From A Guide to Pastoral Care and Connection in a Time of Physical Distancing Reaching Out Safely by Beth Casebolt
Image credit: Ray Pieda from Pexels
From A Guide to Pastoral Care and Connection in a Time of Physical Distancing Reaching Out Safely by Beth Casebolt
Image credit: Ray Pieda from Pexels
At this moment, West Fork UUs are watching things carefully. We are paying attention to the CDC and our local health departments. We will still be having service this week, but will post if anything changes.
Here is a Press Release from UUA President Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray
In his essay “On Prayer,” Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote:
“Prayer is meaningless unless it is subversive, unless it seeks to overthrow and to ruin the pyramids of callousness, hatred, opportunism, falsehood. The liturgical movement must become a revolutionary movement, seeking to overthrow the forces that continue to destroy the promise, the hope, and the vision.”
Our prayer this morning is “Sacred in the Ordinary” by Tamara Lebak
Created by Ralph Roberts
WorshipWeb is delighted to offer these images, created by Unitarian Universalist (UU) minister Ralph Roberts, to count down the days in December to Christmas Eve (December 24).
“If your love for me requires that I hide parts of who I am, then you don’t love me. Love is never a request for silence.” By DeRay Mckesson
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.
Children are welcome. There is an activity for young children during the service.
The building is wheelchair accessible, with an accessible restroom.
Email westforkuu@gmail.com or use our contact form for more information
or write to us at PO Box 523, Clarksburg WV 26302
From Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray’s facebook post
In the Spring of 2017, our association went through a significant institutional rupture that was also intensely personal for many at the heart of those events. Since then, the UUA has recommitted itself to the work of institutional change, to living into the aspirations of our beloved faith community that is anti-racist, anti-oppressive, multicultural and deeply inclusive. At the same time, as a religious community there was also personal repair work that needed to happen, including with the institution of the UUA.
Acknowledging this, a number of people impacted by the events of the Spring of 2017 gathered recently to engage in a restorative conversation. This process was not about expecting agreement nor getting to full resolution, or healing all that was broken. Rather, this was about making space to gather as people – people within a shared faith – to honor and recognize one another’s humanity with all of our feelings and experiences, and to own our own roles as well as our pain.
Together, with our facilitators, we created a statement to describe our gathering, its purpose and character, which I invite you to read. I shared this as part of my recent report to the UUA Board of Trustees and have permission from those who gathered to share it widely with our larger Unitarian Universalist community. I invite you to approach this statement with curiosity and care, and to let the possibility for restorative practices open your heart.
Here is the repair statement
From Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray’s Facebook: “To be a faith of action with love as our doctrine doesn’t mean we live it perfectly, but it does mean we are called again and again to learn, to make amends, to restore relationship, to choose love.
Read more on the essential spiritual and moral value of love in my column in UU World.“
A beautiful reflection by Rev. Connie Simon as featured on Braver/Wiser. How do you kindle the Spirit?
#CenteringUUVoicesofColor
“No pull quotes – this piece needs to be read in full.
Thank you Bart Frost for all your work for the association, and this brilliant perspective on how we can shape the future of this faith tradition.” – from the UUA’s Facebook in reference to the article below.
This was shared on the UUA’s facebook page this morning.
“Cowardice asks the question, ‘Is it safe?’ Expediency asks the question, ‘Is it politic?’ Vanity asks the question, ‘Is it popular?’ But, conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’ And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because one’s conscience tells one that it is right.” – Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Corrosive and Malignant Danger of Remaining Silent About Racism