December carries a tension.  How do we balance the cultural call to be festive, jovial, and active with our evolutionary need to slow down and make time for renewal?  The choir will invite us to “find a stillness, hold a stillness, [and] let the stillness carry [us].”  May we all be so lucky – or … Continue reading Making Space for Stillness

Online Only Community can be an essential factor in our healing journeys. Come listen to voices from within our congregation about how our church or other communities have been a healing presence in their lives.  If you have a story to share, please let Michael know.

Online Only The souls of most nations carry historical wounds.  Different countries have taken different approaches to healing those wounds.  What can we learn from Germany, South Africa, Rwanda and others as we confront the historical wounds that continue to fester within U.S. culture?  How can we move towards healing the long-term impact of the … Continue reading Historical Wounds

Online Only Regardless of the outcome, our national election will leave us with raw emotions, unresolved hurts, and an unsettled future.  Come be in community so we can hold each other, explore options for healing, and allow space to wonder:  What Now?  Our community plate will be a special event – a UU match within … Continue reading What Now

Online Only It takes courage to acknowledge what needs healing.  It takes courage to see healing as a choice.  Healing involves facing our own woundedness.  It means becoming aware of how we can move up the scale of emotions from feelings like shame, guilt, fear and anger through courage, willingness and acceptance toward love, joy … Continue reading The Courage to Heal

Online Only Sometimes pivotal moments in history sneak up on us.  A tsunami, a nuclear accident, a terrorist attack.  Other times pivotal moments are predictable and shapeable.  The imminent election of our next president is such a pivotal moment and we must accept our civic and moral duty to help shape the direction of this … Continue reading Listening to this Moment in History

Deep listening means letting go – of the urge to judge, of the impulse to fix, of the desire to control outcomes and situations.  Deep listening has us surrender to the present moment.  It means we risk being changed by drawing close to someone’s story – especially when listening across divides.  “The most critical part … Continue reading Listening as an Act of Surrender

Parker Palmer reminds us that “we all have an inner teacher whose guidance is more reliable than anything we can get from a doctrine, ideology, collective belief system, institution, or leader.”  Yet so often we find it hard to listen to that inner teacher, to hear the wisdom inside, to become aware of the being … Continue reading Listening Within

Online Only Valerie Kaur writes: “ Wonder is where love begins.  The failure to wonder is the beginning of violence. [..] What if first contact in the Americas had been marked not by violence but by wonder?  [..]  Who we wonder about determines whose stories we hear and whose joy and pain we share.  Those … Continue reading Love Renewed by Wonder

Online Only As we re-gather, still online, still distanced physically, let us celebrate the flowing back together of the life of our community.  May we find renewal in honoring our long standing traditions including our water communion ritual while we open ourselves to the changes made necessary by the pandemic.  Join us for stories of … Continue reading Our Life Flows On – A Water Communion Service