Post-Poetry Popsicles is a playful, positively purposeful, pleasantly pointless (but practically prudent), pastor-approved party, providing perfectly preserved, previously purchased popsicles for parishioners, participants, poets, performers, parents, and pals.
Please proceed post-program to the pleasantly populated social hall where plentiful popsicle provisions will be proudly presented as a peaceful, playful, palate-cooling payoff for pondering profound poems, processing powerful prayers, and participating patiently in a purposeful, poetic production.
This people-pleasing, pseudo-picnic promotes personal presence and proper popsicle purging while preventing permafrosted freezer paralysis. Please participate!
In plain language, the RE Council has a popsicle surplus, and we need the freezer space for other things, so we’ll be giving away free popsicles after the poetry service on Sunday. Everything must go, so please come enjoy a cold treat on a cold day, and if you’re a popsicle fan who would like to take home any leftovers, please let Skyla know!
WHAT: Workshop series to help current and future Fellowship leaders step more fully and successfully into their roles.
WHEN: 1st and 3rd Thursdays in February, March, and April, from 6:30-8:30 PM
WHERE: Social Hall
WHO: Anyone with an interest in leadership in any area of the Fellowship. From small groups or single events to joining the Board of Directors, if you think you might ever like to be one of the people who shape the direction of this congregation, this workshop is for you!
REGISTER: HERE by 1/25. Free childcare is available! When filling out the registration form, indicate if you will need childcare.
This offering will be co-facilitated by Michael Hughes (Treasurer) and Skyla King-Christison (Director of Religious Exploration). Please contact either of us with questions.
This program will:
Affirm the spiritual and emotional gifts and the skills that each person brings to a leadership position
Encourage understanding that holding a leadership position is an opportunity to enrich and deepen one’s own faith
Strengthen understanding of covenant and the practice of keeping covenant within the leadership team and in the congregation
Guide leaders to center relationships as a faithful practice, thinking of the congregation as a “we” rather than a collection of individuals
Lead participants to develop an understanding of the importance of personal spiritual practice and integrity to healthy leadership
Guide participants to consider which voices and perspectives were marginalized in the past and need to be part of congregational or leadership decision-making
Introduce systems thinking, and provide some practice with exploring congregational issues through a systems lens
Encourage participants to consider that conflict can indicate questions needing attention in the larger congregational system and invite them to respond accordingly
Deepen and enrich the experience of congregational leaders and, by extension, the ability of congregations to live out their missions and values, both in congregational life and in the wider world
If any of the ideas above spark your interest and make your heart go, “Oh!” you should register and join us! What we learn together today will help ensure a healthy and vibrant Fellowship for generations to come!
“How many lessons of faith and beauty we should lose, if there were no winter in our year!” – Thomas Wentworth Higginson
Greetings, Families!
I hope your Thanksgiving weekend was full of all the things you love most! It’s time to turn our hearts toward all the good things that December has to offer. Grab your calendar and let’s have a little look ahead!
UPCOMING EVENTS:
12/6 Seeker Space Kids & kids table at the Holiday Fair! 9-3 @ UUFC!
12/14 NO Family Breakfast this month!
12/11 Parent Peer Support Group meal prep night. Register ONCE Here!
12/21 Solstice Pageant during the service NO RE!
12/28 All ages Poetry service with activity kit available for kids NO RE!
Post Holiday Break for Parents: date, time, and registration information were emailed directly to parents. Check your inboxes!
***Childcare is still available in the Rainbow Room on no RE Sundays!
More information about our events can be found below, and info for all events can be found at uucorvallis.org by clicking “News” in the menu bar and then selecting “RE Council” from the drop-down menu.
Our 4th-6th graders in the Seeker Space have been making crafts and art for their booth at the Holiday Fair on December 6th! They learned about Entrepreneurship from our very own Rachel McGrath and have role-played sales etiquette with their advisors. They are ready to see you at the Holiday fair with their selection of magnets, Perler bead ornaments, and one-of-a-kind paintings! Come say hi and support their efforts!
If your Seeker Space kiddo isn’t signed up for a time slot yet, please pop over to register them HERE ASAP!
For the protection of our children, we will not post the date and time of children’s events where their parents and guardians are not remaining on the property. Full information regarding the Post-Holiday Break was sent directly to parents’ inboxes. Please check your email for the December newsletter for the date, time, and registration information. OR, if you are a parent or guardian of a school aged child, you can email me (Skyla) directly at dre@uucorvallis.org for more information.
In an effort to honor feedback from our families, we decided to do something a little different for the winter holidays this year. We will be hosting a Solstice Pageant featuring our children and youth at the center during an intergenerational Sunday morning service instead of holding a separate Christmas Eve service for families with children. This all-ages service will be on December 21st, and while our speaking roles are all spoken for, we do have room for a couple more woodland creatures if any of you missed the news in last month’s newsletter and have children who have an inner squirrel or raccoon just waiting to shine.
The Christmas Eve service is open to all, and we will have electric candles available for children and those who wish to participate but prefer not to handle fire. We will also have some soft toys in the social hall in case your littles need a little more room to burn off some steam while you listen to the service.
The following Sunday, December 28th, will be a second all-ages service, with a poetry theme. Children are invited to participate in all the ways the adults do, and I will have a poetry-themed collaborative art project for the kids to quietly work on together, in case the poetry isn’t quite their thing.
During both the solstice and poetry services, there will still be childcare available in the Rainbow Room for registered children.
Thank you to all who responded to my Coming-of-Age feeler email! Unfortunately, we did not get enough of a response to confidently plan a CoA program for this year. If you let that email slip through the cracks and want to immediately contact me, there’s a chance we hit our minimum needed youth to make a go of it, but…
On my recent trip to the Liberal Religious Educators Association Fall Conference, I connected with many DREs from across the continent and learned that the trend in Coming of Age spaces, since returning to full operations post-pandemic, is increasingly to hold a larger CoA experience once every four years during high school rather than every other year for middle school. The reasons for this shift include the smaller group sizes that are still being experienced nationwide, as well as a shift in developmental readiness for the spiritual content of the program after our kids spent well over a year out of community, both socially and religiously.
I share this to say, do not worry that your child will miss their Coming of Age experience. I will not let that happen! This program is central to what it means to grow up UU! We will be thoughtful about how we evaluate and implement this shift, if that turns out to be the direction we need to move. And I invite you to be in conversation with me about your child’s spiritual and developmental needs as we evaluate this potential shift in programmatic rhythms.
Those of you I’ve discussed this possible shift with have all said, “But what about OWL?” I know we have alternated these two programs annually as far back as anyone can remember. OWL has a wider reach and a waitlist of nonUUs hoping to get in, so as long as we can maintain an adequate number of trained OWL facilitators, there is no reason to shift away from our regular OWL schedule. If you are interested in becoming an OWL facilitator and helping to keep this vital program available to our community, come talk to me!
This past Sunday, we had our very first Children’s Chapel since the pandemic! Those of you who are newer UUs might be wondering what the heck a Children’s Chapel even is.
Whenever there’s a 5th Sunday of the month (about 4 times per year), instead of having our regular age-segregated RE groups, we have one larger group with all of the children and youth except those in the Rainbow Room. They’re a bit wiggly and disinterested in what we’ve got going on in chapel.
As I explained to the kids, each time we gather for a children’s chapel, we will have three primary elements: shared singing, some kind of seasonal ritual, and some form of service. These are three practices that are vital to our community life. Shared singing lifts our spirits, rituals allow us to honor and witness one another and the earth in all our seasons, and service reinforces our interconnectedness with one another and our wider community.
In November, our children’s chapel included learning and analyzing the song What We Need is Here, inspired by the Wendell Berry poem, Wild Geese, which was read for us by Michi Araki. Then we silently processed through electric candlelight to each gather a piece of bread and a cup of apple cider. In our quiet circle, we engaged in a mindfulness practice of thinking of the wide range of people and resources that went into us holding the food that we were about to share. From soil to farmers, millers to road construction crews, power grids and bank software, these kids thought of so many people and skills that made it possible for us to have bread and cider, including all in our Fellowship who give generously so that we can have a comfortable RE budget.
When we had gobbled up all of the bread and had our fill of cider, we assembled winter care kits for each child to have in their car for when they cross paths with someone living outdoors. We talked about safety, and not approaching unknown adults without a trusted adult with them. We talked about what it would be like to have wet feet and have no way of getting dry in the bitter cold of winter. And we learned about the cool ways that family members of some of our kids already keep resources in their cars and bikes for those in need who cross their paths.
It was a lovely return to our regular practice of Children’s Chapel, and I’m already looking forward to next time!
If you have any unmet needs for support, unanswered questions about how or why we do what we do in RE, please reach out any time! Our offerings exist because families share their dreams and needs, and we rely on your partnership! And if you ever want to be removed from our email list, just shoot me a note and I’ll make it so. May we hold Love at the center of all we do together!
This time of year can be a lot for parents as we try to maintain all the rituals, magic, and meaning of the season. To honor all you do, we’d like to offer you a break! Drop off school-aged (k-8) children in the social hall at the designated time. We’ll have a thank you card writing workshop (with helpers for those who haven’t mastered the pen yet), eat snacks, and settle in for a movie while you take a few hours to recover from the holiday hustle. To make the most of the thank you card workshop, please send your child with a list of specific people & gifts for which to offer thanks. Know a non-UU parent who could use a break? Feel free to share!
Registration for this event will close on December 20th, and the date, time, and registration information have been emailed directly to parents in the December RE Newsletter. Check your inbox for the email sent on December 1st, or reach out to Skyla at dre@uucorvallis.org for more information.
There is no progress without failure. Yet, in our culture that is focused on sharing highlight reels, it’s easy to forget that there are no real overnight successes. The road to “what’s next” is littered with beautiful “almosts” and “not quites.” Before you start thinking about New Year’s resolutions, come share in a celebration of this past year’s failures that got you to where you are now.
The evening will begin with a comfort food potluck to ease into togetherness and connection. When we’re feeling full and ready, we’ll reflect on a year’s worth of things that didn’t quite go our way, grieve the dreams that maybe we’re giving up on, and celebrate the new vision that is forming as a result of our failures.
At this event, you can expect some tears, some laughs, and some dancing under disco lights. Best of all, you can expect to walk away with a deeper sense of community because vulnerable sharing and mutual support are an exceptional foundation for new friendships.
Don’t miss it! Come, let us celebrate you and your awesome, brave failures!
Rev. Ralph Roberts created a UU version of an Advent calendar, with little factoids about the influence that Unitarians and Universalists in history had on the winter holidays. We will once again be converting these tidbits into a daily Advent email series to land in your inbox every morning from December 1st through the 24th. You can register to be on that limited-run mailing list HERE by November 27th. Please note that, due to technological limitations, we will not be able to add any recipients to the list after the 27th.
Worship Web offers the following disclaimer about the Advent series: “Due to its temporal nature, many of the historic milestones in this Advent calendar aren’t necessarily recognized on the precise day that they’re celebrated (for example, Kwanzaa is recognized here on December 2nd instead of December 26th, and the December 12 image recognizes Clara Barton’s birthday (December 25, 1821). More than perfect historic accuracy, then, this Advent calendar is offered in the spirit of holding up and delighting in the ways that our Unitarian and Universalist ancestors had a foundational role in many of the winter holidays and the innumerable ways they’re celebrated by people everywhere.”
What a disappointment it was to miss out on our weekly dose of connection and community last Sunday. And that disappointment was compounded by the cancellation of the long-awaited Trick-or-Treat resource Fair scheduled to take place after the service. We can’t let all of the preparation (and candy!) go to waste, so we’re going to offer the resource fair, along with all of the trick-or-treating fun, after the service this Sunday, November 2nd.
I know that Halloween will have already passed, but give those costumes one more day in the sun and come as your favorite character or creature anyway. We will be having the Samhain service, followed by an evacuation drill, and then by the time you come back in to get your coffee or tea in the social hall, we’ll be ready to see your smiling face at the trick-or-treat tables in the social hall, foyer, and Rooms 6B, 6C, and 7 in the classroom wing.
Come play some games, eat some goodies, and learn what the various teams and councils of the Fellowship are up to, and ways to get involved!
Don’t forget to wear your costumes to the Fellowship this Sunday, and plan to attend the Trick-or-Treat Resource Fair happening directly after the service in the social hall, back deck, and patio. Many of the Fellowship’s teams and councils will be present with treats and games, as well as information about what they do and how to get involved. It will be fun for all! And who knows? You might find your new favorite activity!
Even in these too full, largely uncertain days, you give so much to make the Fellowship a warm and welcoming place to be. With that in mind, Religious Exploration is delighted to offer an opportunity to pause and spend an evening in deep relaxation and self-care. The talented Mark Clem of Sonic Journey will be offering a Sound Bath just for us! I especially encourage our leaders who always make time for others to take advantage of this opportunity to show up and tend to their own physical and spiritual bodies.
This experience consists of bringing what you need to lie comfortably on the Social Hall floor and settling in. Mark will then offer a short guided meditation to help us ready ourselves for an hour or so of wordless immersion in sound vibrations of all kinds. After this shared embodied experience, Mark will gently call us back into the moment, serve tea, and lead a reflection on what we experienced in our state of deep relaxation, as well as offer follow-up care tips for holding on to the heightened state of awareness and relaxation as we move back into our lives.
Because space is limited, you MUST PREREGISTER, and once the event is full, the registration form will be disabled. Additional instructions for what to bring and what to expect will be emailed to all registered participants on 11/16. Please contact Skyla (dre@uucorvallis.org) with questions.
The children and youth in RE will be making winter care kits for unhoused neighbors during the November 30th Children’s Chapel.
We need donations of gloves, hats, socks, and HotHands for our kits before November 30th. Please consider donating new or gently used physical items or cash to help us purchase these items for our kits. Donations can be placed in the marked box under the table outside of the RE office in Room 2.
Our goal is for every one of our 40 registered children and youth in RE to have a kit in their car ready to be handed to someone in need. Your generous donations will help us learn about and engage in community care.
Thank you in advance for supporting our RE programs!
