Please join us for the 9th Annual Christmas Sing Along! All are invited to join in the singing and fun. There will be Christmas carols, stories, comfy pillows, and cookies!
Meet in the Fellowship Sanctuary on Sunday, December 22 at 4 PM!
david
Dance Planet! 12/7
This Saturday, December 7, Dance Planet will once again happen from 7:00 to 8:30 at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Corvallis, 2945 NW Circle Blvd. We’ll open with a live set by two amazing percussionists, Dave Chiller and Dave Storrs. They’ll do a unique mix of melodic and rhythmic percussion to warm us all up before DJ Beeara plays an hour-long set of music from around the world and across the decades. Admission to this family-friendly event is a suggested donation of $5—15. One hundred percent of the proceeds will be donated to local environmental organizations.
Green to White
There are many reasons to like the color green: often a symbol of safety, the color of nature, a mark of good luck, among others. At the UUFC, the GREEN name tag is a sign that you are new! We look for you and want to encourage your exploration of our Fellowship.
If you have been coming regularly for a month or so, then it’s time to sign up to get a WHITE name tag. This name tag is an outward sign that you are here, that you have decided to join us regularly, and that you want to continue your religious journey with us!
We’re SO glad you have decided to take this step. Please stop by the Welcome Desk to request your new name tag!
“And Also, Joy” 12/8/2024
“We were made for joy and woe, and when this we rightly know, through the world we safely go” wrote William Blake. Join with the Fellowship Committee on Ministry this Sunday to consider this truth – that joy and sorrow together are part of every human life.
with Mark Aron, Virgil Agnew, Gary Barnes and Alice Lyman
Between Us
As the world turns (wasn’t that the name of a soap opera many years ago?) we still live day by day, and work on the things that are right in front of us most of the time. At the Fellowship, this weekend we are enjoying our annual December Holiday Fair, and planning many ways to gather this month to observe and celebrate holidays, holy days and the turning of the year.
Meanwhile, the classroom wing is filled with boxes and comings and goings as we get ready to empty that part of the building so that it can be repaired, renovated and renewed. This will be a big effort, as you can imagine, and will need many hands. If you haven’t already, please see the Announcement titled ‘Classroom Wing Renovation Begins in January,’ and sign-up to help in one of the listed ways. Or, talk to a member of the Building Expansion Project team in person this Sunday about how you can help.
All activities which regularly meet in the classroom wing will move to other locations in the building (or offsite) beginning after Christmas, and the classroom wing will be closed by January 1. If you have questions about where your group will meet, please ask me or office volunteer Priscilla Galasso.
December Justice Outreach
At least once a year our outreach offerings support Unity Shelter, a local non-profit organization which provides emergency shelter and supported transitional housing, plus wrap-around services, for people who are without safe shelter or housing. Unity Shelter programs include the Corvallis Men’s Shelter, the Hygiene Center, Room at the Inn and SafePlace. The Fellowship helped launch the collaborative project of providing shelters which later became Unity Shelter. Unity Shelter’s mission is to provide safe shelter through community care. The level of need around housing and shelter has not decreased in our community, and support continues to be crucial. Our outreach offering in December will support Unity Shelter.
UUFC Birthday Club
Members and friends who celebrated November birthdays or will celebrate ones in December are invited and encouraged to make “your age” contributions (ex: $76 for a 76th birthday) to the UUFC Birthday Club. Contributions can be made via check payable to the UUFC with memo “Birthday Club” or the Birthday Club button within Breeze. Donations are allocated 50% Operations, 20% Endowment, 20% Reserves, and 10% Justice Outreach. Thank you! Questions: Michael Hughes treasurer@uucorvallis.org
Are You Thinking About Year-End Gifts to Organizations You Appreciate?
At this time of year, many people are planning for the upcoming holidays, looking back at the year that has passed (and what a year it has been), and pondering how they can have a positive impact on our community and world in the year(s) to come. And yes, the holiday season is coming as well. If you are thinking about making year-end gifts to the organizations you appreciate and the UUFC is among those, thank you!
Year-end gifts to the UUFC can be made in many ways:
- Send a check to UUFC, 2945 NW Circle Blvd, Corvallis OR 97330. Indicate “year-end gift” on the memo line.
- Go to uucorvallis.org/donate and donate using a debit, credit or ACH bank transfer. Go to the middle of the donation page and select year-end 2024 in the first drop down menu.
- if you have appreciated stock that is burning a hole in your holiday stocking, transfer stock to the UUFC Schwab account (82873024) using DTC # 0164 Code 40 (you can use these numbers in an online transfer or your broker will know what these are used for)
- If you are of an age where you need to make required minimum distributions from your retirement accounts, you can have a check written to the UUFC or send a message to office@uucorvallis.org and ask for the flyer on how to make such transfers. If you make these distributions directly to the UUFC, they won’t count as income for tax purposes
- Unlike NPR, OPB or an assortment of other non-profits, we have not yet accepted vehicle donations, but if this is of interest to you, send an email to finance@uucorvallis.org and your finance team will see if we can figure out how to make this happen
We thank you for your efforts to make our Fellowship and world a better place for all. May you and yours have a joyous holiday season.
Your UUFC Finance Council
Need Candle Making Supplies For December Crafts
Need quart and pint clean cardboard milk cartons to use as candle molds, plus UNSCENTED or beeswax old candles to recycle or donations of new wax and wicking. Please put in coat closet in bag with my name on it. “Joyce for Crafts”
Every Sunday we go back out into the world with a renewed intention to stay aware of the way things truly are. To cultivate this awareness, within us and around us, is a path of learning to feel how things are happening in many directions at one time. Life, a day, a moment, is not merely either /or. In every moment there is yes and no, good and evil, pain and joy, past and future. From a Taoist perspective this is recognition of polarities. In yoga, this is learning to feel energy moving in opposite directions at the same time. Not to choose one side, one view, one position, one direction, but instead to feel where the sides, views, positions, directions meet and how they are related to each other. It’s not easy. Sometimes it is a luxury. Often it seems impossible. In a hurricane, it may be improbable or feel impossible to move to the center, the calm eye of the storm, and yet the calm center exists as much as the storm does. From the safety of the calm center, one cannot deny the destructive power of the storm all around.
Yes and no, good and evil, pain and joy, past and future. Whether we know it or not, see it or not, this is always where we begin when we pause to become aware of our breath. The breath itself is a guide. It can never go in only one direction – a whole breath is always made of in and out. Once again, may we allow ourselves to settle into the motion of our breath, the motion of Life as it lives through us, the stillness of resting within the motion. May we become aware enough of this motion, of its necessity, that the only thing we can do is give thanks. May we begin the day in gratitude – in calm awareness, in rest, and with thanks.
Sending love to you all – Jill