked her, where is the prime minister? Why isn’t he on TV to tell us that? Another woman approached the counter. “This must be your first,” she said to the young woman behind the counter, who was still shaking her head. “It’s my fourth.”
— Zeynep Tufekci, “This Must Be Your First”, The Atlantic, December 7, 2020.
The Sixth Principle of Unitarian Universaism encourages us to affirm and promote “the goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all”. This Sunday Robert Helfer will explore some of the implications for Unitarian Universalists in our time.
Welcome before prelude
Good morning and welcome to West Fork Unitarian Universalists. I’m Robert Helfer 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.
[If guests] I’d like to welcome our guests. Thank you for taking a chance and taking the time to walk through our doors and join us for worship.
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.
“Thirty Days of Love is our annual celebration that runs approximately from Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in January through Valentine’s Day in February. It is an opportunity to lift up the ways Unitarian Universalists and many of our partner organizations are building and organizing by taking bold, courageous action for intersectional racial justice.
In 2021, 30 Days of Love will focus on four themes from a recently published report called Widening the Circle of Concern, which was developed by the Commission on Institutional Change, a UUA Board commissioned group charged with researching, reporting, and making recommendations for transforming white supremacy and other oppressions in the institutional history and practices of the UUA and its 1,000-plus congregations and covenanted communities.” – Find more here
We think this is a wonderful project. We will be following along with Side with Love and on Mondays and Thursdays will post content for 30 days of Love.
We’ve spent some time coming up with some imagination exercises. They should be a fun and easy way to practice using your imagination skills. Using your imagination is a spiritual practice.
Design a Cat
Make a Rainbow of Your Favorite Colors/Shades
Write a Haiku about the Weather Outside
Describe Your Prefect Dessert and if you’re feeling froggy, make it.
What Three Questions Would You Ask a Mermaid?
Ship Two Superheroes, but Tell Why and How They Fell in Love
Good morning and welcome to West Fork Unitarian Universalists. I’m John 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.
[If guests] I’d like to welcome our guests. Thank you for taking a chance and taking the time to walk through our doors and join us for worship.
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.
“In this new world, you and I make it up as we go along, not because we lack expertise or planning skills, but because that is the nature of reality. Reality changes shape and meaning because of our activity. And it is constantly new. We are required to be there, as active participants. It can’t happen without us and nobody can do it for us.” – Margaret J. Wheatley
“The Unitarian Universalist Association joins leaders across this country in calling for the immediate removal of Donald Trump as U.S. President.
As a religious institution, we live faithfully our role as a part of the critical fabric of our country’s moral conscience. And as Unitarian Universalists, we hold democracy as a central principle for our faith. We must use this moment as an opportunity for profound reflection and awakening, not just in a momentary outcry, but as a basis for significant and lasting change.”
West Fork Unitarian Universalists 