by WUUC | Feb 21, 2020 | Announcements
By Alaine Owsley Davis
One of the ways we care for each other in this church community is by sharing food together. Food is an essential, visceral way that we demonstrate our love for one another. Going out for lunch, cooking together, having friends over for dinner: These are all ways that we deepen our bonds.
WUUC is a pick-up site for Full Circle Farms,
a local organic farm that participates in Community Supported Agriculture
(CSA). Anyone can purchase a weekly (or bimonthly) CSA subscription and get
their fresh, organic produce delivered to a local site like our church. In
exchange for being a pick-up site, WUUC is granted one free CSA box per week,
and we pass this box on in a rotation, with members selected to receive a box,
for example, the first Thursday of each month and someone else the second
Thursday of each month.
One such individual had been receiving the box
for a while and decided it was time to let someone else enjoy it. This person
wrote me a letter that reminded me of why this church exists, why I choose to
be a part of it, and how some of the small things we do can make a big
difference for others in our community.
Dear Alaine,
I think it is time. I
am now working every day and feeling like life is going to work out eventually.
It is time for me to thank you for the farm boxes and let someone else
receive that bounty.
I would like you to
know how much more than just the veg this has been for me. I was
profoundly shattered and definitely not buying fresh items because of
their cost – and the sadness of the change to cooking for one in a tiny
apartment kitchen.
These boxes brought me
into my happy cooking place, creating healthy bakes and soups and such to eat
and fill my freezer. But much more than that, they were a manifestation of the
care I felt from the WUUC community at a time I was bereft. It was basic human
sharing. So special, so meaningful. Each box was both a hymn and a hug.
Thank you so much for
being a part of the path out of darkness, a path paved with carrots, fennel and
leeks!
by WUUC | Feb 21, 2020 | Announcements
By Jean Fowler
The Woodinville Unitarian Universalist Church became a “Welcoming Congregation” in 1998. This status now needs to be renewed annually and, over the past year, your Welcoming Congregation Committee has successfully completed the renewal tasks.
The Five Practices of Welcome Renewal are five benchmarks
that every congregation will need to integrate into congregational life in
order to ensure that lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, asexual,
two-spirit, genderqueer, non-binary, and the like feel fully welcomed,
centered, and embraced in our Unitarian Universalist congregation.
This past year our congregation has:
**Included Welcoming Worship into our annual calendar such
as recognizing LGBTQ+ PRIDE, and Transgender Day of Visibility
**Observed and celebrated Annual Welcoming Days such as Stonewall
Riots Anniversary, National Coming Out Day and Intersex Awareness Day.
**Held the Preemptive Radical Inclusion Workshop by CB Beal.
**And supported TRUUsT (Transgender Religious Professionals
Unitarian Universalist Together)
Additionally, our congregation has celebrated with the hanging of our LGBTQ+ flag on the front of our church.
Your Welcoming Committee members are: Erika Jackson Kirkendall, Jessica Belmont, Jo Raymond, Emma Rockenbeck, DD Hilke, John Hilke and Jean Fowler.
by WUUC | Feb 21, 2020 | Announcements
By Carol Taylor
Stewardship Chair
As we embark on our next journey with a new minister in the coming year, it’s important to build a solid financial footing to launch our ship. Your contributions are vital to the financial viability of WUUC.
Our annual pledge drive runs through March 15. That’s when we’ll know if we have sufficient budget to extend an offer to a ministerial candidate of our choice. We encourage you to make your pledge today at wuuc.org/future.
by WUUC | Feb 13, 2020 | Announcements
By Donna Johnson
The WUUC Worship Team is committed to ongoing evaluation and improvement. At our retreat last fall we talked about the limitations of what we had been doing for evaluation and developed a new approach. We determined that the overall purpose of our evaluation was to optimize the quality of our worship. Team members developed an evaluation template that asks:
- Were there opportunities for emotional response,
spiritual connection, deepening, and transformation?
- Did the service elements combine in a cohesive
flow?
- What worked? What might be? What should be?
The Worship Team schedules an evaluator from the team for each week. The evaluator uses the evaluation template to draft comments about each element of the service. After the service the evaluator, Worship Associate and others who were involved in the service meet to discuss the things that went well, things that could have been changed, and any lessons learned that can be applied to future services. After the post-service meeting the evaluator finalizes the template, and it is stored on google docs. The whole team reviews the completed templates at our monthly meetings and note important take-aways in the meeting minutes.
We started this process in November 2019, and so far, the team is pleased with how the process is going. Worship Associates appreciate being able to talk about the service with colleagues when the experience is fresh. The team’s monthly discussions seem more helpful and focused because there is a designated person to lead the conversation about each service, and the completed templates are a great way to capture things that might be forgotten if we just relied on our memories.
by WUUC | Feb 13, 2020 | Announcements
There are a few more spots open for the Building Your Own Theology (BYOT) class starting on a new day and time — Tuesday, March 3, 6:30-8:30 p.m. in the WUUC Library. Read below for more information or let Lauren Soliday or Chuck Bean know of any questions you may have.
Sign up HERE.
Greetings fellow seekers of truth. BYOT is an older UU curriculum, but still very relevant to our lives. The class will provide material and exercises to stimulate introspection and discussion on your beliefs and worldview. Your participation will either strengthen what you believe or challenge you to stretch your views. Sound interesting? Please consider joining us this spring for exploring and getting to know yourself and each other better. All are welcome; invite a friend, if you’ve taken it before, but want a “tune-up,” new to WUUC, or long-standing members.
Building Your Own Theology
8 Tuesdays, March 3 – April 21, 6:30-8:30 p.m.
WUUC Library
As
Unitarian-Universalists, we are all theologians. Our church, as a spiritual
community, encourages each of us become more fully aware of own personal credo
(Latin for “I believe.”) This 8-week UUA curriculum will help you examine your
values and beliefs about God or ultimate reality, ethics, and the meaning and
purpose of life. You’ll search for what is true in your life. Through a
combination of reflection, group discussion, study, and writing, you’ll examine
your own spiritual history and articulate your own credo. How does your
life experience inform your faith?
Please
note – this is not a “drop-in” class. It’s important to attend all eight
sessions, since they build on one another.
Facilitators: Chuck Bean (chuckcbean@hotmail.com) & Lauren Soliday (lsoliday@wuuc.org)
Please
let us know your interest ASAP. Write or call with questions or just SIGN UP HERE! Thanks!
Session 1 – “Doing
Theology – Getting Started” – to think about/ depict our own “ultimate reality”
at various points in our lives, create spiritual autobiography
Session 2 – “Your
Religious Odyssey – Autobiography with a Spiritual Twist” – share our spiritual
journey & write our own epitaphs (ie: inscription on tombstone)
Session 3 – “Ultimate
Reality – Creating an Honest God” – consider the nature of Ultimate Reality by
whatever name we call it and survey our personal beliefs and attitudes about
God and prayer.
Session 4 – “Ethics as Unenforceable Obligations” – create a list
of our own ethical Ten Commandments
Session 5 – “We are the Meaning Makers” – explore the sources of
meaning for religious liberals
Session 6 – “Suffering and Meaning” – consider human suffering,
learn how different religions have understood it
Session
7 – “Death and Immortality” – explore beliefs about death and immortality
in various religious/cultural traditions, explore our personal feelings
Session 8 – “Wrapping It Up – A Credo”
by WUUC | Feb 13, 2020 | Announcements
Harmony for Hope
Les Six-and-a-half
Sunday, March 15, 7:30 p.m.
$25/15 students and seniors
Woodinville Unitarian Universalist Church, 19020 NE Woodinville Duvall Rd, Woodinville, WA 98077
orcamusic.org
206-368-7091
Music of Poulenc, Tailleferre, Schulhoff, and Villa-Lobos
Performers: Ben Hausmann, Oboe; Sean Osborn, Clarinet; Dana Jackson, Bassoon; Cristina Valdes, Piano
The Harmony for Hope 2019-20 season continues in Woodinville on March 15 at 7:30 p.m., with a concert called Les Six-and-a-half. Proceeds will benefit The Sophia Way, an organization committed to ending homelessness for women.
Performers include Seattle Symphony oboist Ben Hausmann, Metropolitan Opera clarinettist Sean Osborn, Pacific Northwest Ballet bassoonist Dana Jackson, and University of Washington pianist Cristina Valdes. The program includes music by two composers of Les Six, Francis Poulenc and Germaine Tailleferre, along with music by Erwin Schulhoff and Heitor Villa-Lobos. Les Six was a loose collection of composers from early 20th-Century France, whose influence was felt far and wide, and is still felt today.
The Orca Concert Series and Harmony for Hope present the finest in Chamber Music featuring Woodwind, Brass, Keyboard, and String instruments. Featured musicians include those who have performed with: The New York Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Marlboro Festival, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, National Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Pacific Northwest Ballet Orchestra, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, and in recital at Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center. Experience the Transcendent.
At The Sophia Way, the goal is to make homelessness rare, brief and one-time event for the women experiencing it. The women who come to the shelter are in survival mode. The shelters offer them a warm, safe space to take a shower, rest and sleep, and nourishing food to give them strength. Sophia Way case managers focus on their overall wellbeing -– physical, mental, and financial. Their aim is to move the women into a stable and secure environment – their own home. https://sophiaway.org
