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Religious Exploration (More or Less) Weekly UpdatesSeptember 1, 2011Dear UUCCSM RE families and volunteers, RE UUpdates are back from their summer hiatus and will be coming to you. In these emails you’ll be getting important information about the start of the 2011-12 church year and lots more. There’s a great deal in store for us this year in our program, so make sure to stay connected! I hope you’ve all had a fabulous summer and are looking forward to getting our new church year started. Don’t forget – this Sunday will be the final week of our summer service schedule, one service only at 10:00. Starting next Sunday, September 11th, we will be going back to two services at 9:00 & 11:00.
Calendar of upcoming events:Saturday, 9/10
Volunteer Opportunities:NEW VOLUNTEERS STILL NEEDED IN CHILDREN’S RE - The first day of RE classes is September 18th, and we still have some volunteer spots open that need to be filled! We have a very ambitious plan for this year that includes new curricula and program models as well as adding an 11:00 option for our 6th-7th graders and splitting our elementary classes into three groups rather than two to better address the developmental needs of our kids. Would you enjoy spending 1-2 Sundays per month with our vibrant young UUs? Teachers work in teams and serve as lead teacher just once per month, with lots of lesson and planning support, and also serve as assistant once per month. Assistants show up once a month on their designated Sundays to help out during class time. We have need of volunteers in the following areas:
This Week in RE:Final Summer Sunday: This Sunday will be the final week of our summer program. Preschoolers will celebrate their sense of taste, and elementary and up will visit France!
Announcements:NEW Youth Programs Kickoff Event, September 10: Youth in COA & YRUU (grades 8-12) and their parents are invited to a potluck pizza dinner on Saturday, Sept. 10th at 7pm in Forbes Hall for a movie night for the teens and an orientation to our youth programs for parents. Siblings are welcome too! Drinks and popcorn will be provided; please bring a pizza or pizza-party-friendly side dish to share. NEW RE Wish List: I am currently developing a “master wish list” for the RE program, which includes general and lesson-specific RE supply needs for this year’s classes. While the RE operating budget does have some money for supplies, this year’s budget is very tight and donations are happily accepted. The list so far includes: General Supplies: Drawing paper Large foam board Tea light candles Candle lighters Chart markers Flip chart paper (post-it or standard) Pipe cleaners Colored poster board pieces Backup snack supply Cheddar Bunnies (like goldfish crackers but with fewer preservatives, additives) Graham crackers, goldfish crackers okay as alternative Granola bars, rice cakes, other non-sugary dry good snacks NEW RE Books Wish List on Amazon: Another arm of the “master wish list” for the RE program, is an Amazon Wishlist of books that will be used in RE lessons for this year’s program or that will be valuable resources for teachers & families in our church. We do have some money budgeted for book purchases, but we are running on a tight RE budget since the congregation’s budget cutback a couple of years ago, and donations are happily accepted. If you’d like to help out by donating a book or two to the program, check out the Amazon list at http://tinyurl.com/rewishlist. (Used books in “good” condition are just fine!) THANK YOU to the members who have already sent books our way – they are so appreciated!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week: An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Family Rituals for Celebrating Back-to-School Days”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox) Front-Step Photos – Many parents take photos of their kids dressed up in new clothes, carrying new backpacks and lunchboxes, but posed in the same spot on the front steps. It’s wonderful to look at these photos over the years, and maybe even combine them into one collage. Bus Stop Party – Gail Spencer always starts out the year by providing juice and bagels to the 10 or so kids who wait at the bus stop with her kids. Pep Talk in Chalk – In Maryland, Kunni Biener used to wake up extra early on the first day, so she could write messages to her daughters on the sidewalk that led to their school. They giggled as they walked along reading “Good Luck!” and “Have Fun!” and when they reached high school, they started writing messages to each other in the street on the first day.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)August 31, 1740: John Frederick Oberlin was born. He was a simple village parson in Alsace, France, who was animated by his belief in universal salvation and, in consequence, belief in the triumph of universal good. He ran a village school that was noted for its nurturing spirit, especially toward girls. During the French Revolution, the reputation of Oberlin’s personal conduct spared him from anticlerical excess. Oberlin College in Ohio was named in his honor, although its founders never met him personally. September 1, 1844: Meadville Theological School formally opened in Meadville, Pennsylvania, as a school to train Unitarian ministers. Many believed that churches should not be solely dependent on Harvard Divinity School for ministerial training. September 2, 1578: Because of the growing influence of Socinianism, the University of Krakow, Poland, opened its doors to students of all religions. Before this day, the school admitted only Roman Catholics. September 3, 1654: English Parliament charged John Biddle for writing the Two-fold Catechism. Its Unitarian theology was seen as an affront to the Church of England. September 3, 1962: The celebrated American poet Edward Estlin (e. e.) Cummings, a Unitarian, died at age 67. September 4, 1848: Lewis Howard Latimer, an inventor, was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts. One of the founding members of the First Unitarian Church of Flushing, New York, he was the only African-American member of the Edison Pioneers, Thomas Edison’s engineering division of the Edison Company. Latimer was responsible for preparing the mechanical drawings for Alexander Graham Bell’s patent application for his telephone design. The author of many important inventions, particularly in the field of electrical lighting, Latimer died on December 11, 1928. September 5, 1794: Hosea Ballou was ordained on this day without advance notice or preparation. Although he had been a respected Universalist preacher for some time, he had never been ordained. In September 1794, he attended the Universalist General Convention in Oxford, Massachusetts. On the last day of the convention, he was in the pulpit with Elhanan Winchester, who was noted for his fiery preaching. As Winchester reached the climax of his sermon, he suddenly pressed the Bible against Ballou’s chest, crying out, “Brother Ballou, I press to your heart the written Jehovah!” and ordered a church elder, Joab Young, to “charge him.” Ballou was 23 years old. September 6, 1847: Transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau concluded his residence at Walden Pond, just outside Concord, Massachusetts, during which time he not only lived with great self-sufficiency but also kept a detailed journal and completed A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849). Thoreau’s book about his time on Walden Pond, Walden (1854), continues to have a profound impact on Unitarian Universalism to this day. May 6, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 5/8
Volunteer Opportunities:NEW Summer RE Programs: This summer we’ll reprise two of our favorite programs from years past, so this year’s crop of kids can enjoy them: our “elementary and up” program will spend the summer as “UU World Travelers,” exploring a different country each week, and our preschool class will celebrate a “Summer of Senses,” spending two weeks this summer on each of the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. The summer festivities will kick off on the last Sunday in June. And now’s the time to start filling in our volunteer slots. We need one leader and one assistant for each class. Can you help? We’ll make sure snacks and supplies are on hand, and provide a template and tips for planning the morning’s activities, and it’s up to you to share your passion for a particular sense or a country/culture in the ways that you find most exciting. This is a great toe-dipping opportunity if you’re considering teaching in our RE program, or if not it’s also a fabulous way to spend just one morning getting to know some of the youngest members of our community. The schedule for the summer is listed below. Pick your day before it gets grabbed by someone else! Contact catherinedre@yahoo.com or call 310-829-5436 x105 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “People Love Me” This week our preschool classes will think about the many people in their lives who love them, and how we can show our love to others. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Theodore Parker” (9:00): This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with a story from the childhood of Unitarian minister Theodore Parker about the voice of conscience in our hearts. “Maria Mitchell” (11:00): This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with the story of Maria Mitchell, a Unitarian woman who was the first woman to be a professional astronomer in the United States. She is best remembered for discovering a comet in 1847! 3rd--5th Grade: “Honor Life”: In this session, the children identify connections that form the interdependent web of an ecosystem and explore their own relationship with the natural world. We add the signpost "Honor Life" to our Faithful Journeys Path. 6th-7th Grade: “Islam Integration/Baha’i Introduction” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will wrap up their study of Islam and will begin an exploration of the Baha’i faith. Coming of Age (8th): This Sunday COA youth will continue crafting their service, and will continue working on personalized chalices to use in the service (and keep afterwards). It is very important, in these last few weeks leading up to COA Sunday, that all participants attend each Sunday. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 9:00 this week. This Sunday, the YRUU group will prepare for their role in the Coming of Age service to provide a welcome into YRUU.
Announcements:NEW Children’s Art Show at UUCCSM in July: I’m sure you’ve all admired the wonderful artwork on our Art Wall in Forbes Hall each month. Well, it’s our RE children’s turn! Beth Brownlie is coordinating a children’s art show for the Art Wall in July, and all children and youth at UUCCSM are encouraged to submit a work for inclusion. The theme for the show is “Living out our 7th Principle: Caring for our Earth. Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.” Recycled art is encouraged, but not required. Entry forms must be received by May 31, and artwork received by June 22 for inclusion in the show. We’ll have a special opening reception on Saturday, July 2, from 5-7pm. For more details about what and how to submit, see the flyer. NEW Tomato Cages Needed: Do you have any tomato cages that aren’t in use that you’d be willing to give or lend to us? We have fourteen tomato plants in our RE veggie garden at the church, and very soon they’ll need support. Please let me know if you can help us out with one or more cages. NEW Coming of Age Rehearsal: Parents of Coming-of-Agers, participants and teachers will be meeting at the church from 9:00 am – noon on Saturday, May 21st to rehearse the COA service. Everyone else, don’t miss this year’s celebration of the Coming of Age of Sam Cranis, Maxwell DeVita, Madeline Gordon, Chloe Hallinan, Priya Lacombe, Jesse Valore and Lucas Vincenzi on Sunday, May 22nd during each service! THIS SUNDAY Super Camp Sunday May 8th: What a wonderful gift it is to have our very own UU camp in the mountains! This summer, there are opportunities for kids and families to attend weeklong camps – see the announcement below for more details. For the Elementary/Jr. High camp, we are organizing a van trip up and back to save parents’ driving time, and hope to have 8-9 of our young people take advantage of the life-changing experience of camp at de Benneville Pines. See the flyer for more information. On May 8th, stop by the RE table during coffee hour to pick up registration forms for deBenneville summer Youth Camps (see announcement below for dates & links to more info). If you turn the forms and deposits in to us on or before the following Sunday, May 15th, you will receive a $35 discount on the cost of camp. RE Sunday, June 5th: RE Sunday is just around the corner, and I’m excited about engaging all in our RE program in putting it together, through class participation as well as individual contributions. In this year’s service we will take part in a special UU tradition, the Flower Communion, and we’ll celebrate the many gifts we each bring to our community and our world. VOLUNTEERS ARE NEEDED to help organize a teacher appreciation reception following each service. Please contact Catherine@uusm.org or call 310-829-5436 x105 if you can help. Pennies for Peace: Thank you to everyone who contacted me with information about Greg Mortenson’s Pennies for Peace organization. Last week 60 Minutes aired an expose that alleges mishandling of funds and fabrication of elements of Mortenson’s story. We will continue the RE Offering each week to collect pennies to donate to an organization that promotes peace. The RE Committee and church staff are reviewing the situation and will make a decision at the May 3rd RE meeting about where the money we raise will be donated. All are welcome to contact me or an RE Committee member with your thoughts about what should be done. Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended –sign up at church during coffee hour!), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Mother’s Day”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox)
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)May 5, 1751: Judith Sargent Stevens Murray was born in Glouchester, Massachusetts. With her father, Winthrop Sargent, and her first husband, John Stevens, she became influential in Universalist circles. Following Stevens’ death, she married Universalist minister John Murray. A noted essayist, playwright and poet, she also wrote on women’s issues and became a leader in progressive female education. Murray wrote the first Sunday school book for children, A Universalist Catechism (1762), for the American Universalist movement. When John Murray died in 1815, she finished the autobiography he had begun, which was published in 1816 as The Life of John Murray. She was a woman of creative genius who was at the forefront of Universalism. She died on July 6, 1820. May 5, 1819: William Ellery Channing preached the sermon “Unitarian Christianity,” known as the Baltimore Sermon, for the ordination and installation of Jared Sparks as the first minister of the First Independent Church of Baltimore. In 1912 the name was changed to First Unitarian Church. Only those in the first three pews could hear the sermon, which lasted for an hour and a half, because the acoustics were so bad. The sermon was transcribed into seven languages and circulated in many countries. One of the most influential sermons ever preached in America, the Baltimore Sermon served to unite religious liberals under the name Unitarian, which they had previously avoided. May 6, 1659: Richard Cromwell, the son of Oliver Cromwell and his successor as lord protector of England, was deposed when Charles II ascended the throne, ending the tolerance extended to Unitarians during the Commonwealth (1649-1660). May 6, 1769: William Emerson Jr. was born in Concord, Massachusetts. A descendant of a long line of ministers in the Boston area, he was first ordained and installed in rural Harvard, Massachusetts, but his pulpit eloquence and cultural activism in Boston led to a call to that city’s First Church (Unitarian). Thereafter, he became a Harvard College overseer and chaplain to the Massachusetts Senate. He edited a book of hymns and published many sermons and orations. His son was Ralph Waldo Emerson. After William Emerson’s death, the Boston Athenaeum bought his library, which became the core of its collection. Emerson died on May 11, 1811. May 6, 1829: Phebe Ann Coffin Hanaford was born on Nantucket Island in Massachusetts. A Quaker and descendant of the pilot of the Mayflower, she became a teacher and successful author of fiction, children’s books, and biographies. She was introduced to Universalism in Reading, Massachusetts, and joined the Reading Universalist Association of Liberal Ladies for Benevolent and Useful Work in 1866. Her friend Olympia Brown encouraged her to preach, and she became a licensed Universalist preacher. Ordained by the Hingham Universalist Church in Massachusetts on February 19, 1868, Hanaford became the first woman ordained to the Universalist ministry in New England and served a number of Universalist churches, often amidst controversy. She also worked for temperance, women’s suffrage, and the abolition of slavery. Hanaford put together a book of biographies of American women, which was first published as Women of the Century in 1876 and republished in 1882 as Daughters of America. Hanaford lived long enough to vote in the 1918 election in Basom, New York. She died on June 2, 1921. May 6, 1862: Henry David Thoreau, a Transcendentalist writer and naturalist, died at age 44 in Concord, Massachusetts. May 7, 1861: The famous Indian writer Rabindranath Tagore was born in Calcutta. He was from a wealthy Bengali family, studied law in England, and worked for Indian nationalism. Tagore produced 50 dramas, 100 books of verse, 40 volumes of novels, and many books of essays and philosophy. He denounced violence and urged the unity of all people. World famous, he won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 and was knighted in 1915. Tagore and his family were active in the Brahmo Samaj, a Unitarian form of Hinduism. He died in 1941. May 10, 1818: Paul Revere, an American patriot and Unitarian, died at age 83. April 29, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Friday, 4/29
Volunteer Opportunities:THIS SUNDAY RE Beach Cleanup on May 1st: We need adults who would like to spend a morning at the beach with us! Drivers and coordinators are needed to help us have an appropriate kid:adult ratio and to provide enough transportation to get everyone there. We’ll be heading out to the beach just north of the Santa Monica Pier following the Story for All Ages in the 9:00 service, and will return to UUCCSM at approximately 12:30. Can you help? Please contact Catherine for more information or to volunteer: 310-829-5436 x105 or Catherine@uusm.org. The permission forms and waiver forms are available online.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Flowers” This week our preschool classes will explore the beautiful and diverse world of flowers. K-7th & YRUU - Heal the Bay Beach Cleanup: Thus Sunday we will put our seventh UU principle into action by heading to Santa Monica Beach for a cleanup day with Heal the Bay. There will be a single full-morning trip. All who would like to participate are asked to come to church at 9:00; we anticipate returning to UUCCSM by 12:30. Alternate activities will be offered at church for those who choose not to go on the trip. The UUCCSM permission form and Heal the Bay waiver are attached to this email. Parents and RE teachers, would you like to come along and spend a couple of hours beautifying our beaches with the kids in our RE program? We especially need people who would be willing to serve as drivers for the trip. Contact Catherine (contact info above) to volunteer to help out. Coming of Age (8th): This Sunday COA youth will continue crafting their service, and will begin work on personalized chalices to use in the service (and keep afterwards). It is very important, in these last few weeks leading up to COA Sunday, that all participants attend each Sunday.
Announcements:NEW RE Sunday, June 5th: RE Sunday is just around the corner, and I’m excited about engaging all in our RE program in putting it together, through class participation as well as individual contributions. In this year’s service we will take part in a special UU tradition, the Flower Communion, and we’ll celebrate the many gifts we each bring to our community and our world. VOLUNTEERS ARE NEEDED to help organize a teacher appreciation reception following each service. Please contact Catherine@uusm.org or call 310-829-5436 x105 if you can help. NEW DETAILS Super Camp Sunday May 8th: What a wonderful gift it is to have our very own UU camp in the mountains! This summer, there are opportunities for kids and families to attend weeklong camps – see the announcement below for more details. For the Elementary/Jr. High camp, we are organizing a van trip up and back to save parents’ driving time, and hope to have 8-9 of our young people take advantage of the life-changing experience of camp at de Benneville Pines. See the attached flyer for more information. On May 8th, stop by the RE table during coffee hour to pick up registration forms for deBenneville summer Youth Camps (see announcement below for dates & links to more info). If you turn the forms and deposits in to us on or before the following Sunday, May 15th, you will receive a $35 discount on the cost of camp. Pennies for Peace: Thank you to everyone who contacted me with information about Greg Mortenson’s Pennies for Peace organization. Last week 60 Minutes aired an expose that alleges mishandling of funds and fabrication of elements of Mortenson’s story. We will continue the RE Offering each week to collect pennies to donate to an organization that promotes peace. The RE Committee and church staff are reviewing the situation and will make a decision at the May 3rd RE meeting about where the money we raise will be donated. All are welcome to contact me or an RE Committee member with your thoughts about what should be done. Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended –sign up at church during coffee hour!), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week: We join with the Earth Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “May Day”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox) The first day of May is a fascinating holiday because its history is so diverse. Centuries ago in Europe, it was celebrated as a spring festival and fertility rite, with feasting, crowning of May Queens. And dancing around a maypole. Devout religious types frowned on all the wild drinking and partying, including the Puritans who came to this country. What celebration is done in the U.S. today tends to be somewhat muted, though flowers still figure as am important element, and some schools and community groups erect maypoles. In Hawaii, May Day is “Lei Day,” and the local people drape one another with those colorful flower necklaces. Still another aspect is May Day’s association with workers’ rights: at the end of the 19th century, union organizers were fighting hard for the right to an eight-hour workday, and had May Day rallies in support of this. Here are some ideas for families who want to mold this background into traditions of their own.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)April 28, 1579: Faustus Socinus went to reside at Krakow, Poland, where he eventually became the leader of the Unitarian movement, formally called the Minor Reformed Church. April 29, 1733: Simeon Howard was born. He trained for the ministry at Harvard University and succeeded Jonathan Mayhew as minister of West Church (Unitarian) in Boston in 1767. He also married Mayhew’s widow. West Church was prosperous and known for its liberal views. During the Revolutionary War, the British tore the steeple off the church, housed soldiers inside, and forced Howard out of the city. He went to Nova Scotia, where he became a popular preacher, but he returned to West Church after the war and continued as its minister until his death in 1804 at the age of 71. Howard was noted as a man of deep piety and cheerful disposition. April 30, 1771: Hosea Ballou was born in Richmond, New Hampshire. Known as the “father of American Universalism,” he was reared Baptist and became a Universalist at age 19. He founded the Second Universalist Society in Boston and served as its first minister from 1817 to 1846. Ballou published catechisms as well as Notes on Parables (1804) and A Treatise on Atonement (1805), which recast universal salvation in terms of Unitarian divine benevolence rather than as a modification of Calvinist Trinitarianism. Ballou engaged in numerous religious controversies and edited theUniversalist Expositer with his great-nephew, Hosea Ballou 2d. He and John Murray are the most famous early organizers of American Universalism, although the details of their beliefs were not the same. May 1, 1933: The Humanist Manifesto was published. Signed by 36 prominent thinkers, among them scientists, philosophers, and academics, including seven Unitarian ministers and one Universalist minister, the Manifesto affirmed 14 points of religious humanism and became a rallying cry for liberal religious thinkers. May 3, 1912: May Sarton was born in Wondelgem, Belgium. Her family came to America to escape the Germans during World War II, and she was introduced to Unitarianism in Cambridge, Massachusetts, under the ministry of Samuel McChord Crothers. Although she never joined a Unitarian church, Sarton’s sentiments were Unitarian. Early in her life, Sarton wanted to be an actress, but poetry was her first love. Her 50 publications include the memoir I Knew a Phoenix (1954), the novel Faithful Are the Wounds (1955), and the poetry collection In Time Like Air (1958). Sarton lectured and read her poetry widely in Unitarian churches. When she announced publicly that she was a lesbian, she won acclaim from feminist circles. In 1982, she delivered the Ware Lecture, “The Values We Have to Keep,” at the General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association, and the Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation gave her the Ministry to Women Award. May Sarton died on July 16, 1995. May 4, 1796: Horace Mann was born in Franklin, Massachusetts. A Unitarian, he was a tutor in Latin and Greek at Brown University and a lawyer. Mann served in the Massachusetts House and Senate, advocating state hospitals for the insane, restriction of slavery, regulation of liquor sales, and educational reforms. He secured passage of a bill creating a state board of education and gave up a lucrative legal practice to become secretary to the board. In this position, he advocated establishment of teachers’ colleges, called normal schools, and led the fight for nonsectarian education with trained teachers paid adequately. In 1848 he went to Congress, filling the seat vacated by John Quincy Adams. Mann served as president of Antioch College from 1853 until his death on August 2, 1859. April 15, 2011Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for the “RE Offering” in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June. Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 4/17
Volunteer Opportunity:Easter Helpers Needed: Would you like to help with our Easter celebration on April 24th, hiding eggs or providing supervision for our after-service egg hunt? Contact Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x105 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Trees” This week our preschool class will learn about and celebrate trees! Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Maria Mitchell” (9:00): This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with the story of Maria Mitchell, a Unitarian woman who was the first woman to be a professional astronomer in the United States. She is best remembered for discovering a comet in 1847! “Theodore Parker” (11:00): This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with a story from the childhood of Unitarian minister Theodore Parker about the voice of conscience in our hearts. 3rd--5th Grade: “Passover”: In this session, participants will explore our sixth Principle, the goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all. We will affirm world community by experiencing games, crafts and food from cultures connected to our faith through the Partner Church program in Hungary, the Philippines and Poland . 6th-7th Grade: “Islam Field Trip” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their study of Islam with a trip to the Islamic Center of Southern California. 8th Grade: This week the Coming of Age class will be working on crafting their May 22rd service, with help from special visitor Rev. Ernie Pipes. We’re heading into the home stretch, and it is important that youth attend EVERY Sunday between now and May 22nd. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 11:00 this week. This Sunday, the YRUU group will host the visiting youth group from Neighborhood Church in Pasadena! Youth are invited to join the group on a post-service trip to Bagel Nosh.
Announcements:NEW Super Camp Sunday: On May 8th, stop by the RE table during coffee hour to pick up registration forms for deBenneville summer Youth Camps (see announcement below for dates & links to more info). If you turn the forms and deposits in to us on or before the following Sunday, May 15th, you will receive a $35 discount on the cost of camp. THIS SUNDAY Garden Project in K-5th RE at 9:00: On April 10th, Kindergarten-5th graders who come to the 9:00 service will participate with our YRUU youth in planting a vegetable garden at UUCSM! We are encouraging all K-5th families from 9:00 and 11:00 services to participate in this activity. Come early, if you usually come at 11:00, and stay for the whole morning (regular RE classes will be offered during the 11:00 service)! Donate a plant or two. Each class level is requested to bring certain types of plants, so that every class will have its very own garden plot.
Make sure to wear clothes you don’t mind getting dirty, and please bring shovels if you have any we can use for the morning. We’ll have a lot of young planters who need them! We also are looking for donations of soil or mulch. Please contact Beth Brownlie for details if you’d like to make a donation or help out. Easter: On Easter Sunday, April 24th, we will offer a special intergenerational service of celebration and reflection on the meaning of Easter for Unitarian Universalists. The day will culminate in a special egg hunt for RE children. I am looking for volunteers to hide eggs during the service and supervise the hunts. Can you help? Summer RE Programs: This summer we’ll reprise two of our favorite programs from years past, so this year’s crop of kids can enjoy them: our “elementary and up” program will spend the summer as “UU World Travelers,” exploring a different country each week, and our preschool class will celebrate a “Summer of Senses,” spending two weeks this summer on each of the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. The summer festivities will kick off on the last Sunday in June. We’ll begin recruiting volunteer leaders and assistants next month, but if you know already that you’d like to help out, feel free to claim your Sunday now! Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week: May I be safe May you be safe -Buddhist prayer, adapted by Susan Freudenthal Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Home-Based Weekly Rituals”: (from Why Not Celebrate by Sara Wenger Shenk)
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)April 17, 1648: John Webberly was imprisoned in Oxford, England, for translating and publishing Unitarian books. He remained in prison until his death. April 17, 1774: Theophilus Lindsey founded the Unitarian Society (now Essex Street Chapel) in London. The first services were held with 200 attending, including Benjamin Franklin, who joined the church. Many historians consider this the beginning of the Unitarian movement in England. The Unitarian Society was the first church in England organized on Unitarian principles. At that time it was a criminal offense in England to express Unitarian views. April 17, 1978: The pioneering Unitarian religious educator Sophia Lyon Fahs, who was ordained a minister when she was 82, died at age 101 in Hamilton, Ohio. April 18, 1827: The Boston Sunday School Society was organized in the Berry Street vestry of the Federal Street Church in Boston (now the Arlington Street Church). In 1868 the name was changed to the Unitarian Sunday School Society. April 19, 1813: Benjamin Rush, a physician, devout Universalist, and signed of the Declaration of Independence, died in Philadelphia at age 67. April 19, 1882: Charles Darwin, the Unitarian naturalist who formulated the theory of evolution, died at age 73. April 8, 2011Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for the “RE Offering” in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June. Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 4/10
Volunteer Opportunity:Easter Helpers Needed: Would you like to help with our Easter celebration on April 24th, hiding eggs or providing supervision for our after-service egg hunt? Contact Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x105 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Light” This week our preschool class will explore many different kinds of light, with special stories and activities designed to help us celebrate the wonderful properties of light. Kindergarten-5th Grade: Garden Planting with YRUU (9:00 only): See the announcement below for details about the RE vegetable garden project for this Sunday during the 9:00 service! Families are asked to bring trowels as well as plants to add to the garden plot behind the shade structure in our courtyard (plant requests by class in the announcement below). Don’t miss it! We’ll celebrate with a special “RE Salad” in June once our garden is ready for harvest. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “John Murray Comes to America” (11:00 only): This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with the story of John Murray, the founder of the first Universalist church in America, and Thomas Potter, a farmer who waited and waited for a preacher to come who would preach a Universalist message in his chapel. 3rd--5th Grade: “Build World Community”(11:00 only): In this session, participants will explore our sixth Principle, the goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all. We will affirm world community by experiencing games, crafts and food from cultures connected to our faith through the Partner Church program in Hungary, the Philippines and Poland . 6th-7th Grade: “Islam Visitor” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their study of Islam with a special visitor, Omar Haroon, who will talk about how he lives his faith as a Muslim. NEXT WEEK: field trip to Islamic Center of Southern California – details coming soon. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will continue crafting their Coming of Age service & working on their credo statements. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 9:00 this week. This Sunday, the YRUU group will lead our elementary RE program in our special vegetable garden project! Bring trowels, and young lettuce plants, and make sure to wear clothes you don’t mind getting dirty.
Announcements:THIS SUNDAY Garden Project in K-5th RE at 9:00: On April 10th, Kindergarten-5th graders who come to the 9:00 service will participate with our YRUU youth in planting a vegetable garden at UUCSM! We are encouraging all K-5th families from 9:00 and 11:00 services to participate in this activity. Come early, if you usually come at 11:00, and stay for the whole morning (regular RE classes will be offered during the 11:00 service)! Donate a plant or two. Each class level is requested to bring certain types of plants, so that every class will have its very own garden plot.
Make sure to wear clothes you don’t mind getting dirty, and please bring shovels if you have any we can use for the morning. We’ll have a lot of young planters who need them! We also are looking for donations of soil or mulch. Please contact Beth Brownlie for details if you’d like to make a donation or help out. Easter: On Easter Sunday, April 24th, we will offer a special intergenerational service of celebration and reflection on the meaning of Easter for Unitarian Universalists. The day will culminate in a special egg hunt for RE children. I am looking for volunteers to hide eggs during the service and supervise the hunts. Can you help? Youth Service: Three cheers for our YRUU youth for putting on a fabulous service on March 27th! It was a wonderfully meaningful service, exploring many different ways in which our youth have stepped out of their comfort zones. I was so inspired by how articulate and thoughtful (and exuberant!) our youth are. What a strong testament they are to the value of our UU community. Summer RE Programs: This summer we’ll reprise two of our favorite programs from years past, so this year’s crop of kids can enjoy them: our “elementary and up” program will spend the summer as “UU World Travelers,” exploring a different country each week, and our preschool class will celebrate a “Summer of Senses,” spending two weeks this summer on each of the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. The summer festivities will kick off on the last Sunday in June. We’ll begin recruiting volunteer leaders and assistants next month, but if you know already that you’d like to help out, feel free to claim your Sunday now! RE Planning for 2011-2012: Many developments are in the pipeline for next year! I’m so excited to see what’s on the horizon for us in the RE program at UUCCSM, and want to share some of the biggest elements with you now. Following a RE Teacher & Committee mini-retreat at the end of January and the subsequent RE Committee meeting, we have agreed that the K-2nd grade and 3rd-5thgrade classes struggle because of a developmental range that is too wide. For 2011-12, we will split those two groups into three, with K-1st, 2nd-3rd & 4th-5th grade classes. This means we will need an additional classroom space, and will need to recruit additional teachers, but we feel strongly that this will greatly improve kids’ and teachers’ experience in our classes. The K-1st grade class will continue with the Spirit Play program model currently being used in K-2nd grades. The 4th-5th grade class will be using a brand new curriculum being developed by Margot Page & Ian Dodd called “The UUniverse Story,” which engages kids in exploring the mystery and wonder of science and the world around us. We are in the beginning stages of developing a curriculum plan for the new 2nd-3rd grade class, but it will be a new program model based on a set of themes drawn from our church covenant, which will include a monthly rotation of active and engaging projects. The themes include Love, Truth, Service, Peace, Freedom, Fellowship and Covenant, and I am also working with Rebecca, the RE Committee and the Adult Programs Committee to consider ways in which these themes can be explored across all ages in the congregation next year. In addition to these changes in our class curricula, we will be expanding the Faith in Action element of our program, with FIA Sundays in RE monthly in 2011-12 (nearly doubled from this year’s program), and are looking forward to building ongoing relationships with a number of organizations which we’ll support through RE Faith in Action projects each year, including the Westside Food Bank, Heal the Bay, Common Ground and OPCC (Turning Point and Step Up on Second in particular). Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Easter”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox) Easter is the most important festival of the Christian church, and celebrates the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)April 7, 1780: William Ellery Channing, “the father of American Unitarianism,” was born in Newport, Rhode Island. He entered Harvard at age 15 and was a distinguished scholar throughout his life. On June 1, 1803, he was ordained at and became minister of the Federal Street Church, now the Arlington Street Church, in Boston. Despite an initial reluctance to divide the Standing Order, he took and active role in the Unitarian Controversy in Boston and created a stir with the sermon he preached at the ordination of Jared Sparks. The sermon, “Unitarian Christianity,” is also known as the Baltimore Sermon. Its clear points made it the central rationale for the Unitarian movement. Channing was instrumental in forming the American Unitarian Association, though he declined its presidency. He was a vigorous and influential preacher, who exerted much of his influence on behalf of associational organization and progressive social causes, especially opposition to slavery. His sermons were published widely and his collected works went through many editions. In 1820, Harvard awarded Channing a Doctorate of Divinity degree. A statue of him stands at one entrance to the Boston Public Gardens, facing the Arlington Street Church, which now uses his former pulpit. When the Library of Congress was built in Washington, D. C., his name was placed with “Theology” in the hallway decorations where the various disciplines are named. He died in Bennington, Vermont, on October 2, 1842. April 7, 1794: Unitarian Joseph Priestley sailed for America after his home, church, and laboratory were burned in Birmingham, England, in response to his liberal theology and support for the French Revolution. April 7, 1891: The showman Phineas Taylor (P.T.) Barnum, a devoted Universalist, died at age 80 in Philadelphia. April 8, 1652: The Rakovian Catechism was burned in London by the common hangman, signifying that its publication was a criminal offense. Translated into English by John Biddle, it espoused Unitarian doctrines that Parliament considered blasphemous and seditious because they contradicted the Church of England. April 9, 1959: The pioneering American architect Frank Lloyd Wright, and active Unitarian, died at age 89. April 10, 1866: The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was incorporated in New York City. Its founder was Henry Bergh, a member of All Souls Church (Unitarian) in that city. April 11, 1925: Viola Fauver Gregg Liuzzo was born in California, Pennsylvania. She was a Unitarian committed to education and economic justice. Active in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Liuzzo was arrested twice for civil rights activities and pleaded guilty both times. She went to Selma, Alabama, to join the march to Montgomery in support of voting rights for African-Americans after the murder of James Reeb, a Unitarian minister. OnMarch 25, 1965, the day that the marchers arrived in Montgomery, four men forced her car off the road and shot her. She died instantly. President Lyndon Baines Johnson and Martin Luther King, Jr. praised her martyrdom. A plaque in her memory hangs at Unitarian Universalist Association headquarters in Boston. Viola Liuzzo attended the First Unitarian Church of Detroit. April 13, 1743: Thomas Jefferson was born in Shadwell, Virginia. He served in the Virginia House of Burgesses, where he established a reputation as a patriot. As delegate to the Continental Congress (1775-1776), he drafted the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson also wrote the Statute for Religious Freedom of Virginia. In 1785 he became the U.S. minister to France. Upon his return to the United States in 1789, he was appointed secretary of state under George Washington, became vice president under John Adams, and served two terms as president of the United States. In retirement he founded the University of Virginia. Though never formally a member of a Unitarian church, Jefferson was a convinced Unitarian and wrote extensively in Unitarianism’s defense. He also prepared a Socinian edition of the Bible, known as the Jefferson Bible, which is still in use. April 13, 1895: The first conference of the Khasi Unitarians was held at Jowai, India. Seven villages were represented. April 1, 2011Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for the “RE Offering” in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June. Calendar of upcoming events:Friday, 4/1
Volunteer Opportunity:Easter Helpers Needed: Would you like to help with our Easter celebration on April 24th, hiding eggs and providing supervision for our after-service egg hunt? Contact Catherine@uusm.org or310-829-5436 x105 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Darkness” This week our preschool class will explore the special qualities of our world when it is nighttime. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “John Murray Comes to America” (9:00) This we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with the story of John Murray, the founder of the first Universalist church in America, and Thomas Potter, a farmer who waited and waited for a preacher to come who would preach a Universalist message in his chapel. “Thank You, Joseph” (11:00) This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with a story about Joseph Priestley, a Unitarian minister and scientist credited with discovering oxygen. 3rd--5th Grade: “Make Peace”: In this session, participants will explore the sixth Unitarian Universalist Principle, the goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all. We’ll hear about Adin Ballou, a Universalist Christian pacifist who helped establish the Hopedale Community, where members worked to create a new way of living based on the teachings of Jesus. And we’ll create peace pinwheels and sing songs that represent our hopes for peace in our world. 6th-7th Grade: “Islam Introduction” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will begin their exploration of Islam with an introduction to its central tenets, traditions and practice. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will continue crafting their Coming of Age service & working on their credo statements. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 8:30 this week for a special trip. This Sunday, the YRUU group will go on a tour of the Great Wall of Los Angeles, with UUCCSM member Rick Rhoads as our tour guide! Please come at 8:30, with your permission form in hand!
Announcements:NEW Garden Project in NEXT WEEK in K-5th RE at 9:00: On April 10th, Kindergarten-5th graders who come to the 9:00 service will participate with our YRUU youth in planting a vegetable garden at UUCSM! We are encouraging all K-5th families from 9:00 and 11:00 services to participate in this activity. Come early, if you usually come at 11:00, and stay for the whole morning (regular RE classes will be offered during the 11:00 service)! Donate a plant or two. Each class level is requested to bring certain types of plants, so that every class will have its very own garden plot.
Make sure to wear clothes you don’t mind getting dirty, and please bring shovels if you have any we can use for the morning. We’ll have a lot of young planters who need them! We also are looking for donations of soil or mulch. Please contact Beth Brownlie for details if you’d like to make a donation or help out. NEW Easter: On Easter Sunday, April 24th, we will offer a special intergenerational service of celebration and reflection on the meaning of Easter for Unitarian Universalists. The day will culminate in a special egg hunt for RE children. I am looking for volunteers to hide eggs during the service and supervise the hunts. Can you help? NEW Youth Service: Three cheers for our YRUU youth for putting on a fabulous service on March 27th! It was a wonderfully meaningful service, exploring many different ways in which our youth have stepped out of their comfort zones. I was so inspired by how articulate and thoughtful (and exuberant!) our youth are. What a strong testament they are to the value of our UU community. Summer RE Programs: This summer we’ll reprise two of our favorite programs from years past, so this year’s crop of kids can enjoy them: our “elementary and up” program will spend the summer as “UU World Travelers,” exploring a different country each week, and our preschool class will celebrate a “Summer of Senses,” spending two weeks this summer on each of the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. The summer festivities will kick off on the last Sunday in June. We’ll begin recruiting volunteer leaders and assistants next month, but if you know already that you’d like to help out, feel free to claim your Sunday now! RE Planning for 2011-2012: Many developments are in the pipeline for next year! I’m so excited to see what’s on the horizon for us in the RE program at UUCCSM, and want to share some of the biggest elements with you now. Following a RE Teacher & Committee mini-retreat at the end of January and the subsequent RE Committee meeting, we have agreed that the K-2nd grade and 3rd-5thgrade classes struggle because of a developmental range that is too wide. For 2011-12, we will split those two groups into three, with K-1st, 2nd-3rd & 4th-5th grade classes. This means we will need an additional classroom space, and will need to recruit additional teachers, but we feel strongly that this will greatly improve kids’ and teachers’ experience in our classes. The K-1st grade class will continue with the Spirit Play program model currently being used in K-2nd grades. The 4th-5th grade class will be using a brand new curriculum being developed by Margot Page & Ian Dodd called “The UUniverse Story,” which engages kids in exploring the mystery and wonder of science and the world around us. We are in the beginning stages of developing a curriculum plan for the new 2nd-3rd grade class, but it will be a new program model based on a set of themes drawn from our church covenant, which will include a monthly rotation of active and engaging projects. The themes include Love, Truth, Service, Peace, Freedom, Fellowship and Covenant, and I am also working with Rebecca, the RE Committee and the Adult Programs Committee to consider ways in which these themes can be explored across all ages in the congregation next year. In addition to these changes in our class curricula, we will be expanding the Faith in Action element of our program, with FIA Sundays in RE monthly in 2011-12 (nearly doubled from this year’s program), and are looking forward to building ongoing relationships with a number of organizations which we’ll support through RE Faith in Action projects each year, including the Westside Food Bank, Heal the Bay, Common Ground and OPCC (Turning Point and Step Up on Second in particular). Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Bedtime”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox) This is a great time to gently reconnect with your kids and prepare them for fear-free dreaming. Having a soothing, cuddly go-to-sleep ritual every night, preferably at close to the same time, vastly reduces bedtime battles.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)March 31, 1818: John Albion Andrew was born in Windham, Maine. He was reared orthodox but became Unitarian at the Church of the Disciples in Boston during the ministry of James Freeman Clarke. A lawyer, Andrew also visited prisons, took on many cases pro bono, and became an advocate of prison reform. He was an outspoken opponent of slavery, and became the governor or Massachusetts in 1860, after raising funds to support abolitionist John Brown’s family. Andrew also helped found the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, the first African-American fighting unit. A Transcendentalist, Andrew was active in the Unitarian denomination, often speaking at conferences and annual meetings. He died on October 30, 1867. March 31, 1889: The Universalist General Convention ordained Joseph H. Jordan as the first African-American Universalist minister. The ordination took place at Church of the Messiah (Universalist) in Philadelphia, with Edwin Sweetser preaching. April 2, 1652: The British House of Commons ordered the Rakovian Catechism burned. The Rakovian Catechism, from the Socinians, was translated into English by John Biddle and circulated widely. It espoused Unitarian doctrines and was judged by Parliament to be blasphemous and seditious because it undermined the Church of England. April 3, 1856: St. Lawrence University was founded in Canton, New York, by the New York Universalist Educational Society. Although St. Lawrence has expanded beyond its denominational function, the Society still uses its assets to support education for Unitarian Universalist seminarians in the study of Universalism. Canton Theological School closed in 1965, having awarded 410 bachelor of divinity degrees and issued 67 certificates in the art of religious education. April 4, 1802: Dorothea Lynde Dix was born in Hampden, Maine. At age 12, she went to Boston to live with her grandmother, where she became a teacher. She wrote several school texts, Hymns for Children (1825), Meditations for Private Hours (1828), and American Moral Tales for Young Persons (1832). Although she refused to speak in public, she enlisted prominent spokesmen and wrote documents for them to present. Dix also worked for prison reform and founded the first public hospitals for paupers and the mentally disabled. The U.S. government appointed her supervisor of female nurses during the Civil War. She was instrumental in building 32 hospitals in the United States and Europe. The last five years of Dix’s life were spent as a guest in the New Jersey State Asylum at Trenton, one of the hospitals she had build, and it afforded her a home for her declining years. She had strong Unitarian connections through her friendship with William Ellery Channing, the minister of the Arlington Street Church in Boston. She was also good friends with William Rathbone, a noted Unitarian philanthropist. Dix especially appreciated the Unitarian emphasis on the goodness of God, purity of heart, openness to new knowledge, and responsibility for the welfare of all society. She died on July 17, 1887. March 23, 2011Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for the “RE Offering” in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June. Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 3/27 Volunteer Opportunity:NEW Easter Helpers Needed: Would you like to help with our Easter celebration on April 24th, hiding eggs and providing supervision for our after-service egg hunt? Contact Catherine@uusm.orgor 310-829-5436 x105 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Air” This week our preschool class will explore the air around us and its many wonderful qualities. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Thank You, Joseph” (9:00) This week we continue our focus on our UU Heritage with a story about Joseph Priestley, a Unitarian minister and scientist credited with discovering oxygen. “Francis David” (11:00) This we begin our focus on our UU Heritage with a story about the only Unitarian king in history, and the Unitarian minister, Francis David, who served as his advisor. 3rd-12th Grade: All are invited to attend the YRUU Sunday service with their families; no separate RE classes will be offered for these ages. See announcement below for more information about the service.
Announcements:NEW YRUU Sunday Service this Week: Join YRUU, the high school group, this Sunday at 9:00 & 11:00, for their annual service, “Stepping Our of Your Comfort Zone.” Comfort zones are comfortable because you know what to expect! To grow and develop, we need to step out of our comfort zone and experience things in a new way. YRUU youth will share thoughts and experiences from recent interaction with the homeless in San Francisco and Santa Monica, as well as other experiences of transcending comfortable boundaires -- and will reflect on what those experiences have taught them about themselves. Don’t miss it! RE in the cottage will be offered for nursery, preschool and K-2nd grades only; all others are invited to attend the service with their families. NEW Summer RE Programs: This summer we’ll reprise two of our favorite programs from years past, so this year’s crop of kids can enjoy them: our “elementary and up” program will spend the summer as “UU World Travelers,” exploring a different country each week, and our preschool class will celebrate a “Summer of Senses,” spending two weeks this summer on each of the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. The summer festivities will kick off on the last Sunday in June. We’ll begin recruiting volunteer leaders and assistants next month, but if you know already that you’d like to help out, feel free to claim your Sunday now! UU Pals Continues! This week will be our final Sunday of the UU Pals program. Please don’t forget to bring a small note or gift to put in your pal’s bag, and make sure to check your bag! If you have any questions about the program or will be away on Sunday and need help making sure your pal’s bag won’t be empty, please contact Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x105. Please don’t disappoint your pal! Conversely, if on any Sunday you do not receive anything in your bag, please let me know right away so I can follow up with your pal. RE Planning for 2011-2012: Many developments are in the pipeline for next year! I’m so excited to see what’s on the horizon for us in the RE program at UUCCSM, and want to share some of the biggest elements with you now. Following a RE Teacher & Committee mini-retreat at the end of January and the subsequent RE Committee meeting, we have agreed that the K-2nd grade and 3rd-5thgrade classes struggle because of a developmental range that is too wide. For 2011-12, we will split those two groups into three, with K-1st, 2nd-3rd & 4th-5th grade classes. This means we will need an additional classroom space, and will need to recruit additional teachers, but we feel strongly that this will greatly improve kids’ and teachers’ experience in our classes. The K-1st grade class will continue with the Spirit Play program model currently being used in K-2nd grades. The 4th-5th grade class will be using a brand new curriculum being developed by Margot Page & Ian Dodd called “The UUniverse Story,” which engages kids in exploring the mystery and wonder of science and the world around us. We are in the beginning stages of developing a curriculum plan for the new 2nd-3rd grade class, but it will be a new program model based on a set of themes drawn from our church covenant, which will include a monthly rotation of active and engaging projects. The themes include Love, Truth, Service, Peace, Freedom, Fellowship and Covenant, and I am also working with Rebecca, the RE Committee and the Adult Programs Committee to consider ways in which these themes can be explored across all ages in the congregation next year. In addition to these changes in our class curricula, we will be expanding the Faith in Action element of our program, with FIA Sundays in RE monthly in 2011-12 (nearly doubled from this year’s program), and are looking forward to building ongoing relationships with a number of organizations which we’ll support through RE Faith in Action projects each year, including the Westside Food Bank, Heal the Bay, Common Ground and OPCC (Turning Point and Step Up on Second in particular). Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Honoring Special People in the Lives of Families”: (from How to Bury a Goldfish by Virginia Lang & Louise Nayer) There is always enough love to go around. Many of us remember special adults from our childhood who were not relatives, but who visited us and gave us special attention. Perhaps they played blocks with us upstairs, read us stories, taught us how to French braid our hair, or babysat from time to time. Families can be quite insular, protective, and sometimes jealous of outside influences, but when a trusted close friend enters a family, wonderful exchanges can happen. The children receive more love, and the parents get needed breaks from the demands of family life. We can honor these special people for all they do for the children and the whole family. We can also remind our families how important they are to the lives of special friends. This ritual is one way to honor these friends and welcome the into the family. –L.N.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)March 23, 1657: Richard Coppin was arrested a second time for preaching Universalism. One of the first two Englishmen known to have preached universal salvation, he was arrested under a 1648 statute that required belief in future judgment: “Those who held to the final salvation of all people shall be seized and imprisoned until they give assurance that they will teach such doctrine no more.” There was an outcry against the law, and Coppin was released. Some sources say he was executed after 1659, others that he lived on without notoriety. His works were reprinted in the 1700’s and vigorously denounced by James Relly, who used other methods to derive his own theology of universal salvation. March 24, 1935: Caroline Julia Bartlett Crane died at the age of 76. She was a Unitarian minister and activist for public kindergarten and urban sanitation. March 24, 1882: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, an American poet and Unitarian, died at age 75 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. March 25, 1525: Laelius Socinus was born in Sienna, Tuscany, Italy. He was expected to study law as many in his family had, but he was seized with the reforming spirit of his day and studied the scriptures instead. He found them so different from the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church that he became a disciple of Michael Servetus and Bernardino Ochino. A Latin scholar, Socinus wanted to study the Bible in Greek as well. His views led him, with his nephew Faustus Socinus, to the formation of Socinianism. In Venice he met with about 40 others who embraced the principles of the Reformation. He left Italy in 1547, fearing for his safety because of his radical religious views. He traveled in France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland, where he became acquainted with Sebastian Castellio and encountered constant opposition to his anti-Trinitarian opinions. Although Laelius Socinus left numerous writings, his main influence was through his nephew Faustus. Laelius’ brother Camillus also embraced the principles of the Reformation and carried his views much further than the leading reformers of his day. Laelius Socinus died in his prime at age 37 of May 14, 1562. March 25, 1881: Bela Bartok was born in Nagyszentmiklos, Hungary. He was an outstanding composer, but his greatest passion was for Hungarian peasant songs. Bartok was professor of piano at Budapest Academy, but his anti-Fascist stance during World War II forced him to leave Hungary for the United States, where he died in 1945. Still beloved in Hungary, he is an honorary member of the Hungarian Parliament. Bartok was an ardent Unitarian and his son served as president of the Hungarian Unitarians. March 25, 1965: Viola Fauver Gregg Liuzzo was murdered in Selma, Alabama, at the age of 39. She was in Alabama to participate in the freedom march between Selma and Montgomery, lef by Martin Luther King, Jr., to secure voting rights for African-Americans. March 27, 1813: Nathaniel Currier was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts. With James Merritt Ives, he produced highly popular lithographs and prints. They showed typical scenes and events in American family life, decorated with lively young men and women. Both their sons succeeded to the business. Nathaniel Currier, a Unitarian, died on November 20, 1888. March 28, 1841: At the suggestion of Unitarian minister William Ellery Channing, Dorothea Dix made her first visit to a prison, experiencing such a strong revulsion that she devoted the rest of her life to institutional reform for both convicts and persons with mental illness. March 18, 2011Traffic Warning: Sun, Mar 20. Many roads in Santa Monica and Los Angeles will be closed for the LA Marathon on Sunday. Please consulthttp://www.lamarathon.com/ for road closures and plan an alternate route to UUSM as needed. Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for the “RE Offering” in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June.
Calendar of upcoming events:Friday, 3/18
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Water” This week our preschool class will explore the many wonderful properties of water. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Francis David” (9:00) This we begin our focus on our UU Heritage with a story about the only Unitarian king in history. “Our Church Lesson” (11:00) This week’s story will help us think about the way in which our church is like a chalice. 3rd--5th Grade: “No Ruz”: This week our classes will learn about the Persian New Year celebration of No Ruz. Festivities will include the Haft-Sin table, jumping the “fire,” and special snacks that all begin with the letter S! 6th-7th Grade: “Christianity Wrap-Up” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will conclude their exploration of many different varieties of Christianity. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will continue crafting their Coming of Age service. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at a special time this week in order to have enough time to rehearse next week’s YRUU service – will meet at 10:00. This is it – the final run-through of next week’s YRUU service! Please make sure to attend and take part in this important opportunity to show our whole congregation what YRUU is all about!
Announcements:NEW UU Pals Continues! This week will be our second Sunday of the UU Pals program. Please don’t forget to bring a small note or gift to put in your pal’s bag, and make sure to check your bag! If you have any questions about the program or will be away on Sunday and need help making sure your pal’s bag won’t be empty, please contact Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x105. Please don’t disappoint your pal! Conversely, if on any Sunday you do not receive anything in your bag, please let me know right away so I can follow up with your pal. RE Planning for 2011-2012: Many developments are in the pipeline for next year! I’m so excited to see what’s on the horizon for us in the RE program at UUCCSM, and want to share some of the biggest elements with you now. Following a RE Teacher & Committee mini-retreat at the end of January and the subsequent RE Committee meeting, we have agreed that the K-2nd grade and 3rd-5thgrade classes struggle because of a developmental range that is too wide. For 2011-12, we will split those two groups into three, with K-1st, 2nd-3rd & 4th-5th grade classes. This means we will need an additional classroom space, and will need to recruit additional teachers, but we feel strongly that this will greatly improve kids’ and teachers’ experience in our classes. The K-1st grade class will continue with the Spirit Play program model currently being used in K-2nd grades. The 4th-5th grade class will be using a brand new curriculum being developed by Margot Page & Ian Dodd called “The UUniverse Story,” which engages kids in exploring the mystery and wonder of science and the world around us. We are in the beginning stages of developing a curriculum plan for the new 2nd-3rd grade class, but it will be a new program model based on a set of themes drawn from our church covenant, which will include a monthly rotation of active and engaging projects. The themes include Love, Truth, Service, Peace, Freedom, Fellowship and Covenant, and I am also working with Rebecca, the RE Committee and the Adult Programs Committee to consider ways in which these themes can be explored across all ages in the congregation next year. In addition to these changes in our class curricula, we will be expanding the Faith in Action element of our program, with FIA Sundays in RE monthly in 2011-12 (nearly doubled from this year’s program), and are looking forward to building ongoing relationships with a number of organizations which we’ll support through RE Faith in Action projects each year, including the Westside Food Bank, Heal the Bay, Common Ground and OPCC (Turning Point and Step Up on Second in particular). Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
Pennies for Peace: We are asking children and youth to bring pennies in to their RE classes each week for the “Pennies for Peace” offering to bring peace to our world through education and literacy. To date, “Pennies for Peace” has generated funds to build more than 130 schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan. So if you see a penny, pick it up, and bring it to church on Sunday – we’ll make sure it goes to good use!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “First Day of Spring”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox) - The official beginning of spring, March 20 or 21, is marked by the vernal equinox, when the sun crosses the equator from south to north. Some fresh ways to mark this joyful transition:
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)March 18, 1568: The Act of Religious Freedom and Conscience (Edict of Torda) was issued by Prince John Sigismund of Transylvania, assuring religious freedom in his principality. March 18, 1869: Arthur Neville Chamberlain was born in Birmingham, England. He came from a Unitarian family and his father, Joseph Chamberlain, was a distinguished statesman. Neville maintained a loose connection with the Unitarian church. He served the government as lord mayor of Birmingham, chancellor of the exchequer, and minister for health. In 1937 he became prime minister and pursued a policy of appeasement toward the new German chancellor, Adolph Hitler. This policy came under fire when Hitler launched World War II. Chamberlain’s government fell, and he died within the year. Subsequent thinking has shown him in a more favorable light as England was ill-prepared for war. Chamberlain died on November 9, 1940. March 19, 1652: Richard Coppin, a student at Oxford University in England, stood trial for his belief in universal salvation. He was expelled from the university. March 19, 1899: Margaret Barr was born in Menston in Warfedale, Yorkshire, England. She devoted her life to working with the Unitarians in the Khasi Hills, in the state of Meghalaya in northeast India. Her work stressed education so that poor people could have their own leaders, schoolteachers, midwives, and health care workers. She opened her first school in Shillong in the 1930s. Barr’s main support came from the English, but the Canadian Unitarians and the Unitarian Universalist Association offered help as well. In 1972 the Kong (Sister) Barr Memorial Hospital opened in Kharang, and Khasi Unitarians remember Margaret Barr with affection. She was greatly inspired by Mohandas Gandhi, whom she met many times. She died on August 11, 1973. March 20, 1727: Sir Isaac Newton, a celebrated English mathematician and Unitarian, died at age 84 and was buried in Westminster Abbey, London. March 21, 1844: Ezra Abbot, an American Unitarian scholar, died. He served on the American Bible Revision Committee, which was charged with producing an American edition of the Bible to replace the King James Version. March 21, 1965: More than 3,000 civil rights marchers left Selma, Alabama, for Montgomery to urge passage of the Voting Rights Act. Four days later, more than 25,000 people entered Montgomery. This successful march followed the tragic events surrounding “Bloody Sunday.” More than 125 Unitarian Universalist ministers participated in the marches (including UUCCSM’s own Rev. Ernie Pipes!). March 11, 2011Daylight Savings Time starts this Sunday – don’t forget to set your clocks FORWARD an hour on Saturday night! Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for the “RE Offering” in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June. Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 3/13 This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Birds” This week our preschool class will explore the many wonderful kinds of birds that share our Earth with us. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “How Ganesh Got His Name” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional story about the Hindu god Ganesh. “Nasruddin and the Stolen Smells” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional Sufi wisdom tale about Mullah Nasruddin. 3rd--5th Grade: “Get Involved”: This week students will explore how children can affirm and promote our fifth Unitarian Universalist Principle, the right of conscience and the use of democratic process. We will learn about our Association's leadership role in contemporary justice issues and the impact Unitarian Universalist children and adults had when they sent thousands of handmade valentines to California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to promote marriage equality. We can all make a difference! 6th-7th Grade: “Mormon Field Trip” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of the Church of Latter Day Saints with a trip to the Mormon Church in Westwood for a worship service and to visit the new multimedia visitors center at the nearby Temple. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will continue crafting their Coming of Age service. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 9:00. This is it – time for final creation of the YRUU Sunday service on March 27th. Please make sure to attend and take part in this important opportunity to show our whole congregation what YRUU is all about!
Announcements:NEW RE Planning for 2011-2012: Many developments are in the pipeline for next year! I’m so excited to see what’s on the horizon for us in the RE program at UUCCSM, and want to share some of the biggest elements with you now. Following a RE Teacher & Committee mini-retreat at the end of January and the subsequent RE Committee meeting, we have agreed that the K-2nd grade and 3rd-5th grade classes struggle because of a developmental range that is too wide. For 2011-12, we will split those two groups into three, with K-1st, 2nd-3rd & 4th-5th grade classes. This means we will need an additional classroom space, and will need to recruit additional teachers, but we feel strongly that this will greatly improve kids’ and teachers’ experience in our classes. The K-1st grade class will continue with the Spirit Play program model currently being used in K-2nd grades. The 4th-5th grade class will be using a brand new curriculum being developed by Margot Page & Ian Dodd called “The UUniverse Story,” which engages kids in exploring the mystery and wonder of science and the world around us. We are in the beginning stages of developing a curriculum plan for the new 2nd-3rd grade class, but it will be a new program model based on a set of themes drawn from our church covenant, which will include a monthly rotation of active and engaging projects. The themes include Love, Truth, Service, Peace, Freedom, Fellowship and Covenant, and I am also working with Rebecca, the RE Committee and the Adult Programs Committee to consider ways in which these themes can be explored across all ages in the congregation next year. In addition to these changes in our class curricula, we will be expanding the Faith in Action element of our program, with FIA Sundays in RE monthly in 2011-12 (nearly doubled from this year’s program), and are looking forward to building ongoing relationships with a number of organizations which we’ll support through RE Faith in Action projects each year, including the Westside Food Bank, Heal the Bay, Common Ground and OPCC (Turning Point and Step Up on Second in particular). Second Sunday Supper – a Special Opportunity for Fun, Food & Fellowship for all Ages: Food Revolution Second Sunday Supper, March 13, sponsored by the UUCCSM Green Living Committee. Cooking Demo at 5pm by Farmer’s Market inspired Chef, Shaheda, using local ingredients and presentation by Jennifer Piette of Out of the Box Collective, a food delivery service focused on local products and supporting local farmers. Potluck at 6pm: Bring your favorite side dish that is local, organic, home-cooked, or healthy. Please bring and share your recipes. The GLC will be providing drinks and vegetarian main dish. As a special treat, we are celebrating the birthdays of those born in January, February and March. Come see your cake and eat it too! Join the conversation about how to improve our health and the health of the earth by changing the way we eat. We would like this event to be TRASHLESS: Bring your own plates, cups, utensils, and cloth napkins. Show off your wares! (We will have extra dishes if needed or you cannot bring your own.) Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
Pennies for Peace: We are asking children and youth to bring pennies in to their RE classes each week for the “Pennies for Peace” offering to bring peace to our world through education and literacy. To date, “Pennies for Peace” has generated funds to build more than 130 schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan. So if you see a penny, pick it up, and bring it to church on Sunday – we’ll make sure it goes to good use! VolunteerSpot Snack Signups Coming Soon: Parents, as part of our support for our dedicated teachers, the RE Committee and I feel that we should not be asking teachers to bring snacks to class every week in addition to planning lessons and gathering supplies. We’d like to ask parents to step forward and volunteer to bring a simple snack for your child’s class. If everyone helps out, it will only require that each family sign up for a couple of Sundays between now and June in order for us to fill the rest of the program year. I am creating a snack schedule through the VolunteerSpot website, and you will be getting an invitation in the next week to sign up to help.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
We join with the earth and with each other. To bring new life to the land To renew the forests We join with the earth and with each other. To celebrate the seas We join with the earth and with each other. To recreate the human community We join with the earth and with each other. -U.N. Environmental Sabbath Program Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Children’s Just Desserts”: (adapted from Why Not Celebrate y Sara Wenger Shenk) - What can be done to strengthen families so that children will have the inner strength to counter the forces that undermine our best efforts? Here is a sample list of “Children’s Just Desserts” which we could try to infuse into our family life. Perhaps pinning such a list up onto a bulletin board or refrigerator for weekly reference could be one small way of reminding ourselves about what is truly important for our children. Each family could compose its own list together and revise it from time to time. Perhaps an accompanying “Parents’ Just Desserts” list could be generated too!
What would your family’s list include?
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)March 10, 1660: A conference between Roman Catholics and Unitarians took place at Roznow, Poland. Andrew Wissowatius took the lead for the Unitarians. July 10 of the same year had been fixed as the date by which all Unitarians who refused to conform to the Catholic religion would have to leave the country. John Szafraniec Wieolopolski, a senator of the kingdom, presided over the conference. He said, “If all Hell had been let loose, the whole infernal host could not have defended the cause of the Socinians more valiantly than Wissowatius had done, standing alone.” The Unitarians lost the debate and they were forced to leave the kingdom in what became known as the Great Exile. March 11, 1965: James Reeb, a Unitarian minister, died in Selma, Alabama, after a civil rights march. Two days earlier, segregationists had attacked Reeb and the two ministers he was with, hitting Reeb on the head with a club. He was one of more than 125 Unitarian Universalist ministers who answered Martin Luther King’s call to march in support of voting rights for black Americans. Two other civil rights activists were killed during the Selma protest – Jimmy Lee Jackson, an African-American farm laborer and church deacon, and Viola Liuzzo, a Unitarian Universalist layperson from Detroit. March 13, 1733: Joseph Priestley was born in Fieldhead, Yorkshire, England. He was educated for the Dissenting ministry and became an outstanding theologian. He wrote many books on religion, including the influential History of the Corruptions of Christianity (1782), which Thomas Jefferson credited with his conversion to Unitarianism. Priestley also became a successful preacher, despite a marked and painful stutter. However, he is best known for chemistry, the hobby he took up in his mid-thirties. He took part in a group of accomplished liberal religious thinkers (called the Lunar Society because it met when the full moon promoted safe travel) who also engaged in science. Priestley is credited with a number of discoveries, including oxygen and a method of curing scurvy at sea, which was used by Captain Cook on his voyages. His inventions included anesthesia, carbonated water, and pencil erasers. Supported in these interests by his wife’s brothers, Priestley made his inventions available to the public and received no money for any of them. Priestley’s major ministries were in Leeds and Birmingham in England, and then in Philadelphia. He taught at Warrington Academy, a Unitarian school for training ministers and a predecessor of Harris Manchester College at Oxford. There he conducted many of his scientific experiments and wrote science textbooks. Extremely liberal in his politics, Priestley was forced to leave England for America in 1794 after a mob burned his home and laboratory over his support for the principles of the French Revolution. He received numerous honors during his lifetime. Priestley died on February 6, 1804. [Catherine’s note: Joseph Priestley makes an appearance on our presently inaccessible mural upstairs. Once construction is done, we’ll be able to take a look at him again! His dual role as minister and scientist is depicted through clothing him on one side in a lab coat and holding a beaker of chemicals, and on the other side he wears a minister’s robe and holds a Bible.] March 13, 1906: Susan Brown Anthony, a Unitarian and American leader for women’s suffrage, died at age 86. March 14, 1571: Prince John Sigismund of Transylvania died at age 30 from injuries in a horse-riding accident. He was a champion of Unitarianism and religious toleration in Transylvania. March 14, 1583: Faustus Socinus debated former Jesuit Christian Francken on the honor due Christ. Like Frandis David, Francken considered God alone to be due worship, and not Christ. Francken’s debating style was reportedly abrupt and impetuous. Socinus answered in so scholarly and thorough a manner that Francken conceded defeat and withdrew. March 14, 1945: The American Unitarian Association voted to establish fellowships, or lay-led groups. The fellowship movement encouraged individualism and in many cases stressed social commitment. Although many fellowships grew into churches, many preferred their lay status and its varying forms of worship. Munroe Husbands and Lon Ray Call guided the movement. Call had notices during his pastorate in Louisville, Kentucky, that several small churches continued with lay leadership after they could no longer support clergy. From 1948 to 1958 the number of people joining fellowships accounted for one third of the denomination’s increase in membership. March 4, 2011Children and youth are invited to bring pennies for a new RE Offering in their classes, raising funds for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This offering will be a regular part of our RE classes through the end of the program year in June. Adults are also invited to participate by bringing pennies for the Pennies for Peace tins which will be available in Forbes Hall during coffee hour. Calendar of upcoming events:Friday, 3/4
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Fish” This week our preschool class will explore the wonderful underwater world of fish. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “How Ganesh Got His Elephant Head” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional story about the Hindu god Ganesh. “Nasruddin Feeds His Coat” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional Sufi wisdom tale about Mullah Nasruddin. 3rd--5th Grade: “Mardi Gras”: This week students will take part in an exploration of Mardi Gras and the beginning of Lent. 6th-7th Grade: “Mormon Visitor” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of the Church of Latter Day Saints with a special visitor. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will view Coming of Age services from past years as they begin to craft their own service plan. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 11:00. YRUU youth are invited to gather to discuss plans for the upcoming YRUU service in March!
Announcements:LAST CHANCE TO SIGN UP ON SUNDAY: UU Pals is Coming!
NEW Second Sunday Supper – a Special Opportunity for Fun, Food & Fellowship for all Ages: Food Revolution Second Sunday Supper, March 13, sponsored by the UUCCSM Green Living Committee. Cooking Demo at 5pm by Farmer’s Market inspired Chef, Shaheda, using local ingredients and presentation by Jennifer Piette of Out of the Box Collective, a food delivery service focused on local products and supporting local farmers. Potluck at 6pm: Bring your favorite side dish that is local, organic, home-cooked, or healthy. Please bring and share your recipes. The GLC will be providing drinks and vegetarian main dish. As a special treat, we are celebrating the birthdays of those born in January, February and March. Come see your cake and eat it too! Join the conversation about how to improve our health and the health of the earth by changing the way we eat. We would like this event to be TRASHLESS: Bring your own plates, cups, utensils, and cloth napkins. Show off your wares! (We will have extra dishes if needed or you cannot bring your own.) NEW Let’s Go to Camp this Summer! de Benneville Pines Summer Camp Registration Open: Flyers and registration information for this year’s Summer Camps at our lovely UU camp in the mountains are now available online. UUCCSM has its own church camp weekend in June each year (HIGHLY recommended – be on the lookout for signups at church later this spring), but there are many more opportunities to go to camp for people of all ages throughout the summer. See below or check out the full roster of programs at http://www.uucamp.org. What is Camp de Benneville Pines? This year is the 50th anniversary of our UU district’s (including SoCal, Arizona and part of Nevada) ownership of the camp located in the Barton Flats area of the San Bernardino National Forest, about 90 miles east of Los Angeles. At an elevation of 6,800 feet, the camp is surrounded by a forest of towering pines, cedars, and oaks. The mission of Camp de Benneville Pines is to provide a mountain retreat where Unitarian Universalist principles and values are lived and celebrated in community.
Pennies for Peace: Beginning this week, we will be adding a “Children’s Offering” to our program, to take place weekly in each RE class. We are asking children and youth to bring pennies in to church each week for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to bring peace to our world through education and literacy. To date, this program has generated funds to build more than 130 schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan. So if you see a penny, pick it up, and bring it to church on Sunday – we’ll make sure it goes to good use! VolunteerSpot Snack Signups Coming Soon: Parents, as part of our support for our dedicated teachers, the RE Committee and I feel that we should not be asking teachers to bring snacks to class every week in addition to planning lessons and gathering supplies. We’d like to ask parents to step forward and volunteer to bring a simple snack for your child’s class. If everyone helps out, it will only require that each family sign up for a couple of Sundays between now and June in order for us to fill the rest of the program year. I am creating a snack schedule through the VolunteerSpot website, and you will be getting an invitation in the next week to sign up to help. UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Family Worship”: (adapted from Rejoice Together by Helen Pickett) Some 200 years ago, when Unitarianism and Universalism were new in North America, prayers were part of the family’s daily ritual. Gradually, we have let go of this practice. Though some UU families still say grace at meals or encourage children to say bedtime prayers, even these simple customs have been largely abandoned. In the Handbook of Religious Services, the Rev. Robert L’H. Miller wrote:
How can Unitarian Universalist families create our own occasions for religious observance? Here are some ideas and suggestions to stimulate your creativity. Around the Dinner Table: Try to find at least one time during the week when the whole family can sit down for a meal together. It may turn out to be a weekend breakfast instead of an evening meal. If you gather regularly around the dinner table, you have more opportunities for the simple observances that can make the time together meaningful for all. Lighting a Chalice or a Candle: You can make your own chalice by placing a small votive candle in a shallow bowl. When you sit down together, take turns lighting the chalice and saying special words. Or simply say: Today, I’m thankful for... This flame is to help us remember... Today, I’m thinking about... This day is important to me because... Saying Grace: Choose a table grace to say together. Or your families can collect lines of poetry or other readings that are meaningful to you. Take turns saying grace in your own words, or hold hands around the table for a silent grace, passing around a hand-squeeze to say, “Amen.” Celebrating Milestones and Special Occasions: Birthdays, of course! In addition to your usual practices, add a few minutes to reflect on the past year and share favorite memories of, by, or about the birthday person, ways in which she/he has grown or wishes and hopes for the coming year. Birthdays of Famous Persons: Choose a “famous UU birthday” to celebrate each month. Let various members of the family be responsible for decorations, food, and appropriate stories, readings, or songs. If a cake with candles makes it Happy Birthday time at your house, then do it for Ralph Waldo Emerson and Clara Barton as well! Creating a Setting: You can do any of the following to create a special time of worship or reflection with your family:
Creating a Pattern: Here is how one family gathers for a family service in their living room:
Other Ways to Create a Service Together: Set up a box or paper bag in which you can drop ideas or themes for services as they occur to you, for example, P.T. Barnum’s birthday, the Harvest Moon, helping others, making your home ecologically responsible, or Black History Month. After your family service, but while you are still gathered in your worship space, someone reaches into the box or bag and pulls out a slip of paper with a theme. Decide as a group who is to be responsible for creating a visual focal point, opening words, a song, a reading, and a closing. Agree to present the service the next time you gather. You might also plan a service around religious questions that members of the family raise. (Do we believe in Jesus? What happens when people die? Why do bad things happen?) Take some time to gather ideas and materials that focus on the question in different ways. Encourage other members of the family to say how they feel about the question or what their responses might be. The point, of course, is not so much to answer the question as to give it the attention and importance that it deserves and to keep those big questions coming. Whatever pattern of religious celebration you develop, make it your own, enjoy it, and keep it flexible so that it can grow and change. Worshipping together can enrich your experience of life and deepen your relations with one another.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)March 3, 1568: The second religious debate between Unitarian Francis David and Calvinist bishop Peter Melius opened at Gyulafehervar, Transylvania. It lasted 10 days. Tradition has it that after returning home from that debate, Francis David preached standing on the “round rock” at the corner of Torda street in Kolozsvar and converted all who heard him to Unitarianism. The stone is now in the narthex of the First Unitarian Church in Kolozsvar. The series of debates began at the Diet of Torda and ultimately resulted in the conversion of Prince John Sigismund of Transylvania to Unitarianism. March 4, 1864: Thomas Starr King, a Universalist and Unitarian minister and missionary on the West Coast, died at age 39 of diphtheria. When he died, President Lincoln ordered guns to be fired from U.S. forts in recognition of his service to the country. March 5, 1761: John Taylor died at age 67. A minister in Norwich, England, his religious studies emphasized Hebrew languages and Jewish scriptures. To accommodate those wishing to enjoy his simple form of Christian worship, the Nonconformist congregation of Norwich built the Octagon Chapel and became Unitarian. Taylor was the author of several theological works and principal and tutor in theology at Warrington Academy, England. March 6, 1582: The debate between Simon Budny and the Catholics began at the Synod of Iwie in Poland. A native of Lithuania and a Calvinist priest, Budny had met disciples of Faustus Socinus, George Blandrata, and other Unitarians and joined their ranks. He founded the sect called Budneans in Poland. His view was that Jesus was born naturally and was not an appropriate object of worship; he also rejected infant baptism. A biblical scholar, Budny translated the entire Bible from Hebrew, Greek and Latin into Polish (1572). He gained a large following in Lithuania and Poland, where he was denounced at the Synod of Luclavice, Poland, and excommunicated. He was told the excommunication would be lifted if he would renounce his “obnoxious opinions,” but he refused. March 6, 1888: The beloved American writer Louisa May Alcott died at age 55 in Boston. Louisa’s father was Bronson Alcott, a founder of the Transcendentalist Club who ran a school in Concord, Massachusetts, and educated Louisa and her sisters at home. She worked as a teacher and a domestic worker and eventually began to write poems and short stories for children. Alcott was an ardent abolitionist and served as a nurse during the Civil War. This experience provided material for Hospital Sketches (1863), which established her literary reputation. She also wrote various stories for children, of which Little Women (1868) is the best known. It was largely autobiographical and a great financial success. Alcott wrote numerous other stories, including Gothic tales published under the pseudonym A. M. Barnard. She devoted her later life to reforms, including temperance and women’s rights. Alcott did not like formal church connections, but her beliefs were Unitarian and she moved among such prominent Unitarians as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, Samuel Gridley Howe, and Julia Ward Howe. March 7, 1601: A Socinian conference opened at Rakow, Poland, to discuss the nature of Christ, his relation to God, and whether he should be worshipped. March 7, 1844: The Dissenters’ Chapels Act was introduced in English Parlaiment, aimed at giving Unitarians legal rights to their church property. It was an important step in religious freedom in England. It passed by a vote of 202 to 41 and Queen Victoria gave it the royal seal on July 15, 1844. March 7, 1920: Seven people met with Egbert Ethelred Brown, and African-American Unitarian minister, in Harlem to form the Harlem Community Church of New York City, the first African-American Unitarian congregation in the United States. Maurice Dawkins, an African-American, became the minister of education there in 1948. March 7, 1965: Six hundred civil rights marchers who set out from Selma, Alabama, on their way to Montgomery to urge passage of the Voting Rights Act, were attacked by local law enforcement officials at the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Known as “Bloody Sunday,” this event led Martin Luther King to call on clergy of all faiths to join him in Selma. More than 125 Unitarian Universalist ministers answered the call, including UUCCSM minister Rev. Ernie Pipes. On March 21, 1965, more than 3,000 marchers left Selma for Montgomery and by March 25, 1965, 25,000 marchers entered Montgomery. On August 6, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act. Three people were killed during the Selma marches – James Reeb, a Unitarian Universalist minister; Jimmy Lee Jackson, an African-American laborer and church deacon; and Viola Liuzzo, a Unitarian Universalist layperson from Detroit. February 25, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 2/27
This Week in RE:Preschool: “My World Has Animals” This week our preschool class will take part in a lesson about the many different kinds of animals who share the Earth with us. Kindergarten-5th Grade: “Pennies for Peace” Children’s Chapel: This week our two elementary classes will combine for a special introduction to an RE service project that we’ll take part in through the rest of the program year. Pennies for Peace is an organization that promotes and provides community-based education and literacy programs, especially for girls, in remote mountain regions of Central Asia. To date, more than 130 school have been built in Afghanistan and Pakistan. We’ll take part in our very own “Pennies for Peace” campaign at UUCCSM, and this Sunday young people in our program will learn about the program, and how pennies can help bring peace. 6th-7th Grade: “Mormonism Introduction” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will begin their exploration of the Church of Latter Day Saints with an introduction to the Mormon faith. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will begin focusing on credo writing in this week’s session, an exploration of “Who Am I?” 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 9:00. YRUU youth are invited to gather to discuss plans for the upcoming YRUU service in March!
Announcements:NEW Pennies for Peace: Beginning this week, we will be adding a “Children’s Offering” to our program, to take place weekly in each RE class. We are asking children and youth to bring pennies in to church each week for the “Pennies for Peace” campaign to bring peace to our world through education and literacy. To date, this program has generated funds to build more than 130 schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan. So if you see a penny, pick it up, and bring it to church on Sunday – we’ll make sure it goes to good use! NEW VolunteerSpot Snack Signups Coming Soon: Parents, as part of our support for our dedicated teachers, the RE Committee and I feel that we should not be asking teachers to bring snacks to class every week in addition to planning lessons and gathering supplies. We’d like to ask parents to step forward and volunteer to bring a simple snack for your child’s class. If everyone helps out, it will only require that each family sign up for a couple of Sundays between now and June in order for us to fill the rest of the program year. I am creating a snack schedule through the VolunteerSpot website, and you will be getting an invitation in the next week to sign up to help. THIS SUNDAY Our Whole Lives for Sr. High (10th-12th grade) February 27, 12:30-4:30 pm - Part II - Mandatory OWL Parent Orientation for parents of 10th-12th graders planning to enroll their teens in OWL. SIGN UP NOW: UU Pals is Coming!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Waking up this morning, I smile, -Thich Nhat Hanh Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “The Family Meditation”: (from How to Bury a Goldfish by Virginia Lang and Louise Nayer) - Whether we call it meditation, contemplation, or prayer, we can all benefit from focused thought. When many people share this focus, the results can be powerful. Listening through meditation can help children learn to respect their inner lives and develop self-confidence. What You Need
What You Do – Pose a challenge or simply ask a question about a concern that the family shares. Is someone ill? Is the family contemplating a move? Are there financial concerns that need solutions? Is there an unresolved conflict between family members? Ask each person to sit quietly, focusing on the matter for ten minutes in absolute silence. Then, ask each person to speak from the heart, sharing the insights gained. If no insights are forthcoming, continue the meditation that night in sleep and gather again the next day. When we sit quietly with something, new sources of creativity become available as we learn to look to ourselves for answers.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)February 24, 1566: The first disputation on the Trinity in Transylvania, originally scheduled for Torda, was opened at Gyulafehervar under the leadership of Francis David and authority of Prince John Sigismund. This brought to a close a period of outbursts against the Trinity by local clergy and congregations throughout the country. February 27, 1807: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine. He taught modern languages at Bowdoin College in Maine and at Harvard University in Massachusetts. His many famous poems included “Psalm of Life,” “Excelsior,” “The Song of Hiawatha,” “The Wreck of the Hesperus,” “Tales of a Wayside Inn,” and “Evangeline.” A friend of the Transcendentalists of the Concord-Cambridge area, Longfellow was the brother of Samuel Longfellow. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was the most famous American poet of his time, at home and abroad, and was especially loved in England, where he received honorary degrees from both Oxford and Cambridge. His house in Cambridge, once a center of the intellectual life in the Boston area, is now maintained by the National Park service, which gives historical tours and hosts cultural events. Longfellow died on March 24, 1882. February 28, 1579: The Synod of Torda in Transylvania affirmed that Unitarians did not “innovate” but only developed their previous, and legal, teachings. The Synod rejected the charges brought against Francis David and affirmed that seeking religious knowledge and truth was not only allowed but the duty of ministers. February 28, 1901: Linus Carl Pauling was born in Portland, Oregon. He was considered a genius in college and became an expert on x-ray diffraction, analyzing the spacing and orientation of atoms in crystalline materials. He helped integrate chemistry with quantum theory and founded the discipline now known as molecular biology. Pauling became assistant professor of theoretical chemistry at California Institute of Technology in 1927 and full professor in 1931. He published important works in chemistry and quantum mechanics. President Harry Truman awarded him the Medal of Merit for his contribution to the war effort. When the atomic bomb was developed, Pauling became a pacifist. He joined the First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles, California. In 1945 he received the Nobel Prize for Chemistry, and in 1973 he created the Linus Pauling Institute of Science and Medicine. Other honors included the National Medal of Honor from President Gerald Ford (1960) and the International Lenin Peace Prize (1971). Linus Carl Pauling died on August 19, 1994, at the age of 93. February 17, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Friday, 2/18-Sunday, 2/20
This Week in RE:Preschool: “I Can Pretend” This week our preschool class will take part in a lesson about pretending, with special activities and stories to help get our imaginations going! Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Nasruddin and the Stolen Smells” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional Sufi wisdom tale about Mullah Nasruddin. “Muhammad” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with an introduction to Islam and the life of the prophet Muhammad. 3rd-5th Grade: “Speak Out” This session draws particularly on the fifth Unitarian Universalist Principle, the right of conscience and the use of democratic process. We’ll introduce Maria Cook (1779-1835), an early Universalist preacher, who responded to a trumped-up vagrancy charge by practicing passive resistance and, when jailed, preached Universalism to those who shared her incarceration. In Maria Cook, participants will find a model of someone who held fast to the teachings of her conscience in the face of authority and found peaceful, dignified ways to express her views even when those around her tried to shut her down. 6th-7th Grade: “Quaker Field Trip” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of protestant Christianity with a trip to the Santa Monica Friends Meeting for a Quaker service. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will continue its two-week exploration of death and its meaning this week. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 9:00. YRUU youth who are not on the San Francisco trip are invited to gather to discuss plans for the upcoming YRUU service in March, as well as play some games.
Announcements:NEW If You’re Goin’ to San Francisco... Many of our YRUU youth and advisors, as well as Catherine, will be missing from UUCCSM this Sunday. We’ll be taking part in a social justice field trip to San Francisco, along with the youth group from Neighborhood UU Church of Pasadena. The Faithful Fools Street Ministry is an organization that ministers to the homeless and poverty stricken in San Francisco’s Tenderloin. They sponsor monthly “Street Retreats” in which participants interact with and minister to those in need on the streets, in shelters and soup kitchens. Our YRUU youth will share their experiences on the retreat, as well as additional reflections on “Stepping Out of Your Comfort Zone” in their annual Sunday service on March 27th. Don’t miss it! NEW Thank You! Thanks to all of our wonderful RE families, who helped make our RE program’s gift to Rebecca for her Installation possible. Seventy of our children and youth submitted pages for inclusion in the “RE Directory” for Rebecca, and she tells me that she is very much enjoying reading them and learning more about the younger members of our church community! If your children did not get one done in time for the Installation, but would like to be included, you can still give your pages to me and I’ll make sure they get added to Rebecca’s book. UU Pals is Coming!
Our Whole Lives for Sr. High (10th-12th grade) February 27, 12:30-4:30 pm - Part II - Mandatory OWL Parent Orientation for parents of 10th-12th graders planning to enroll their teens in OWL. Compost Bin at UUCCSM! Last month, our YRUU youth set up a compost bin outside of the church kitchen. This is a gift to our community, and you’re encouraged to bring items in to church to add to the bin, and especially to make use of it when having events with food (or coffee!) at the church. There are instructions posted on the bin for what should be added to the bin. Three cheers for our green-minded youth!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Hail Mother, who art the earth, -Bill Faherty Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Take Time to Relax”: (from Nurturing Spirituality in Children by Peggy Joy Jenkins) Materials – An average-sized rubber band, one colored band for each child, a box or book that the rubber band will barely stretch around, and a small paper wad. What to Do – Pull the rubber band to show how much stretch there is in it, and then put it around the large box or book. “Rubber bands are made to stretch to fit around bigger items, and hold things together. But what might happen if the rubber band is stretched out for very long? If a rubber band is kept under tension, if it is stretched out all the time, it will deteriorate rapidly and break. We must allow it to return to its natural state [remove the band from the box] in order for it to last a long time. “People are very much like the rubber band. They also need to relax or they won’t function as well as they are designed to function. Some say that when things get tight, something’s got to give. When people are under tension or strain, two areas that often give way are their health and their relationships.” Perhaps you have other examples, such as schoolwork or piano practice. Someone once said that real maturity is not growing up so much as it is growing in. Explain to the children that they have an Inner Teacher who can help them with their challenges if they take some time each day to relax and listen within. Demonstrate with a paper wad that, the farther back we pull the rubber band, the farther forward it will shoot something. Remind the children that the deeper we go into our inner world, the more effective we can be in the outer world. In silence, we draw back into a knowingness of our true identity. Great works require much time in the silence. Gandhi did “silent sitting” one full day every week. Discuss what time of day would be best for the children to be alone, to relax with closed eyes, and to listen within. Generally, the amount of time should be one minute for each year of age. Give each child a colored rubber band as a reminder to have silent sitting time each day. This lesson could be especially valuable for overly active children. It could also be slanted to help the children understand why adults need their own quiet time. You may wish to take an extra few minutes and have the children do a relaxation exercise. The simplest is to have them close their eyes, take three or four really deep breaths, and then think about a happy experience. Another simple but effective technique is to have them get in a very relaxed position, close their eyes, and concentrate on their breathing while they breathe through their noses. Several books are available with centering and meditation exercises for children.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)February 16, 1691: Sir Isaac Newton wrote to John Locke to request that he not publish Newton’s Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture until after Newton’s death. Newton’s treatise attacked the accuracy of two biblical texts about the Trinity (1 John 5:7 and 1 Timothy 3:16). February 17, 1698: The English House of Commons petitioned the king to suppress all literature disputing the Trinity and to punish the authors. The Blasphemy Act in 1648 had made Unitarianism a crime punishable by the denial of civil rights. February 17, 1818: The abolitionist Sallie Holley was born in Canandaigua, New York. She attended Oberlin College and found herself defending her religious views as the only Unitarian there. At Oberlin she met Caroline Putnam, who became her lifelong friend and partner. She worked for the American Anti-Slavery Society and fought for voting rights for freed slaves after the Emancipation Proclamation. With Putnam, she worked to teach black students in Lottsburgh, Virginia, and her school became known as the Holley School. Holley and Putnam built a new school and hired two black women as assistant teachers. Sallie Holley died on January 12, 1893. February 18, 1719: The English Parliament repealed the Schism Act, which set severe penalties for anti-Trinitarian clergy. February 19, 1868: Phebe Ann Coffin Hanaford was ordained at Hingham, Massachusetts, becoming the first woman Universalist minister in New England. February 19, 1881: William Adam of Beaconfield, Scotland, died. He was an orthodox Baptist missionary who attempted to convert Rajah Rammohun Roy, the founder of a Unitarian form of Hinduism calledBrahmo Samaj. Instead, Adam found himself converted to Unitarianism. February 20, 1855: Joseph Hume, a member of English Parliament who adopted Universalist views, died. He was the leader of the Radical Party for thirty years, taking special interest in financial oversight of both public and private enterprises. February 21, 1612: Bartholomew Legate, a cloth merchant of Essex, England, having been convicted of heresy for advocating Unitarian beliefs, was burned to death before a large crowd. He had not been granted a legal trial but had defended his Unitarian views in a series of private conversations with King James I, who condemned him to death. February 22, 1805: Sarah Flower Adams was born in Harlow, Essex, England. An actress who achieved a dramatic triumph as Lady Macbeth, she became ill suddenly and had to give up the stage. She was a lifelong Unitarian, deeply devoted to her Unitarian church in South Place, London, and the author of many religious works, including Vivia Perpetua (“Eternal Life”). She also composed hymns, the most famous of which is “Nearer, my God, to Thee.” Adams worked with prisons, fought for greater civil and religious liberty, and established Sunday schools and benevolent societies. She died on August 15, 1848. February 11, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 2/13
Volunteer Opportunities:SATURDAY: Help Bake Cookies for Rebecca’s Installation! From Cynthia Cottam: I will be at the church in the kitchen from 11-3ish on Saturday. If you’d like to help, bring your recipe and ingredients, and a tupperware-type container to put the cookies in, if you have one. I will bring a stand mixer, parchment paper, some cookie sheets, wire racks, heart shaped cookie cutters and a few utensils. If someone doesn't have a recipe but wants to bake, you can contact me and I will plan for you. Contact Cynthia for more information.
This Week in RE: Preschool: “I Can Love” This week our preschool class will take part in a special Valentine’s lesson about how we can show our love to others. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Nasruddin Feeds His Coat” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional Sufi wisdom tale about Mullah Nasruddin. “How Kindness Leads to Great Joy” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a Buddhist wisdom tale about the rewards of treating others with kindness. 3rd-5th Grade: “Ask Questions” This session draws particularly on our fifth Source, humanist teachings that counsel us to heed the guidance of reason and the results of science. We’ll learn about Clyde Tombaugh, the Unitarian Universalist man who discovered Pluto, and the decision in 2006 to change Pluto's status from planet to dwarf planet. We will also experience the relative scale of the planets in as we continue our quest for truth and meaning. 6th-7th Grade: “Quaker Introduction” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of protestant Christianity with an introduction to the Quaker faith. We’ll have a special visitor and will begin preparing for next week’s field trip to a Quaker Meeting. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will begin a two-week exploration of death and its meaning this week. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 11:00. YRUU youth will explore this week’s theme: “Master Your Feelings.”
Announcements:LAST CHANCE: RE Directory Pages for Rebecca Needed! We have a very special event coming up on the afternoon of February 13th, Rev. Rebecca Bijur’s service of Installation! As part of our welcome to Rebecca, the RE department will present her with a “Religious Education Directory,” which will include a page from each child and youth in the program. Rebecca enjoyed visiting RE classes on January 23rd and spending some time with our kids, but this directory will help her get to know all of our children and youth a little better, and will help her connect faces to names. To make this happen, though, I need your help! Please help your child or youth fill out the info sheet (for young children, they may draw pictures and parents can write their responses down for them). Then affix a recent photo of your child or youth to the page. Thank you for helping make Rebecca’s Installation gift truly special! If you need another copy of the sheet, it is posted at http://www.uusm.org/re/rebeccadirectorytemplate.pdf. SIGN UP THIS SUNDAY: UU Pals is Coming! Q: What is UU Pals? Q: How does UU Pals work? Q: How do I sign up? Q: What else do I need to know? Our Whole Lives for Sr. High (10th-12th grade) THIS SUNDAY: February 13, 12:30-3:00 pm - Mandatory OWL Parent Orientation for parents of 10th-12th graders planning to enroll their teens in OWL. Compost Bin at UUCCSM! Last month, our YRUU youth set up a compost bin outside of the church kitchen. This is a gift to our community, and you’re encouraged to bring items in to church to add to the bin, and especially to make use of it when having events with food (or coffee!) at the church. There are instructions posted on the bin for what should be added to the bin. Three cheers for our green-minded youth! Unsupervised Children: Parents, please remember that you are responsible for your children at all times when they are not in RE classes. Even though our church is a safe and loving place, it is not a good idea for children to roam the grounds without their parents. Staff and volunteers are not responsible for supervising children when they are not in our RE classes or official childcare. Also, please remember that children through grade 5 must be picked up by their parents at the end of RE time (10:15 or 12:15). This is one part of our church’s safety policy, and is especially important as our younger RE classes are now held in a separate building from the sanctuary and social hall.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week:
Let the good in me -Rebbe Nachman of Breslov Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Valentine’s Day”: (from The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox) What’s Sweet About You Poster – This is like giving your kid a giant Valentine card, but much more personal. Make one for each child. If you’re having a special dinner, you could bring the posters out then. Or prop them up against the kitchen chairs, so your kids find them when they come to breakfast or come home from school. Materials: Large sheets of poster board in white, pink or red (one sheet for each poster); red and pink construction paper; scissors; glue; small Valentine candies, such as chocolate hearts wrapped in foil; markers. Instructions: Cut 9 to 12 hearts from the construction paper. The hearts should be about 4 inches high and 3 inches wide. On each heart, write one trait you love about that child’s nature. Make it specific, focusing on positive aspects of their personality. Also, praise behavior you’d like to reinforce, such as putting away toys or progress in potty training. Across the top of the poster, write “What’s Sweet About (Child’s Name).” Glue the hearts to the board, but just put glue on the bottom edges and up the sides of the hearts. Leave the top open, so they work like pockets. Put a piece of Valentine candy in each pocket. The Book of Love – Who wrote the Book of Love? You did. Buy an inexpensive blank book with a heart on the cover, or glue one there. Call it “The Book of (your last name) Love,” and each year, have every member of the family write one loving things about very other member (take dictation for young kids). Red Food Night– At the Straw household in Plano, Texas, all the food for Valentine’s dinner is red. Sue Straw serves beets or red cabbage, mashed potatoes mixed with red food coloring, and either ham (pink) or pasta with red sauce. Red fruit might include grapes, raspberries or strawberries. Even the milk is red. Dessert can be brown, as long as it’s chocolate and shaped like a heart. Valentine Tree – Trees are a great centerpiece of ritual action because they grow and change like families do, symbolize life and hope, and can be easily but beautifully decorated for any occasion. Every year, the Dodge family buys a small tree in a pot, and decorates it with a string of tiny white lights. They buy red craft paper and cut out teddy bears and hearts, poke holes in their tops, and use thin ribbon to tie them onto the tree. The decorations stay on until spring, when the family plants the tree in their yard. If you do this every year, you could designate a special Valentine Grove on your property. Have-a-Heart Awards – Each member of the family gives an award to each other member for a special act of love or kindness. Buy round, fuzzy, ping-pong-ball-sized pom-poms at your local craft store, to which you can glue little eyes and mouths and feet. Cut hearts from a piece of construction paper 4 inches square, and glue the feet to the paper heart. Write on the heart the name of the person getting the award and what they did. Perhaps one child helped a younger sibling learn to tie his shoes. Perhaps Mom or Dad earned an award for coaching Little League last summer.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)February 10, 1652: John Biddle, freed from prison in the Scilly Isles, where he had been exiled for his Unitarian heresy, gathered a group of Unitarians into a society. Although it did not last beyond Biddle’s death on September 22, 1662, it represented the first Unitarian society in England. February 10, 1945: The North Shore Unitarian Church was founded in Long Island, New York. It is now the Unitarian Universalist Congregation at Shelter Rock in Manhasset, New York. As part of its founding outreach, the congregation contacted an Episcopalian named Caroline Veatch, who provided for the church to receive income from her oil fields in Germany after her death. The church has since turned this income into the largest single source of funding for the Unitarian Universalist Association and its work. February 11, 1802: Lydia Maria Child was born in Medford, Massachusetts. An advocate of women’s independence, she was an ardent writer and activist for racial justice. She joined the church served by her Unitarian minister brother, Convers Francis, in Watertown, Massachusetts. She also enjoyed the worship of the Swedenborgians. Child found success as a popular writer, producing a romantic historical novel and practical household manuals, most notably The Frugal Housewife (1829). Her literary earnings helped her to support her husband’s unsuccessful legal practice. She became vice president of the Women’s Anti-Slavery Convention of New York and edited the National Anti-Slavery Standard. Later she turned to religious issues and published The Progress of Religious Ideas through Successive Ages, which contended that all religions had sacred insights. In 1833 Child wrote An Appeal in Favor of That Class of American Called African. She also espoused women’s suffrage and the cause of Native Americans. Child died on October 20, 1880. February 11, 1963: The celebrated poet Sylvia Plath committed suicide at the age of 30. Plath was a poet, literary critic, novelist, diarist and social activist. A member of the Unitarian church in Wellesley, Massachusetts, she attended conferences at Star Island in New Hampshire as a youth. Her published works include The Bell Jar (1963), The Colossus (1981), and Collected Poems(1981), which received the Pulitzer Prize in 1983. February 12, 1809: Charles Darwin was born in Shrewsbury, England. He was descended from Unitarian families on both sides. In his youth he attended the Unitarian church in Shrewsbury, England. Darwin’s early training was for the church, but his interest was in the natural sciences. From 1831 to 1836 Darwin sailed as the official naturalist aboard the HMS Beagle. He published several works on his geological and zoological discoveries, the most important of which was The Origin of the Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859), with Alfred Russell Wallace. This was an epoch-making work, defended and attacked violently to this day. Its central thesis, that species evolve in response to changes in their habitats, has been called the most important concept in modern society. Charles Darwin died on April 19, 1882. February 12, 1816: Charles Henry Appleton Dall was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He was educated in Boston public and Latin schools and graduated from Harvard University in 1837 and Harvard Divinity School in 1840. He served churches in Baltimore, Maryland; Portsmouth, New Hampshire; Needham, Massachusetts; and Toronto, Ontario. In 1841 Dall was ordained an evangelist under the direction of William Greenleaf Eliot in St. Louis, Missouri, but his health began to fail under the arduous pastoral duties. Dall turned to missionary work and became the first foreign missionary of the American Unitarian Association. In February 1855 he sailed for Calcutta, India, where he instituted the first girls’ school for natives, the first school for homeless and friendless children, and the first children’s temperance society. He wrote over 100 pamphlets that were distributed widely in India. Dall’s work in India included preaching, Sunday school instruction, lectures, newspaper articles, leaflets, and small books, as well as founding industrial schools and distributing literature. He also worked with the Unitarians of Khasi Hills in northeast India. Charles Henry Appleton Dall died on January 18, 1886. February 12, 1855: Fannie Barrier Williams was born in Brockport, New York. She was an African-American woman whose parents and grandparents were free people educated in Northern public schools. After teaching briefly in the South and studying music in Boston, she married and moved to Chicago. Her family joined All Souls Church (Unitarian) in Chicago, where Jenkin Lloyd Jones was minister. Williams helped establish the club movement for African-Americans to meet socially, discuss politics, lift their self-esteem, develop their talents, and pool practical information. She was founder of the Provident Hospital and Training School for Nurses in Chicago (1891) and co-founder of the Frederick Douglass Center (1905), a predecessor of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Urban League. Fannie Barrier Williams died on March 14, 1944. February 13, 1730: Josiah Wedgewood, the founder of Wedgewood Pottery, was born in Burslem, Staffordshire, England. Along with the simple designs and pure colors of his art, he invented the manufacturing processes for his famous pottery and designed production systems to promote workplace safety and cleanliness. He was a devoted Unitarian, philanthropist, friend of Joseph Priestley, and frequenter of the English royal court, where he was appointed potter to the Queen. He died on January 3, 1795. February 14, 1805: The Board of Overseers of Harvard University confirmed Henry Ware, Sr. to the Hollis Professorship of Divinity at Harvard College, making him the first Unitarian to hold that position. Ware’s election, by a vote of 33 to 23, set off the Unitarian Controversy, which split New England’s established Standing Order of congregational religion. Ware was 40 years old at the time and had been minister in Hingham, Massachusetts, for 17 years. The controversy at Harvard pitted Calvinists against Unitarians over the doctrine of the Trinity. It also involved the Calvinist doctrine of human depravity against the Unitarian doctrine of human goodness. February 15, 1748: Jeremy Bentham was born in London, England. A noted British philosopher and political economist, he published a work on Unitarianism under the name of Gamaliel Smith. Although he studied law, he never practiced it but wrote extensively on the theory of legal reform. Bentham’s most important work was Introduction to Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789). He left a large bequest of money and books to University College. The college was one of the first to open its doors to anyone who could pass the entrance exams and pay the fee, regardless of race or class. It thus became an important center for Unitarians to study, since Unitarians were denied access to Oxford or Cambridge University. February 15, 1820: Susan Brownell Anthony was born in Adams, Massachusetts. Her family was Quaker, but they were also active members of First Unitarian Church in Rochester. Anthony spoke often of the guidance she received from the church’s minister, William Ellery Channing. She was active in the temperance and abolition movements as well as teachers’ organizations. She wanted to include women in the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which gave African-Americans the right to vote. Anthony published a women’s rights periodical, The Revolution, and organized the National Woman Suffrage Association with Elizabeth Cady Stanton in 1869. The two women spent the next 35 years traveling around the United States working to get the vote for women. In 1872, Anthony went to the polls in Rochester, claiming the right to vote as a citizen under the Fourteenth Amendment. She was arrested and fined $100, which she refused to pay. With other feminists, she compiled and edited The History of Woman Suffrage. In February 1906, a month before her death, Anthony gave her final speech at the women’s suffrage convention in Baltimore and stated, “Failure is impossible!” Congress passed the Nineteenth Amendment, giving women the right to vote, 14 years after Susan B. Anthony’s death. She died on March 13, 1906. February 3, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Friday, 2/4
Volunteer Opportunities:UU Pals Volunteers Needed! UU Pals is coming, and I’m in need of several volunteers to help out. Would you be willing to staff the signup table following one of the Sunday services on Feb. 13, 20 or 27th? It’s an easy job, and would be a big help. Contact Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x105 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “I Can Dance” This week our preschool class will have a lesson with stories and special crafts about the way our bodies move and bend and stretch in celebration when we dance. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Muhammad” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with an introduction to Islam and the story of Muhammad. “Gifts for the Robber” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a traditional story about Zen monk Ryokan. 3rd-5th Grade: “Chinese New Year” This week our classes will explore the Chinese New Year celebration, with stories, special activities and the creation of our very own dragon parade. 6th-7th Grade: “First AME Field Trip” This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of protestant Christianity with a field trip to attend a service at the First African Methodist Episcopal Church of Los Angeles. Gather in the courtyard at 9:00 am for the trip. Don’t forget to bring your permission slip! 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will explore the concept of tolerance this week. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 11:00. This week YRUU youth will explore this week’s theme: “Declare Your Identity.”
Announcements:NEW: RE Directory Pages for Rebecca Needed! We have a very special event coming up on the afternoon of February 13th, Rev. Rebecca Bijur’s service of Installation! As part of our welcome to Rebecca, the RE department will present her with a “Religious Education Directory,” which will include a page from each child and youth in the program. Rebecca enjoyed visiting RE classes on January 23rd and spending some time with our kids, but this directory will help her get to know all of our children and youth a little better, and will help her connect faces to names. To make this happen, though, I need your help! Please help your child or youth fill out the info sheet (for young children, they may draw pictures and parents can write their responses down for them). Then affix a recent photo of your child or youth to the page, or you may send an email with a photo attached to me at Catherine@uusm.org and I’ll print and attach it to your child’s sheet. To give me time to compile the book, the sheets and photos must be turned in no later than THIS SUNDAY, February 6. Thank you for helping make Rebecca’s Installation gift truly special! NEW UU Pals is Coming! Q: What is UU Pals? Q: How does UU Pals work? Q: How do I sign up? Q: What else do I need to know? NEW Our Whole Lives for Sr. High (10th-12th grade) February 13, 12:30-3:00 pm - Mandatory OWL Parent Orientation for parents of 10th-12th graders planning to enroll their teens in OWL. Compost Bin at UUCCSM! Last month, our YRUU youth set up a compost bin outside of the church kitchen. This is a gift to our community, and you’re encouraged to bring items in to church to add to the bin, and especially to make use of it when having events with food (or coffee!) at the church. There are instructions posted on the bin for what should be added to the bin. Three cheers for our green-minded youth! Unsupervised Children: Parents, please remember that you are responsible for your children at all times when they are not in RE classes. Even though our church is a safe and loving place, it is not a good idea for children to roam the grounds without their parents. Staff and volunteers are not responsible for supervising children when they are not in our RE classes or official childcare. Also, please remember that children through grade 5 must be picked up by their parents at the end of RE time (10:15 or 12:15). This is one part of our church’s safety policy, and is especially important as our younger RE classes are now held in a separate building from the sanctuary and social hall.
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week: Blest be the hand that plants the seed, -Joyce Poley Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Celebrating the New Year with a Chinese Tradition”: (from How to Bury a Goldfish by Virginia Lang and Louise Nayer) (This year’s Chinese New Year observance began today February 3rd. Celebrations continue for 15 days..) Virginia Lang’s daughter’s name, YuWen, means “abundance and literature” or “rich culture,” depending on your interpretation of the Chinese characters. In our family, we are learning to observe some time-honored Chinese traditions and to respect YuWen’s rich heritage. I particularly like the way Chinese families welcome the New Year – by visiting family, preparing ritual foods, and abstaining from work on days held sacred. Families write words of hope for good luck, good health, and prosperity on red cloths. They then hang them upside down on their front doors to indicate that the virtues or wishes they express will soon arrive in their homes. What You Need – A gold marker, a red cloth What You Do - Think of your good wishes and hopes for the year ahead. They may be hopes for yourself, your family, or the world. Some examples are: “We hope to travel someplace special this year,” “Wo hope Grandmother will enjoy good health this year,” “We hope the world will be at peace this year.” Ask each person in the household to write their hopes in gold marker on the red cloth without judging themselves. You may prefer to write the expressions of hope on small pieces of fabric and sew those pieces onto the larger cloth. Hang the cloth upside down on the front door. Save the red cloth from each year as a family tradition.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)February 3, 1888: Horace Greely was born in Amherst, New Hampshire. At the age of 20, he went to New York City, where he started a small printing office and produced a magazine called theNew Yorker, which was published from 1834 to 1841. In 1841 Greely founded the New York Tribune. Greely served in Congress briefly and ran for other offices unsuccessfully. He was an ardent opponent of slavery, though he sought a peaceful solution. After the Civil War, his ardent support of Reconstruction eroded his popularity. He was a stalwart Universalist. Horace Greely died November 29, 1872. February 4, 1821: Elizabeth Blackwell was born in Bristol, England . Best known as America’s first woman physician, she came to the United States with her family in 1832, living in New York City and then Cincinnati. She became a teacher in the south, started reading medical books and decided to become a physician, in spite of social prejudice and ridicule. She received her medical degree (and was first in her class) from the Geneva Medical School in western New York in 1849. She published a book called The Laws of Life; with Special Reference to the Physical Education of Girls (1852) and wrote on physical hygiene for women, which in those times were offensive and taboo. She later founded the New York Dispensary for Poor Women and Children and later the New York Infirmary for Indigent Women and Children. She moved back to England and spent the rest of her life promoting health and hygiene. Elizabeth Blackwell was a member of the First Unitarian Church in Cincinnati, Ohio, where her family lived when she was a child. February 4, 1939: The American Unitarian Association sent Martha and Waitstill Sharp to Czechoslovakia to work with refugees from the Nazis. This marked the beginning of the Unitarian Service Committee, which was organized in May 1940 as a standing committee of the association “ to investigate opportunities for humanitarian service both in America and abroad.” The USC became independent of the AUA in 1948. In 1963 it merged with the Universalist Service Committee, which was first organized in 1945, also as a response to the war in Europe. The Unitarian Universalist Service Committee focuses on humanitarian aid, development, and human rights in America and throughout the world. February 5, 1900: Aldai Stevenson was born in Los Angeles, California. A graduate of Princeton, he studied law at Harvard and Northwestern law schools and joined a law firm in Chicago, Illinois, in 1927. During World War II, he was a special assistant to the secretary recovery of Europe. She was elected Governor of Illinois in 1948 and ran as the Democratic candidate for the U.S presidency twice (1952 and 1956). Stevenson’s mother was a lifelong Unitarian and his father was a Presbyterian, but the family attended the Unitarian Church. He became a member of the Bloomington church in 1952. Adlai Stevenson died on July 14, 1965. February 7, 1812: Charles Dickens was born in Landport, England. He was reared in great poverty, an experience reflected in his writings, particularly Oliver Twist. Dickens had little formal education but spent his extra time at the British Museum reading. He wrote A Christmas Carol while a member of Little Portland Street Chapel, London. He is well known for numerous other novels, many of which had a profound effect on social changes in early 19th century England. Dickens also wrote factual newspaper and magazine articles with radical reforming intent. He died on June 8, 1870. February 9, 1819: Lydia Estes Pinkham was born in Lynn, Massachusetts. Her family was Quaker but abandoned that religion because they felt it was unwelcoming to the African Americans who came to their Universalist Church. They also joined the Female Anti-Slavery Society, and Pinkham organized the Freeman’s Institute, a debating society that welcomed everyone, regardless of religion, race or politics. She worked as an unpaid visiting nurse and developed a compound to treat every female ailment. Her sons persuaded her to market the compound, which was 18 percent alcohol, and she developed a successful business, Pinkham wrote a book on the: facts of life” and another on the female reproductive system through all its stages. After her death, her publisher continued to print “her answers” to personal letters, and that practice, along with information about the alcohol content of her elixir, led to the formation of the Federal Food and Drug Administration. Lydia Estes Pinkham died on May 17, 1883. January 20, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Saturday, 1/22
Volunteer Opportunities:RE Teacher Needed for K-2nd at 9:00 service! Our Kindergarten-2nd grade class is staffed by a team of wonderful volunteers, but they’re spread a little thin. We are looking for one more teacher to join the team and commit to leading one to two times per month between now and the end of May. This class uses the “Spirit Play” story-based program model; the only advance prep needed is practicing telling the week’s story. Class includes sharing of the week’s story with a basket of small objects that provide a visual focus for the story, discussion time, and self-directed “work time” with story baskets or art materials. We’ll provide you with the story and materials and as much help and support as you need in preparing to lead the story. Can you help? ContactCatherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x108 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Rev. Rebecca Bijur will be visiting all RE classes this Sunday! She’s excited to see how our classes work, and to meet and get to know our children and youth. Preschool: “I Can Listen” This week our preschool class will have a lesson with stories and special crafts about listening. We’ll acknowledge that listening can be difficult for young children, but we can give them opportunities to have fun while listening and to explore listening and talking as a way of sharing. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “How Kindness Leads to Great Joy” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a Buddhist wisdom tale about the rewards of treating others with kindness. “Wise People and the Elephant” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a wisdom tale attributed to the Buddha. 3rd-5th Grade: “Seek Truth” The session introduces our fourth Unitarian Universalist Principle, a free and responsible search for truth and meaning, through the story of Egbert Ethelred Brown, a Jamaican man who converted to Unitarianism. In this session participants will explore the basics of a Unitarian theology. They’ll engage in their own search for truth and meaning and investigate the concept of a call to ministry. (Perfect for the day of Rebecca’s visit!) 6th-7th Grade: This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of protestant Christianity with a wrap-up of their Baptist unit and an introduction to Methodism. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will explore the concept of personal morality this week, with a special visit from Ian Dodd. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 11:00. This week YRUU youth will wrap up last week’s theme: “Take Charge.”
Announcements:NEW Peace Sunday 1/30: Children in our elementary RE classes will take part in a Peace Sunday project on January 30. We’ll explore how we can be peacemakers in our homes, in our communities, and in the world. I’m looking for several helpers for the day; if you’d like to spend a morning building peace with our youngsters, please let me know at Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x105. NEW Compost Bin at UUCCSM! Last Sunday, our YRUU youth set up a compost bin outside of the church kitchen. This is a gift to our community, and you’re encouraged to bring items in to church to add to the bin, and especially to make use of it when having events with food (or coffee!) at the church. There are instructions posted on the bin for what should be added to the bin. Three cheers for our green-minded youth! Unsupervised Children: Parents, please remember that you are responsible for your children at all times when they are not in RE classes. Even though our church is a safe and loving place, it is not a good idea for children to roam the grounds without their parents. Staff and volunteers are not responsible for supervising children when they are not in our RE classes or official childcare. Also, please remember that children through grade 5 must be picked up by their parents at the end of RE time (10:15 or 12:15). This is one part of our church’s safety policy, and is especially important as our younger RE classes are now held in a separate building from the sanctuary and social hall. Time to Register for Elementary Winter Camp: The Pacific Southwest District’s Elementary Winter Camp at de Benneville Pines, is over President's Day Weekend next month, Saturday February 19 - Monday February 21.
Whether you are a family with elementary aged children planning to attend together, or you have an elementary-aged camper who is longing for a weekend away from home, this is the place for you! Snow angels, hot cocoa, inspired worship, sledding, talent show, wintery hikes - we have a perfect weekend planned for you and your family! Our talented program staff puts together the program; you and your family enjoy it! For the campers who want to come on their own, we have trained cabin counselors who supervise them throughout the weekend. Come to camp and become Inspired UUs!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week: This week’s reading is a poem by Rabindranath Tagore, a Bengali poet, Brahmo Samaj philosopher (see “This Week in UU History” below for a link discussing the connection between Brahmo Samaj and Unitarianism), visual artist, playwright, novelist, and composer whose works reshaped Bengali literature and music in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He became Asia's first Nobel laureate when he won the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature. Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high: -Rabindranath Tagore Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Our Icebergs”: (from Nurturing Spirituality in Children by Peggy Joy Jenkins) Materials: Small paper cups (for making miniature icebergs), a deep, wide, clear glass bowl, filled with water. Optional: Add blue food coloring to the water to make it more opaque. Lesson: Before the lesson, make two or three miniature icebergs by filling small paper cups with water and freezing them solid in the freezer. Then run warm water over the outside until the ice slips out or you can tear off the paper cup. Put the ice from the cups into the clear bowl filled with cold water. Notice that most of the ice is below the surface and not very visible. Explain that this is why ships sometimes run into icebergs and get damaged. There is a part of us that is not visible to others too. Our icebergs are the hidden emotions that we and others forget about until we bump into them. Our parents, schoolmates, neighbors, and even good friends may not see the submerged part of our emotions. The hidden fears and anger that we forget we even have till someone bumps into them. Nor can we see the invisible parts of our friends, neighbors or schoolmates. That is why we can’t fairly criticize them. There is a well-known saying: “You can’t judge anyone until you have walked a mile in their shoes.” We don’t know what personal battles each person is facing. Also, our negative emotions, like hate, anger, and fear, can be as dangerous to people as an iceberg in the ocean is to a ship. They can destroy one’s self-esteem and hurt others. Suggested affirmation: I won’t judge anyone until I have walked in their shoes.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)January 20, 1566: Francis David, who later converted Prince John Sigismund of Transylvania to Unitarianism, gave his first Unitarian oration in the main church of Koloscar, Transylvania. January 20, 1839: The Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson preached his last sermon, “The Miracle of Our Being,” in Concord, Massachusetts. January 21, 1825: George Blaurock received the first adult congregational baptism in Zurich, Switzerland, thus establishing congregational Anabaptism, which later merged with Socinianism to enlarge and strengthen the Unitarian movement. January 22, 1556: Peter Giezek declared his Unitarianism at the Calvinist Synod in Secemin, Poland. He went on to form the first Unitarain organization in Europe, the Minor Church, later called the Minor Reformed Church. January 23, 1830: The first Brahmo Samaj Temple opened in India. Brahmo Samaj is a Unitarian form of Hinduism. (Visit http://dcwi.com/~uuf/Sermons/012305.html for the text of a sermon that explores the relationship between Unitarianism and Brahmo Samaj.) January 24, 1556: The second Synod of the Reformed Brethren (Socinians) in Poland at Secemin adopted Unitarian positions and rejected the Nicene and Athanasian creeds. Gregory Pauli, the pastor of Pelsnick, Poland, avowed his anti-Trinitarianism. January 25, 1759: Robert Burns was born in Ayershire, Scotland. He is the national poet of Scotland and a beloved figure in Scottish history and literature. His birthday is the annual occasion of Burns Night festivities. Though he had no formal connection with Unitarianism, Burn published several satires of orthodox revivalism, for which he is celebrated by the Unitarians of Scotland as a religious forbear, and there is no doubt of his Unitarian beliefs. Such Unitarians as Joseph Priestley and Theophilius Lindsey influenced him. His heretical views were notorious, as were his irregular romantic alliances. Some of his contemporaries shunned him, but his poetry and songs are now familiar everywhere. He wrote and adapted many Scottish songs, including “Auld Lang Syne” and “John Anderson, My Jo.” Known as “Rob the Ranter,” Burns was concerned about the repressive measures against reformers and founded a debating society. He died on July 21, 1796. January 12, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Sunday, 1/16
Volunteer Opportunities:RE Teacher Needed for K-2nd at 9:00 service! Our Kindergarten-2nd grade class is staffed by a team of wonderful volunteers, but they’re spread a little thin. We are looking for one more teacher to join the team and commit to leading one to two times per month between now and the end of May. This class uses the “Spirit Play” story-based program model; the only advance prep needed is practicing telling the week’s story. Class includes sharing of the week’s story with a basket of small objects that provide a visual focus for the story, discussion time, and self-directed “work time” with story baskets or art materials. We’ll provide you with the story and materials and as much help and support as you need in preparing to lead the story. Can you help? ContactCatherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x108 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “I Can Help” This week our preschool class will have a lesson with stories and special crafts about the power we all have to help the people we love and the world around us. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “Gifts for the Robber” (9:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a classic Buddhist wisdom tale told about the Zen monk Ryokan. “How Ganesh Got His Name” (11:00) This week we will continue our World Religions focus with a story about the Hindu god Ganesh. 3rd-5th Grade: “MLK Day” This week our classes will learn about the story of Rosa Parks, and the legacy of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. 6th-7th Grade: This week our Neighboring Faiths class will continue their exploration of protestant Christianity with a special trip to attend worship at Calvary Baptist. Permission forms will be emailed to NF families ahead of time. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will explore “UU Vlaues” this week. 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 11:00. This week YRUU youth will discuss this week’s theme: “Take Charge,” and will also set up their new compost bin for UUCCSM.
Announcements:STILL ROOM! RE FAMILY SNOW WEEKEND 1/21-23: From Julie Kinsinger: Attention all RE families and friends: Our church has reserved Craigs Cabin at Camp de Benneville Pines for the weekend of January 21 - 23, 2011. There are 2 rooms LEFT and the price can't be beat, if we get 9 families, its $112/room. All families will share the rental cost, $1000 for the weekend. We will bring in our own food. I have food lists already organized. The rest of the camp will be empty. For those of you who have never been, Camp de Benneville Pines is located at 6800 feet elevation, in the San Bernardino National Forest amidst towering pines, cedars, and oaks. It is owned and operated by the Pacific Southwest District of the Unitarian-Universalist Association. Check out the camp: http://www.debenneville.org/ Craig's Cabin provides more luxurious accommodations for Camp de Benneville program participant. In addition, the cabin is available for rent as a self contained program site. It will sleep up to 25 people in the 9 bedrooms. There are three bathrooms each with showers and one has handicap facilities. There is a meeting room with a fireplace, adjacent to the kitchen/dining area. A TV with VCR allows viewing video cassettes. Unsupervised Children: Parents, please remember that you are responsible for your children at all times when they are not in RE classes. Even though our church is a safe and loving place, it is not a good idea for children to roam the grounds without their parents. Staff and volunteers are not responsible for supervising children when they are not in our RE classes or official childcare. Also, please remember that children through grade 5 must be picked up by their parents at the end of RE time (10:15 or 12:15). This is one part of our church’s safety policy, and is especially important as our younger RE classes are now held in a separate building from the sanctuary and social hall. Time to Register for Elementary Winter Camp: The Pacific Southwest District’s Elementary Winter Camp at de Benneville Pines, is over President's Day Weekend next month, Saturday February 19 - Monday February 21.
Whether you are a family with elementary aged children planning to attend together, or you have an elementary-aged camper who is longing for a weekend away from home, this is the place for you! Snow angels, hot cocoa, inspired worship, sledding, talent show, wintery hikes - we have a perfect weekend planned for you and your family! Our talented program staff puts together the program; you and your family enjoy it! For the campers who want to come on their own, we have trained cabin counselors who supervise them throughout the weekend. Come to camp and become Inspired UUs!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home): Reading of the Week: We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destine. -Martin Luther King, Jr. Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Change is Needed for Growth”: (from Nurturing Spirituality in Children by Peggy Joy Jenkins) This lesson is especially useful when a child is facing a challenge or a risk, perhaps like joining scouts or a soccer team, going away to camp, staying overnight with a friend for the first time, or entering a new school. Materials: A real houseplant that has become bound by its roots in its current pot and needs transplanting. If a rootbound plant is not available, use a tiny clay flowerpot or a small cardboard transplanting pot, a large tangled mass of string stuffed into the pot, and an artificial flower to be inserted into the string mass. Lesson: If you don’t use a houseplant, explain that the mass of string represents the roots of the flower. “Roots need a lot of soil to grow in, but these roots have grown so that there is hardly room for any soil. We need to remove the plant from the old pot and put it into a larger one, or the plant will always be limited in size.” Explain that people are just like the plant, and at times we, too, need more room to grow. Compare the pot to the children’s old ways of thinking about themselves. The old pot, or the old ways, can be so comfortable that sometimes we need to push ourselves out of our “comfort zone.” If not, our growth will become stunted, just as the plant’s growth is stunted when it’s in a container that’s too small for it. The old pot met the needs of the plant at one time and was good for the plant. Now that the plant has grown, a change is necessary so it can continue its growth. Discuss how, in order to grow and become all that they can be, children must change their old ideas about themselves. Help them see change as a means of “becoming,” and use examples like an acorn breaking apart to sprout a new tree or a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. Suggested affirmation: I welcome change in my life because it helps me grow.
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman) January 13, 1568: Following the Diet of Torda on January 6 in Transylvania, at which Unitarian minister Francis David won debates with Calvinist Bishop Peter Melius, Prince John Sigismund converted to Unitarianism on this day and then issued the Edict of Torda, which declared toleration for other religions. January 13, 1819: The Unitarian Association for Protecting the Civil Rights of Unitarians was formed at the London Tavern, Bishopsgate Street, to protest the persecution of Unitarians in England. Reflecting a split between orthodox and Unitarian Dissenters, Unitarians were under severe civil penalties from laws and court decisions. It was a criminal offense to profess Unitarian belief. Most of the penalties were repealed in 1836 with the Registration Acts. January 13, 1832: Horatio Alger was born in Revere, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard Divinity School and was ordained in 1864 as a Unitarian minister in Brewster, Massachusetts. Later he moved to New York City and devoted himself to literature, drawing on his experiences in social work at the Newsboys’ Lodging House in New York. His books about young boys made him enormously popular and wealthy. Alger was a prolific writer and produced 119 novels as well as collections of poetry and biographies of Abraham Lincoln and James Garfield. He died on July 18, 1899. January 14, 1571: The Diet of Maros Vasarhely in Transylvania legally recognized the Unitarian religion as equal to three other recognized religions – Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism. This protection, subsequently reaffirmed by Prince John Sigismund, saved the religion from the extinction it suffered in Poland. January 14, 1615: John Biddle was baptized at Wotton-under-Edge in Gloucester, England. He was known as the “father of English Unitarianism.” His study of scripture caused him to reject the Trinity and adopt Unitarian belief. After his views were betrayed to a Parliamentary Commission, he was jailed the first of several times for his heresy. The House of Commons declared that Biddle’s work was “blasphemous against the Deity of Christ” in 1647 and ordered that his pamphlet outlining his beliefs should be burned by the hangman (signifying that its publication was a criminal offense). Yet the pamphlet went through several printings. Biddle published many theological works, including a translation of the Rakovian Catechism and the Two-fold Catechism, which contained A Scripture Catechism and a brief Scripture Catechism for Children. He died on September 22, 1662, from a disease contracted in prison. January 14, 1875: Albert Schweitzer was born in Kayersberg, Upper Alsace, Germany (now part of France). He trained as a theologian and held doctorates in theology, philosophy, music, and medicine, and he was an authority on Bach and on organ construction. In the early 1930’s, Schweitzer went to French Equatorial Africa (now Gabon) as a medical missionary. He wrote many books, including The Quest of the Historical Jesus (1906), Civilization and Ethics (1923), Out of My Life and Thought (1931), and The Psychiatric Study of Jesus (1948). A Nobel laureate, Schweitzer left Africa only to lecture in Europe and the United States to raise money for his hospital in Lambarene. Schweitzer was a member of the Unitarian Church of Capetown, South Africa, and accepted an honorary membership in the Unitarian Church of the Larger Fellowship. He died on September 4, 1965. January 15, 1654: A committee of the British Parliament recommended that John Biddle stand trial for publishing his Two-fold Catechism. Capital punishment was the expected sentence, but Oliver Cromwell dissolved Parliament and banished Biddle to the Scilly Islands off the southwestern coast of England instead. January 16, 1826: The idea of creating a Boston Sunday School Society was proposed at a teacher’s meeting of the Franklin Sabbath School, organized by Josiah Flagg. Joseph Tuckerman was chosen as the first president. In 1832, the Society changed its name to the Sunday School Society, and it became the Unitarian Sunday School Society in 1858. The Society coordinated the development of hundreds of Sunday school books and teacher-training conferences until 1912, when the Department of Religious Education of the American Unitarian Association took over most of its responsibilities. January 17, 1827: The Nonconformist Club in London, composed chiefly of Unitarians, resolved to work for repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, which restricted the civil liberties of Dissenters. January 18, 1778: Joseph Tuckerman was born in Boston, Massachusetts. Educated at Harvard University, he became a minister in Chelsea, Massachusetts, in 1801. Tuckerman was the first president of the Boston Sunday School Society, the forerunner of the Unitarian Sunday School Society. He was concerned about the growing poverty in Boston and, under the tutelage of Henry Ware, became the first Unitarian minister-at-large to assist the needy. In 1834, he founded the Benevolent Fraternity of Unitarian Churches in Boston, which became a major influence on the development of professional social work and a model for other ministers and organizations in the United States and England who wanted to address urban poverty. Joseph Tuckerman died on April 20, 1840. January 18, 1782: Daniel Webster was born in Salisbury, New Hampshire. He was a Unitarian lawyer and political leader best known for using his powerful oratorical skills to promote moderate federal unity when the divisions over slavery were growing extreme. He opposed the War or 1812 and, as a member of Congress from New Hampshire, refused to vote for taxes to support the war. Webster moved to Boston and became a leading constitutional lawyer, and eventually a U.S. congressman and then senator representing Massachusetts. As a senator, he opposed the annexation of Texas. Webster also ran for president on the Whig Party and served as secretary of state under William Henry Harrison, John Tyler and Millard Fillmore. He supported the Compromise of 1850, allowing slavery where it existed but not in new states. Daniel Webster died on October 24, 1852. January 7, 2011Calendar of upcoming events:Saturday, 1/8
Volunteer Opportunities:NEW RE Teacher Needed for K-2nd at 9:00 service! Our Kindergarten-2nd grade class is staffed by a team of wonderful volunteers, but they’re spread a little thin. We are looking for one more teacher to join the team and commit to leading one to two times per month between now and the end of May. This class uses the “Spirit Play” story-based program model; the only advance prep needed is practicing telling the week’s story. Class includes sharing of the week’s story with a basket of small objects that provide a visual focus for the story, discussion time, and self-directed “work time” with story baskets or art materials. We’ll provide you with the story and materials and as much help and support as you need in preparing to lead the story. Can you help? Contact Catherine@uusm.org or 310-829-5436 x108 for more information or to volunteer.
This Week in RE:Preschool: “I Can Wait” This week our preschool class will have a lesson with stories and special crafts about the good things that can happen when we are able to wait. Kindergarten-2nd Grade: “The Wise People and the Elephant” (9:00) This week we will begin our World Religions focus with a classic Buddhist wisdom tale about the nature of truth. “How Ganesh Got His Elephant Head” (11:00) This week will begin our World Religions focus with a story about the Hindu god Ganesh. 3rd-5th Grade: “Create Magic, Change the World” In this session, participants explore the third Unitarian Universalist Principle, acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations. Children will hear a contemporary story about Aisha, a pagan Unitarian Universalist girl, who celebrates the harvest holiday Lammas at a peace rally. During the celebration, she finds the courage to take the stage and lend her voice to the gathering. Participants will explore a concept of "magic" based on focusing one's energy on purposeful, positive action to change the world in a positive way. We discuss ways our spiritual practices, such as the pagan practice of magic, lead us to involvement and faithful action in the world. 6th-7th Grade: This week our Neighboring Faiths classes will continue their study of protestant Christianity with a visit form UUCCSM member Barbara Gibbs. 8th Grade: The Coming of Age class will explore the concept of god this week. Fertile ground for discussion, for sure! 9th-12th Grade: YRUU meets at 9:00. This week YRUU youth will discuss this week’s theme: “Challenge Your Vision,” and will also talk about their upcoming overnight and the February trip to San Francisco.
Announcements:NEW Guest at Your Table Boxes Collected this Week: Some of you have already brought your Guest at Your Table boxes back to the church, but if you haven’t yet, this Sunday is the time! We’ll collect them in the service, so bring them on in. Money raised through the GAYT program is given to the UU Service Committee to help people in need all over the world. NEW Unsupervised Children: Parents, please remember that you are responsible for your children at all times when they are not in RE classes. Even though our church is a safe and loving place, it is not a good idea for children to roam the grounds without their parents. Staff and volunteers are not responsible for supervising children when they are not in our RE classes or official childcare. Also, please remember that children through grade 5 must be picked up by their parents at the end of RE time (10:15 or 12:15). This is one part of our church’s safety policy, and is especially important as our younger RE classes are now held in a separate building from the sanctuary and social hall. NEW Time to Register for Elementary Winter Camp: The Pacific Southwest District’s Elementary Winter Camp at de Benneville Pines, is over President's Day Weekend next month, Saturday February 19 - Monday February 21.
Whether you are a family with elementary aged children planning to attend together, or you have an elementary-aged camper who is longing for a weekend away from home, this is the place for you! Snow angels, hot cocoa, inspired worship, sledding, talent show, wintery hikes - we have a perfect weekend planned for you and your family! Our talented program staff puts together the program; you and your family enjoy it! For the campers who want to come on their own, we have trained cabin counselors who supervise them throughout the weekend. Come to camp and become Inspired UUs!
UU Everyday (resources and ideas for practicing your UU values at home):Reading of the Week: The food which we are about to eat -Unitarian Prayer Each week I’ll share a short meditation or poem that can be shared as a blessing at mealtimes, or for a family chalice lighting ritual, a morning meditation, a goodnight prayer… or just a moment of reflection for you as a UU parent. I’m tickled by the idea of all of our UUCCSM families sharing a reflection in common each week as we go about our daily lives. If this proves meaningful for you, I’d love to hear about it! An At-Home Activity to Reinforce our UU Values – “Hidden Treasures”: (from 10-Minute Life Lessons for Kids by Jamie Miller) Materials: Large metal or plastic mixing bowl, several coins, pitcher of water, cellophane tape or clay. Before you begin, secure several coins to the bottom inside of the bowl with clear tape or clay and place the bowl on a table. Have a child come up and stand next to the bowl and describe what she sees inside. Tell her that each of the coins represents a “treasure” in the child’s nature or personality. You can even name each quality as you attach the coin or point to it in the bottom of the bowl – her artistic ability, her optimistic nature, her willingness to help others, her resourcefulness, her kindness toward animals, etc. All children have many positive qualities, and most children don’t hear about them often enough. This is a good time and a fun way to make note of those things that make each child unique. If you’re doing this with a group of children, you can talk about good qualities in general. Now ask the child to slowly move away from the bowl, keeping her eye on it as she walks backward. Tell her to keep going until she can no longer see the coins at the bottom of the bowl. Have the child remain where she is standing. At this point, talk about the things in life that sometimes cause us to lose sight of our special qualities and think less of ourselves. Depending on the age of the child, these things might include critical teachers, unkind friends, sibling rivalry, difficulty with certain subjects in school, not measuring up to the “best” child on a sports team or in dance class, parents’ expectations, etc. You might even name specific things in the child’s experience as she takes each step backward. Naturally, the qualities discussed can be greatly simplified for young children. With the pitcher, pour small amounts of water into the bowl at a time. Each time you pour, name something or ask the child to name something that can help her see her positive qualities – her true self. These could include things like finding something else she is talented in and developing that talent, spending less time on unimportant things and more time on learning and growing, not comparing herself to the “best” in the group, doing nice things for others, making a personal “victory list” – writing down all her good qualities, associating with friends who recognize her strengths, reading stories about people who have achieved greatness in spite of weaknesses or handicaps, etc. Eventually, when the bowl is full of water, the child will be able to see the coins once again – her own “hidden treasures” will be brought into view for all to see. (This optical illusion occurs when the bowl is full of water and the light bends so that the child is able to see the reflection of the coins.)
This Week in UU History: (From This Day in Unitarian Universalist History, by Frank Schulman)January 4, 1846: Theodore Parker, a radical Unitarian theologian, was installed as the first minister of the Twenty-Eighth Congregational Society of Boston, Massachusetts. On that occasion he preached the sermon, “The True Idea of a Christian Church.” January 5, 1835: Olympia Brown was born in Prairie Ronde, Michigan. Reared as a Universalist, she graduated from St. Lawrence University Theological School and became the first woman ordained to the ministry by a full denominational authority on June 25, 1863. She served Universalist churches in Vermont, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Connecticut, Illinois, and Iowa. Brow was also co-founder of the New England Women’s Suffrage Association and president of the Federal Suffrage Association. She died on October 23, 1926. January 6, 1568: The Diet of Torda, called by Prince John Sigismund to settle disputes between the Calvinists and the Unitarians, opened in Transylvania. The minister Francis David represented the Unitarians, and the bishop Peter Melius represented the Calvinists. As a result of the debates, Sigismund converted to Unitarianism and issued the Edict of Torda, which declared official toleration for other religions. It was the first time in Western history that a ruler allowed his subjects to practice a religion different from his own. January 6, 1811: Charles Sumner was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He graduated from Harvard University and Harvard Law School and began a law practice. In 1837, Sumner toured Europe for several years to learn its languages and to study its social changes. After returning to the United States, he went back to his law practice, became a notable lecturer, and joined reform movements involved in improving education, abolishing slavery, and advocating world peace. In 1849, at an address before the American Peace Society, Sumner called for “institutions of international government, including a court and congress of nations.” Sumner became a senator from Massachusetts in 1851 and was an ardent abolitionist. He is best known for surviving a physical attack on the floor of the U.S. Senate. His assailant was a South Carolina congressman who took offense at Sumner’s strong language against slavery and the South. Sumner was a lifelong member of King’s Chapel (Unitarian) in Boston. He died on February 11, 1874. January 7, 1800: Millard Fillmore was born in Locke, New York. He was a lawyer who served in the New York State Assembly and the U.S House of Representatives. Elected vice president of the United States in 1848, Fillmore became president on July 9, 1850, when President Zachary Taylor died, and he held that office until 1853. Fillmore signed a series of bills known as the Compromise of 1850, which admitted California into the Union as a free state, restricted the slave trade in the District of Columbia, and provided for the return of fugitive slaves. He authorized the first American mission to establish trade relations with Japan. In 1856 he ran for president as the candidate of the Native American (“Know-Nothing”) Party but was defeated. Fillmore was a member of the Unitarian Church in Buffalo, New York. He died at age 74 on March 8, 1874. January 8, 1985: The Universalist Church of the Philippines changed its name to the “Unitarian Universalist Church of the Philippines.” January 9, 1784: Sir George Savile died at age 63. He was a noted philanthropist and a member of the English Parliament for Yorkshire who worked for the civil and religious rights of Catholics and the reform of penal laws. Savile spoke publicly of his Unitarianism and worked to free Unitarians of the legal impediments to practicing their faith. At that time, Unitarians were forbidden to own their own churches or perform weddings, funerals, or baptisms. January 12, 1737: John Hancock was born in Braintree (now Quincy), Massachusetts. Raised by a wealthy uncle in Boston, Hancock graduated from Harvard University in 1754 and joined his uncle’s mercantile business, which he inherited in 1764. A leading patriot, he opposed the Stamp Act (1765) and other British commercial policies. In 1769 Hancock was elected to the Massachusetts General Court. He was a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1775 to 1780, serving as president for the first two years, and he was the first delegate to sign the Declaration of Independence. In 1780 the people of Massachusetts elected Hancock governor. He resigned in 1785, was reelected in 1787, and served again until his death. He presided over the Massachusetts convention to ratify the new Constitution in 1788. Hancock was a member of the Brattle Street Church (Unitarian) in Boston and chair of the church’s building committee in 1773. He died on October 8, 1793. January 12, 1820: Carolina Seymour Severance, known as Caroline, was born in Canandaigua, New York. She worked all her adult life for social reform and her home was a gathering place for liberal causes. At first she held the conventional view that a woman’s role was as a wife and a mother, but she became increasingly involved with women’s rights and stressed women’s ability to shape public policy. When her family moved to Boston, Massachusetts, Severance took part in the city’s reform movements. When her family moved again, to Los Angeles, California, they founded the city’s first Unitarian congregation, Unity Church. Severance championed Christian socialism, progressivism, and peace. In 1900 she became president of the Los Angeles County Woman Suffrage League. Carolina Seymour Severance died on November 10, 1914, at age 94.
For older entries see: Weekly Updates -- 2010  |