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Journey Group Packet 2014 Sep: Faith

2014 Sep


faith (n.) mid-13th-century; "duty of fulfilling one's trust," from Old French feid, foi "faith, belief, trust, confidence, pledge," from Latin fides "trust, faith, confidence, reliance, credence, belief," from root of fidere "to trust," from Proto-Indo-European root bheidh (source also of Greek pistis). Theological sense is from late 14th-century; religions called faiths since circa 1300.
-from Online Etymoligical Dictionary

Some us have a warm, fuzzy response to the word “faith.” Others of us have a cold, prickly reaction to the word. I understand the cold, prickly reaction. Far from its original sense of “fidelity; fulfillment of duties with which one has been entrusted,” “faith” today has sometimes seemed to mean “clinging to a belief regardless of the evidence – regardless, even, of any possible future evidence.” If that’s what “faith” means, it’s no wonder that many Unitarian Universalists would rather have nothing to do with it.

If we are to have fidelity to the truth, we understand that we must always be willing to change our belief in light of new evidence. To define “faith” as “refusal to modify beliefs, whatever the evidence” is to make faith into the opposite of the fidelity that “faith” originally indicated!

The Greek word was pistis. Indeed, in Greek mythology, the goddess Pistis personified trust and reliability. In Roman mythology, her name was Fides (hence, fidelity). The Greeks often spoke of Pistis together with Elpis (hope), Sophrosyne (prudence), and the Charites (a.k.a. Graces, which variously included such minor goddesses as charm, beauty, fertility, creativity, splendor, mirth, and good cheer – all attributes generally associated with harmony among people.) When Paul of Tarsus wrote to the Corinthians that “faith, hope, and love abide,” he was clearly evoking this Greek background.

For the Greeks, Pistis evolved to include persuasion. In the Greek understanding of rhetoric, pistis are the elements to induce true judgment. So the idea of fidelity to duty morphed to refer especially to fidelity to the truth, and the logical means of persuasion of the truth.

In the hands of the writers and the interpretive community of readers of the Christian ("New") Testament, the Greek pistis evolved further from “persuasion” to “conviction.”

The Christian Testament was originally written in Greek, and pistis (uniformly translated to English as “faith”) appears many times. Below is a sampling. As you look over these passages, I invite you to consider what difference it makes if you read faith as “fidelity to an entrusted duty” or as “conviction of belief.”
All these meanings – fidelity, persuasion, and conviction – echo through our conception of faith today. What is at the core, unifying these disparate meanings?

Jumping from the ancient Greeks and the Christian Testament writers to today: recent reflections on the nature of faith provide important avenues for getting at the core of faith while discarding the association of faith with willful disregard of evidence and reason. Let’s take a look at three contemporary approaches.

1. Wieman

The Unitarian theologian Henry Nelson Wieman (1884-1975) provides helpful guidance on the nature of faith. Wieman’s view, as described by Virginia Knowles:

“Religious faith is the act by which we commit ourselves with the fullness of our being, insofar as we are able, to whatever can transform and save us from the evil of devoting ourselves to the transient goods of social success, financial opulence, or even scholarship or beauty or social concern.” (1992)

We all have egos, and our egos desire recognizable achievement -- socially, financially, physically, professionally, politically, or artistically. Our egos motivate us to do some good work, but Weiman identifies excessive devotion to the ego’s desires as evil. We may be saved from that evil, suggests Weiman, through commitment to grow and change in ways that make us increasingly better able to avoid the evil of overly focusing on the ego’s desires, increasingly oriented toward humble service of enduring values rather than ego desires and inconspicuous harmony with life and our world rather than recognition of achievement.

Wieman’s understanding of faith captures what has been most central and important about faith in Western religious traditions. The outcome of faith – personal transformation and transcendence of ego-centric desires -- is precisely the outcome that the traditional Western religions have seen as the product of a faithful life. Wieman has showed us a way to embrace this valuable function of faith without the unfortunate notion that faith requires irrational conviction that flies in the face of evidence. Try reading the above samples from the Bible with Wieman’s understanding of faith in mind. Does it work?

2. Salzberg

For American Buddhist writer Sharon Salzberg (b. 1952), faith is

"the act of opening our hearts to the unknown."

Rather than believing without evidence, faith is a willingness to go forward to take in new evidence and new experience, ever-willing to be transformed. This throwing ourselves into the unknown often does feel like leaping -- hence the phrase, "leap of faith."

At the same time, Salzberg is drawing upon the tradition that faith stands in distinction from reason and evidence. After all, reason and evidence tell us about what we can know. Making our peace with unknowability is also a crucial part of a whole life.

While Weiman draws attention to the ego’s focus on achievement, Salzberg’s formulation points to another trick of the ego. The ego pretends to know more than it actually does know about what's going to happen next and about where your life is headed. Ego loves its illusion of being in control. Our conceptions of how things are “supposed” to go can close us to realities that present themselves. Faith is the liberating capacity to step out of our illusion, and, without pretending already to know, be open to surprise and mystery.

Following Salzberg, we can see that faith means engaged and open-minded and open-hearted participation in life. It means the courage to offer up all that we are to the world around us, not knowing what the world will ask or what we will find in ourselves to offer. Faith is the overcoming of the fear that could cause us to withdraw and stand safely on the sidelines. Faith is jumping in -- there's the leap again -- into all that life has to offer, the joy and the triumph and the grief and the loss. Faith is stepping, jumping, skipping, leaping, somersaulting right into the middle of possibilities for how we might evolve and for what goodness might burst forth. Faith's opposite, then, is not doubt, but despairing withdrawal.

This understanding leads to seeing faith as also awareness of an interconnected universe. We are not alone no matter how alone we sometimes feel. What happens to us and from us is part of the larger fabric of life, always rippling out through threads of connection.

If we read the above Bible samples with Salzberg’s understanding of faith in mind, do they may more sense? Less?

3. Fowler

James Fowler (b. 1940, Prof of Theology and Human Development at Emory and a United Methodist minister) defined faith as:

“a way of knowing, construing, and interpreting existence.”

A “religion,” then, for Fowler, is “a community’s way of giving expression to faith relationships held in common.”

Fowler’s definition preserves our very common sense that Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, etc. are faiths (or, more specifically, are names of communities that give expression to faith relationships held in common among the community’s members). Each offers a certain way of knowing, construing, and interpreting existence.

The idea that it’s a good thing to have convictions that are entirely unshakeable regardless of the evidence is a bad mistake. That idea does nevertheless convey, for all its misdirection, one implication that is true: evidence is not the same thing as meaning, and evidence alone does not suffice. The way we understand the world is more than just evidence. Fowler’s definition preserves that nugget of insight about faith: that evidence alone doesn’t offer much guidance. Mere phenomena present us with “a blooming, buzzing confusion” (William James) until interpreted, fit into an overall context, made sense of.

There are many various ways to put the same evidence together into a structure of value and meaning, and each way is, for Fowler, a faith. We all have faith – it’s unavoidable – since we all interpret and make sense of existence. To have “little faith,” then, would be to have a rather haphazard and often incoherent way “knowing, construing, and interpreting existence.” To have a lot of faith would be to know, construe, and interpret existence in a way that coherently makes sense of a vast range of data. How does it work to read the above Bible verses with Fowler’s definition in mind?

Weiman, Salzberg, and Fowler each offer us an active conception of faith. It’s the act by which we commit (Weiman), the act of opening (Salzberg), and a way of doing something, namely, interpreting existence (Fowler). Faith is best understood not so much as something we have, but as something we do – or, sometimes, fail to do.


For this exercise, we will consider faith in its aspect of trust. For the Western religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), faith involves trust in God. The core idea is that we don’t have to take responsibility for everything. How things turn out is, of course, an interactive mixture of what we do and what is beyond our control. Yet sometimes we fall into the trap of thinking we control what we do not. One of our “secret” strategies for control involves “shoulding.” I try to ensure that other people – or even inanimate objects – will behave in the way I want by clinging tightly to a belief that they should behave that way. Thus, when somebody (maybe me) fails to be and do as they should, and the result is that things don’t turn out as I want, I get upset. Trust (whether in God, or in society, or in the universe) involves letting go of trying to control everything – including letting go of shoulding. There are two levels.

Level A: Trusting that things will work out the way I want them to
Level B: Trusting that things will work out in a way that is really and deeply OK even if it’s very different from what I would have wanted.

“Level B,” of course, gets more to the essence of faith – which reminds us that acceptance as well as trust are central aspects of faith.

Your exercise, then, is:

For one week try letting go of something that you normally spend energy “shoulding” about or otherwise trying to control. Just let go of worrying and meddling with it. Have faith that it will turn out OK (even if it isn’t what you would have thought you’d want). NOTE: Do exercise reasonable prudence in selecting something to let go of. Stepping back and trusting your toddler to make it across a busy street by himself would probably not be a good choice.

Come to your Journey Group prepared to talk about how the exercise went.


As always, don’t treat these questions like “homework.” You do not need to engage every single one. Instead, simply look them over and find the one that “hooks” you most. Then let it take you on a ride. Live with it for a while. Allow it to regularly break into – and break open – your ordinary thoughts. And then come to your Journey Group meeting prepared to share that journey with your group.

1. How would it change your life if you had more faith? Less faith?

2. “Bad faith” is a term in existentialist philosophy. It means: refusal to confront facts or choices. What, if anything, does this tell you about what faith is?

3. What did faith mean to you when you were 7-years-old? When you were 14-years-old? What was your faith then? In what ways is that still a part of you today?

4. For Fowler, a religion is “a community’s way of giving expression to faith relationships held in common.” What are the faith relationships that Unitarian Universalists hold in common?

5. Have you ever had a “crisis of faith”? Are you still having it? How did it change you?

6. What is faith? How does living with faith enrich one’s life?

7. Some forms of Christianity teach that faith is always a gift from God and never something that can be produced by people. How much control, if any, do you think we have over whether or not we have faith? Can you choose faith – or does faith choose you?

8. Which approach – Weiman’s, Salzberg’s, Fowler’s – makes most sense to you? Or does combining all three seem attractive to you?

9. What value, if any, do you see in strong conviction? What value, if any, do you see in doubt?

11. Is it good for a society for its members to be diverse in their faiths?

12. A few years ago UUA produced postcards that UU congregations could buy and use for mailing to visitors. The postcard had a nice picture of a diverse and smiling group and the words: “Imagine a place where people of different beliefs worship together as one faith.” Is it a good way to express what UU is all about?

13. People have different concepts of what faith means. How much does having different concepts of faith interfere with finding “Common Ground”?

14. What are the differences between faith and hope? What are the intersections between faith and hope?


As always, this is not “required reading.” We will not analyze or dissect these pieces in our group. They are simply meant to get your thinking started – and maybe to open you to new ways of thinking about what it means to live with happiness and joy.


“Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.” -Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.”-Rabindranath Tagore

“There are many things that are essential to arriving at true peace of mind, and one of the most important is faith, which cannot be acquired without prayer.” -John Wooden

“Faith is the strength by which a shattered world shall emerge into the light.” -Helen Keller

“A man of courage is also full of faith.” -Marcus Tullius Cicero

“We are twice armed if we fight with faith.” -Plato

“If patience is worth anything, it must endure to the end of time. And a living faith will last in the midst of the blackest storm.” -Mahatma Gandhi

“To have faith is to trust yourself to the water. When you swim you don't grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead you relax, and float.” -Alan Watts

“Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother.” -Khalil Gibran

“All the world is made of faith, and trust, and pixie dust.” -J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

“Faith is not the belief that God will do what you want. It is the belief that God will do what is right.” -Max Lucado

“Sometimes beautiful things come into our lives out of nowhere. We can't always understand them, but we have to trust in them. I know you want to question everything, but sometimes it pays to just have a little faith.” -Lauren Kate, Torment

“You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.” -Mahatma Gandhi

“None of us knows what might happen even the next minute, yet still we go forward. Because we trust. Because we have Faith.” -Paulo Coelho, Brida

“A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.” -Friedrich Nietzsche

“Believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.” -Rainer Maria Rilke,

“Doubt everything. Find your own light.” -Buddha

“Faith is walking face-first and full-speed into the dark. If we truly knew all the answers in advance as to the meaning of life and the nature of God and the destiny of our souls, our belief would not be a leap of faith and it would not be a courageous act of humanity; it would just be a prudent insurance policy.” -Elizabeth Gilbert

“Faith is about doing. You are how you act, not just how you believe.” -Mitch Albom,

“You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.” -Thomas Merton

“When you get to the end of all the light you know and it's time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: either you will be given something solid to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly.” -Edward Teller

“This is my living faith, an active faith, a faith of verbs: to question, explore, experiment, experience, walk, run, dance, play, eat, love, learn, dare, taste, touch, smell, listen, speak, write, read, draw, provoke, emote, scream, sin, repent, cry, kneel, pray, bow, rise, stand, look, laugh, cajole, create, confront, confound, walk back, walk forward, circle, hide, and seek.” -Terry Tempest Williams

“Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.” -Paul Tillich

“Faith is not something to grasp, it is a state to grow into.” -Mahatma Gandhi

“When all is said and done, the life of faith is nothing if not an unending struggle of the spirit with every available weapon against the flesh.” -Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“You have as much laughter as you have faith.” -Martin Luther

“There lives more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds.” -Alfred Tennyson

“To 'choose' dogma and faith over doubt and experience is to throw out the ripening vintage and to reach greedily for the Kool-Aid.” -Christopher Hitchens

“Life is doubt, and faith without doubt is nothing but death.” -Miguel de Unamuno

“A faith that cannot survive collision with the truth is not worth many regrets.” -Arthur C. Clarke


Google “Fowler Stages of Faith” and peruse a few of the top returns.

Sharon Salzberg, “Faith” http://www.sharonsalzberg.com/archive/article/142

Blogger Dan Fincke’s post on “Why I Define Faith Philosophically as Inherently Irrational and Immoral”

Dangerous Faith? Faith vs. Reason on Responding to Climate Change

Audio: 3-minute audiobook excerpt from Salzberg’s Faith. http://www.sharonsalzberg.com/books-audio/78


Sharon Salzberg, Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience (2003). Faith resides not in the outcome, but in the willingness to see the possibility for change.

James Fowler, Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Human Development and the Quest for Meaning (1981). Faith develops through life. Few ever reach the sixth and last stage. Many never progress pass the 3rd or 4th stage.

Chris Stedman, Faitheist: How and Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious (2012). The story of a former Evangelical Christian turned openly gay atheist who now works to bridge the divide between atheists and the religious.

Eboo Patel, Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim in the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation (2010). A hopeful and moving testament to the world-changing potential of an interfaith youth movement.


“Raw Faith” (2010) “an intimate and revealing documentary that follows two years in the private life of Marilyn Sewell, a Unitarian minister." Trailer and other info:

“Dead Man Walking” (1995)
“The Virgin Spring” (1960)
“The Last Temptation of Christ” (1988)
“The Ruling Class” (1972)

Short Films on Youtube (about 6 mins each):


“Leap of Faith”

What’s the connection between faith and . . . animal resuce? Check out:

Neil deGrass Tyson says faith and reason are irreconcilable.


George Michael, “Faith”
Posted by Rev. Meredith Garmon at 14:26 No comments: Labels: Journey Group


Autumn at CUUC

How autumn comes -- 2014
 Sep 29: Oct 6: Oct 13: Oct 20: Oct 27: Nov 3: Nov 10: Nov 17:

Nov 24: Dec 1: Posted by Rev. Meredith Garmon at 19:25 No comments: Labels: Pictorial


CUC Bird Walk Report: Sun Aug 24

Our theme today was journeys, and journeying light in honor of the fall migration of birds that is well underway. At night you can see flocks of small warblers passing in front of the moon as they head south and during the day see them feeding up in the trees. They fly high so as to avoid the lower, thicker resistant air, but by flying at higher altitudes, they have to have all kinds of physiologic adaptations that make them supreme flying athletes. They also have hollow bones, air sacs, and no bladder to lighten their load.

The eight of us heard poetry and contemplated many facets of traveling. One of the poems we shared was Mary Oliver's, "The Journey."

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice–
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
‘Mend my life!’
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognised as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do–
determined to save
the only life you could save.

To save ourselves, and the world, most of us went to morning service where the theme was also journeys as Rev. Garmon spoke of the Beatniks and the book, On The Road. After the morning's service, a few of us put up ultraviolet stickers on the sanctuary windows so the birds would not hit the windows. We have found a number of dead birds around the building and our hope is to decrease these accidental deaths caused by hitting our windows. We hope to make our congregation a safe home for the many.

Today's bird count was the lowest yet, but we did enjoy the close sighting of several birds, and spending a wonderful morning with one other.

Next bird walk is September 28, 2014, 8:30 a.m. behind the Parsonage.

4 House sparrows
12 American robins
9 Mourning doves
2 Tufted Titmice
6 Common grackles
2 Black-capped chickadees
2 House finches
2 Northern cardinals
Posted by LoraKim Joyner at 15:35 No comments: Labels: Bird Walk


Search for a CUC Youth Program Coordinator

The search for a CUC Youth Program Coordinator has begun again. We revised the job description to fit the quarter-time position and attract a vibrant, caring, responsible candidate to work with our youth and adult volunteer advisors. The person in this position will be fortunate to collaborate with a strong team of volunteers and supportive staff members to further develop our youth ministry. The CUC Search Committee is very hopeful the right person will appear. In addition to all the ways we are advertising the position, we hope you will keep your eyes open and let us know if you think of anyone who might be the right fit for this position. Please let Perry know or have the person contact us. For the full job description, CLICK HERE.
Posted by Perry Montrose at 21:23 No comments: Labels: RE


Technical Problem vs Adaptive Challenge

As our Community Unitarian addresses the various issues and questions that come up, it is important to be able to distinguish a "technical problem" from an "adaptive challenge." At the Board of Trustees retreat on Sat Aug 16, the Board studied the differences. As we go forward, it will be crucial to ask ourselves: "Is this simply a technical problem? Is there an underlying adaptive challenge here -- for, if so, a very different approach is called for."

The single biggest failure of leadership is to treat adaptive challenges like technical problems.



Adapted from Ronald A. Heifetz & Donald L. Laurie, “The Work of Leadership,” Harvard Business Review, January-February 1997; and Ronald A. Heifetz & Marty Linsky, Leadership on the Line, Harvard Business School Press, 2002.



Posted by Rev. Meredith Garmon at 11:57 No comments: 

2014-15 Common Read: Reclaiming Prophetic Witness The Unitarian Universalist "Common Read" for 2014-15 is:

Paul Rasor, Reclaiming Prophetic Witness: Liberal Religion in the Public Square

The selection committee met during the summer, thoughtfully considered the 14 books nominated for the 2014-15 Common Read, and, on Aug 5 announced their choice.

In Reclaiming Prophetic Witness, Rasor argues that conservative Christianity is not the only valid religious  voice in our national social policy. His book invites Unitarian Universalists to explore and claim our c ontribution, as religious liberals, to the pressing moral and ethical debates of our contemporary world.

Th e UUA Common Read began as part of long-range preparation for the 2012 “Justice” General Assembly.

Past years' Common Reads:
2010-11: Margaret Regan, The Death of Josseline
2011-12: Eboo Patel, Acts of Faith
2012-13: Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow
2013-14: Saru Jayaraman, Behind the Kitchen Door

The selection committee includes both headquarters and field staff of the UUA, charged each year to discern the most useful and appealing offering for congregations and individual Unitarian Universalists. This year's selection is an elegantly written, 105-page book is a gem. Rasor observes that many liberals are uncomfortable with talking about our faith as the well from which spring our social justice commitments. The book includes insights from our theological heritage and our history that have bearing for us today, and calls us to prophetic, faith-based justice work.

Order your copy from the UUA Bookstore: CLICK HERE
Or from Amazon: CLICK HERE
Posted by Rev. Meredith Garmon at 21:47 No comments: Labels: Common Read, Denominational, Suggested Books

The Beauty of the Breeze (Perry's Ponderings)

As I sit in my cleaned out and almost completely-organized office, the most perfect breeze passes through the open door and peacefully awakens my senses. In its wake, I cannot help but pause for a moment to notice the beauty around me, feeling fully alive and connected to the nature outside the door and the life of the congregation within it.

There have been some days this summer when we were in the midst of the cleaning and reorganizing that there was a busyness in the heat, much as you might find on a city sidewalk baking in the sun as it absorbs thousands of footsteps. Then the cooling off happens overnight and we are refreshed by the air, able to see anew what has passed. It is heartwarming to see the imprint of the footsteps at CUC and the fresh air breathing new life into the building.

What has transpired for you this summer? Have your steps quickly traversed those city sidewalks with a destination in mind? Have you found those moments to pause and connect with nature, or loved ones on vacation? Whether a particular conversation gave you pause or the perfect passing breeze held you still, I wonder what has contained significance for you in the changes of the summer season. What will you bring back with you to this community when you return?

We are more than halfway through the summer and coming upon the time when our minds are pulled into thinking about a new school and church year. We savor the time we have before it comes and begin to prepare in motions that will transition us from one mode to the other. I hope the summer activity and slowing down have provided what you needed during this time and the remaining summer weeks bring more of that.

I have been planting seeds in what is new soil for me at CUC and look forward to nurturing more of those growing relationships, so we may have a bountiful fall. I await to hear your stories and prepare for the ones we will be creating together.

Posted by Perry Montrose at 17:56 No comments: Labels: Congregational Life, Perry's Ponderings


UU Christian Fellowship for 2014-15

from CUC Community Minister, Rev. Kelly Murphy Mason:

Happy summer, everyone! In just a couple of months, starting in September 2014, we’ll resume our monthly meetings of the Metro NY Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship for the 2014-15 program year. Our new theme is:

Desert Spirituality: Contemplation in the Christian Wisdom Tradition.

On Thu Sep 18, we’ll gather at:
The Community Church of New York
40 E 35th St
Manhattan, NY 10016

Through the church year, we'll gather every 3rd Thursday evening of each month following, for fellowship and conversation.

See these three PDFs:
1) Flyer highlighting the new Metro NY UUCF theme this coming year, Desert Spirituality (CLICK HERE).
2) The customary agenda for our chapter meetings, with our regular chalice lighting (CLICK HERE).
3) A comprehensive UUCF program calendar and detailed outline of our upcoming discussion topics (CLICK HERE).

One cornerstone of our conversations will be Dr. Christine Valters Paintners award-winning text, Desert Fathers and Mothers: Early Christian Wisdom Sayings, published by SkyLight Press.

Companion volumes this year will include:
Thomas Merton, The Wisdom of the Desert
Mary C. Earle, The Desert Mothers: Spiritual Practices from the Women of the Wilderness.

All of these books are available for purchase online. Together the books will help introduce us to the ‘Desert Spirituality’ at the heart of some of the earliest Christian contemplative movements. Note that our reading list – while quite illuminating – is only recommended, not required. Paintner’s book should be especially useful in our ongoing conversations, but certainly, people are welcome to join the group at any time with any degree of familiarity with the material.

Do let me know about any questions, concerns, or comments you might have regarding our Metro NY UUCF chapter meeting. Folks from various congregations throughout the tri-state area have attended in recent years, so thank you all for your generous support of UUCF within this Metro NY district. You are heartily encouraged to pass on word of our regular UUCF meetings to those in your UU congregations or to other Christian-curious friends who might be intrigued by what UU Christianity, in particular, has to offer. A number of you attended the recent UUA General Assembly in Providence. It was great to see you there with thousands of other UUs and also members of the national UUCF organization. Many thanks to UUCF Executive Director the Rev. Ron Robinson for helping us publicize and promote our program here in Metro NY. At the national level, UUCF has its own rich store of resources available at its website and invites lively dialogue about alternative Christian communities and various “heresies” within the larger church, all online at www.uuchristian.org.

Suggestions about future programming for Metro NY UUCF will be gratefully taken into advisement. We also respond to invitations from area congregations, either for communion services or occasional adult religious education offerings. Feel free to copy, post, forward or otherwise distribute any & all of the attached PDFs to anyone anywhere who might be interested in our local UUCF programs. I do hope to see some of you at Community Church this coming fall. Please remember that this UUCF chapter is always kept open; the invitation to join us at the Metro NY fellowship remains a standing one, month after month, year after year.
Posted by Rev. Meredith Garmon at 20:10 No comments: Labels: UU Christian Fellowship


New & Improved Youth Room! (Perry's Ponderings)

“Now open” it says on the newly painted magnetic chalkboard wall in the Youth Room. Next month, high schoolers will be returning to their special space at CUC. Thanks to senior Sofia’s sweat equity, they will find that the wall reserved for decorating can be drawn on with chalk and have things posted. It will be open for creativity and the sharing of ideas.

We have added three comfortable couches in the Youth Room and now have ample seating for our Youth Group that includes a large incoming sophomore class from Coming of Age last year. We want to be sure there are not only seats for those we expect to join us, but also always room for one more. A welcoming space is the first step to facilitating a vibrant Youth Group. In the fall, all the youth will have the opportunity to add their creative touches to the room and turn it into a true home when they begin connecting with each other through sharing, learning, worship, and service.

The CUC Search Committee for the Youth Program Coordinator position will be reconvening to find us a suitable candidate to guide the youth and their volunteer adult advisors. The Board has expressed full support for this position by funding a reasonable salary for this ten-hour a week position. Thank you all for your pledges that make this important position possible. Please let me know if you think of someone outside of the congregation who might be a possible candidate, as we search for a responsible kind-hearted person who shares our values and understands the balance of stepping up and stepping back when guiding youth. This person will anchor the program, while collaborating with the other staff members and a strong team of youth advisors to further develop our youth ministry.

I encourage our youth and their families to communicate with me about what they would like to see in youth programs. We want to engage our youth in the varied opportunities for growth that they seek. Within those experiences there will be surprise self-discoveries and bonding with others that forms a safe space in which to be held during the teen years. The self-confidence and understanding built upon those relationships will sustain the youth throughout their lives.
Posted by Perry Montrose at 13:53 No comments: Labels: Perry's Ponderings, RE