Updated program: We will gather in the social hall or deck, in conversational-size groups to enjoy an opportunity to become better acquainted. Each table group will have a facilitator to help keep the conversation flowing and meaningful. This will provide more ways to make the connections that we all hope for and need. Come help build your sense of community! Iced tea & cookies will be provided.
david
Less is More Class, 10/1
Additional seats are now available in the Less is More waste reduction workshop offered by Master Recycler, Betty Shelley, in the UUFC Sanctuary, Mondays 6:30-7:30 pm on October 1, 8, 15 , and 22. The Climate Action Team expands the offering of this 4-part workshop to those who missed bidding on seats in our April auction. The workshop is $25 /person (cash or check at the first session) which will help support the Fellowship. Friends and non-members are also welcome.
Less is More: Getting to One Can of Garbage a Year
Join this 4-part workshop to learn why and how to reduce your waste. Reducing your waste is a simple, profound way to decrease your environmental impact on our world and save money at the same time. Presenter Betty Shelley is a Master Recycler and a former Recycling Information Specialist for Metro Regional Government in Portland. Betty and her husband, Jon, have generated only one can of garbage a year since 2006.
For more information, contact Betty Shelley
Crafters & Artists Wanted for Holiday Fair, 12/7
Calling All Crafters & Artists Our UUFC Holiday Fair is coming December 7. Do you enjoy jewelry making, calligraphy, quilling, ceramics, woodworking, making greeting cards, knitting, crocheting, quilting, painting, photography, glass making, etc.? Turn your hobby into cash for yourself and UUFC, and joy for the buyers who love getting hand-crafted items for themselves or as gifts. UUFC retains 25% of the selling price and you get the rest. Do you have limited inventory? Then share a table with another UUFC crafter. Start creating now.
Tom & Isabel Prusinski are coordinating artists/vendors.
Please let them know you wish to participate.
Bread Bag Exchange
We’ve been running an experimental exchange of bread bags to be used as dog poop bags. The supply side has been a huge success, with lots of bags contributed. However, the demand has been low, with few takers. We plan to give it another couple of weeks, but if bread bags are not an attractive option for after-dog clean up, we’ll discontinue the experiment.
Questions/suggestions: Contact Michael Hughes
Pop-Up Parking Lot Rummage Sale, 8/31
Our Pop-Up Parking Lot Rummage Sale is Saturday, August 31 – 10:00-1:00 There’s just one more week to gather items you no longer need, price them, and bring them to our UUFC Parking Lot on Saturday, August 31.
• Stay for 3 hours and “sell” your items
• Send buyers to a central cashier
• Take home any unsold items at the end of the sale It’s a fun event and an easy way to recycle items you no longer want while helping to support the Fellowship.
Please join us and tell others. We need “sellers” and buyers.
Public welcome.
Oregon Clean Power Cooperative Offers OSU College of Forestry Investment Opportunity
The UUFC itself and UUFC members have invested in Oregon Clean Power Cooperative (OCPC) projects in the past. OCPC has a new offering for solar work OSU’s College of Forestry. Loans will be two-year with rate varying from 1-4%. The UUFC will soon be repaid for a loan we made to OCPC for a project at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. The Fellowship may reinvest in other OCPC projects once we have had an opportunity to explore other investment options. The UUFC invests ~4% of its reserve funds in “alternative” investments. These are investments that may not be quite at market rate but offer some return and benefit our local community.
Russ Karow, Chair UUFC Financial Oversight Council
See the OCPC Website for more information.
Men’s Gathering, 2nd and 4th Sundays
All who identify as men are welcome to join our gatherings on the 2nd and 4th Sundays of each month beginning at 11:45 AM, in Room 9, upstairs in the classroom wing.
“Can We Be Prepared?” 8/25/24
The unexpected is completely common, and we try to prepared for a variety of possible events – earthquakes, fires, ice storms, tsunamis, power outages, births and deaths, new love and break-ups, aging and related losses, political upheaval(?) and so much more. Statistics (what might happen) and logistics (possible responses) are something, but not everything and maybe not even the most important. What does it mean to be prepared?
Between Us
So much of our time and energy, whether we are aware of it or not, goes into finding our footing, so to speak, or trying to find balance – mostly emotional or spiritual balance, though sometimes (especially as we age) our physical balance as well. The world we live in is so good at challenging our sense of balance – our sense of stability and even of trustworthiness. Too often we react as if the world is doing this to us personally – trying to make our own lives difficult. Usually however, Life, and the world, are simply doing what they do – being immensely complex arrangements between life and death, love and hate, beginnings and endings.
Humans have many ways of dealing with these realities! (That’s an understatement.) Religious beliefs and practices are often involved, as are power dynamics and ways of dealing with fear, and lots of other things. Not that most of us name these dynamics in ourselves – especially our ways of dealing with fear.
At the heart of spiritual searching, and sometimes of spiritual practice, is the need to respond to the presence of fear. For myself in this practice, sometimes I think I am learning and growing, and sometimes I’m pretty sure I’m mostly fooling myself. Because of this I have a sense that working together to address fears is very helpful. The political landscape in our country is part of the way the world is going, and it certainly adds to our challenges of trying to find and maintain balance in the presence of fear. For the next few weeks, I’m looking forward to talking about these challenges with all of you, as we make our way toward an election season which will need the best we have to give.
See you Sunday — Jill (PS: Ask me about my theory that tendencies toward authoritarianism around the world are closely related to un-articulated fears about climate change.)
Share Your Produce
Too much zuchinni? Apples to share? Gardeners and gathers are welcome to bring and share produce with others at the Fellowship each Sunday morning. The exchange usually happens on and around the bench just outside the Firwood entry doors.