No Service today at UUFP or via Zoom. We wish you all a wonderful holiday spent with family and friends. Happy Labor Day!
Indoor services are to resume on September 12th, however if there are changes, esp. with pandemic protocols, services will either be held outdoors or by Zoom
A Gathering of Waters – Speaker: Rev. Kerry Mueller
We will celebrate our coming together after a time apart. Please bring a small container of water from your last year. As we pour our waters into a single bowl, we will reflect on what it means to be a gathered community in times of joy and times of stress and uncertainty.
The Three C’s: Compassion, Charity and Connection by Speaker: Terry Dixon
Lay Leader: Allan Pallay
Compassionate concern for others is instinctual. It is the ethical root of all religions and also humanism. As humans, we are hard wired to connect with and care for others. It is central to who we are from an evolutionary perspective and key to our survival as a species. In many ways, compassion is the societal expansion and expression of the fundamental maternal instinct. Indeed, the Biblical Hebrew word for compassion, rachamin, derives from the word for womb, rechem. So why do we find it so hard to practice in our lives? How can we cultivate greater compassion for ourselves and others? Our guest speaker, Terry Dixon, will explore compassion from various religious and philosophical perspectives. He will also lead us in a metta/loving kindness meditation.
Terry Dixon is a member of Main Line Unitarian Church, where he has served on the Board of Trustees, as chair of the Worship Committee, and in various other roles. He is also an intellectual property lawyer with degrees from Trinity College, Dublin and Columbia University Law School.
Dreaming with Zeus and Hera: Toward a Unitarian Universalist Theology
by Rev Dave Hunter
Unitarians, it was often said in the past, believe in one God – at most. Today such a statement would be insufficient to describe our Unitarian Universalist theological diversity. Here’s Dave’s take on the God question.
At Dave’s family reunion in July, I found myself in conversation with a young relative about the apparent gender transition of a cousin of his generation. How do we witness and bless such major life events when so many people are un-churched these days, I wondered. And on the way home I heard a book review about a novel in which a couple develop an app to create custom rituals for non-religious people. The app goes viral, creating all sorts of disruptions in their lives and the life of the world. So I was primed to listen carefully later in the week to an interview on Radio Times with Robert P. Jones, founder and CEO of PRRI, the Public Religion Research Institute about recent changes in religious affiliation. This major survey, based on half a million interviews in which people self identify, has data right down to the county level, and includes Unitarian Universalists as a separate group, not lumping us under “all other” as usual.
What did I learn about the religious landscape? Here are the headlines:
The NONES – atheists, agnostics and those not affiliated with any religion have increased to one-quarter of the population.
White evangelicals have declined starkly from about 25% in 2008 to 14.5% in 2020. They are declining especially among the young. The result is that their median age is 56 – not far off from the UU median age of 53, both above the median age of 47 for all Americans.
In the interview, Jones said that younger people are leaving some forms of Christianity over values like LBGTQ rights, reproductive freedom, the climate crisis, leaving the liberal faiths looking like 30 year-olds and the more conservative religions looking like 70 year-olds.
What does this mean for this congregation? Might those young NONES realize they could benefit from a spiritual community that reflects their values? Maybe they will come looking for liberal religious education for their children and life passage rituals for their families? Might you find ways to welcome them warmly, to offer them nurture and challenge, and to receive the new ideas and skills and challenges that they would bring? What will your new normal look like? Who do you want to be? How do you want to bless the world?
Love, Kerry
Conservation Leaders, Part II. Lay Speaker: Lisa Jokiel
We’ve added three more stars to the Hit Parade of Environmentalists – Al Gore, Birute Galdikas, and Aldo Leopold. There will be more statements of awareness, this time from members of the congregation, and we’ll take am in depth look at the work of Washington’s Gov. Jay Inslee.
The Dignity and Worth of Every Person: Our Impossible Belief? Speaker: Rev Dave Hunter
In the first of our seven UU principles we affirm “the dignity and worth of every person.” Do we really mean it? How many people can you think of in the next minute who appear to lack “dignity and worth”?
Truth, Trust, and Tribe. Speaker: Rev. Kerry Mueller
UU Principles include the use of the democratic process in society at large, but how do we engage in that process when we live in divided realities, pervasive disinformation and rampant distrust? Come explore these questions with Rev. Kerry.
Finding Serenity. Lay Speaker: Emily Quarles-Mowrer
Have you ever had the sensation that you are flailing, while others effortlessly float through life? When we see a swan gliding across a placid lake, we do not think about the furious underwater paddling that propels it. Perhaps the people we think are floating are flailing in their own ways. The Serenity Prayer attributed to Reinhold Niebuhr says, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” Join us as we think about the difference between failing and floating in the river of life.