Mar 16, 2020 | Family Ministry
This week’s Soulful Homes activity lifts up a theme-related mantra for your family to carry with them throughout the month. The authors invite us to think of these “family sayings” as tools for the journey, reminders that help us re-focus and steady ourselves and our kids as we navigate through life’s challenges and opportunities. Write them on sticky notes to put in your car, on kitchen cabinet fronts, on computer screens and/or your family message board. Share them out loud at home and out in the world, where and whenever the need arises.
We encourage you to use the “Soulful Homes” activities posted weekly to support your role as the primary religious educators of your children. These activities can help you stay engaged with the monthly theme and support you in carving out spaces for spiritual grounding and family connection. Staff will be including a weekly activity from Soulful Homes or another source once a week on this Family Ministry blog. Please contact me if you have questions, feedback or suggestions on how we can support families during this time of social distancing. Take care.
Rev. Claudia
faithdev@uuasheville.org.
March’s Mantra: What wisdom does this hold for me?
Sometimes we recognize wisdom right when we encounter it, but more often, it takes careful reflection, a little more life experience, or a good amount of time passing before we come to understand the deeper truth and meaning of what we’ve been part of or witness to.
Still, we know that our experiences–especially the challenging ones–are places where our wisdom is grown. This month, we invite you to keep the mantra in front of you whenever you find yourself facing something unusual or mildly unsettling: What wisdom does this hold for me?
Asking the question in and of itself can help us shift away from reactionary thinking and into more critical thinking. It also reminds us that when our beliefs or assumptions get shaken up a bit, it can be an opportunity for us to re-examine old ideas to either be sure they still fit or change them.
Realizing that you’re late on something you really, really wanted to do on time… “What wisdom does this hold for me?”
Noticing a couple or a parent and child arguing in public… “What wisdom does this hold for me?”
Disagreeing with a friend or acquaintance on a core belief of yours… “What wisdom does this hold for me?”
Again, you may only seldom have an answer, but the question is signaling a readiness to welcome epiphanies and realizations wherever they may be found, even in your challenges.
Mar 16, 2020 | Featured
Remember, that amid all this mess, what we CAN all do is be as compassionate and kind and helpful and understanding as possible (which is hard when you’re totally stressed yourself), to our family, friends, neighbors and strangers we encounter, and to yourself. All you can do is the best you can do. Take a deep breath. Maybe 5.
We know a lot of you are trying to connect through video–but it can be intimidating. So, we have 5 congregants who are willing to host a meeting for you. Whether you want to connect with fellow UUCAers or family members or friends, contact one of these people who will either help you figure out how to host a meeting or actually host it for you, so all you have to do is click in to join.
Many thanks to these volunteers. Look up their contact info on REALM or email Tish for that info.
Evelyn Becker
Virginia Bower
Rebekkah Hilgraves
Jeff Jones
Kelly Wedell
Mar 15, 2020 | Featured
Calling our young ones – and all others who love Spirit Play! We’ll be sharing a Spirit Play story and gathering time via Zoom Thursday evening. We’ll open with our Sunday rituals, including our joys and sorrows candles, and a storyteller will share a story. What a beautiful way to end the day.
PS Everyone is welcome to join us! This is a great opportunity for our 9:15 class, 11:15 K-2nd grade Spirit Play, and anyone else who wants to enjoy this special program together. If you are registered in RE, you will automatically receive a Zoom invitation. If you’re the kind of person who loves Spirit Play stories, too, contact Rev. Claudia for a Zoom invitation.
Mar 15, 2020 | Featured
What if you thought of it
as the Jews consider the Sabbath—
the most sacred of times?
Cease from travel.
Cease from buying and selling.
Give up, just for now,
on trying to make the world
different than it is.
Sing. Pray. Touch only those
to whom you commit your life.
Center down.
And when your body has become still,
reach out with your heart.
Know that we are connected
in ways that are terrifying and beautiful.
(You could hardly deny it now.)
Know that our lives
are in one another’s hands.
(Surely, that has come clear.)
Do not reach out your hands.
Reach out your heart.
Reach out your words.
Reach out all the tendrils
of compassion that move, invisibly,
where we cannot touch.
Promise this world your love–
for better or for worse,
in sickness and in health,
so long as we all shall live.
–Rev. Lynn Ungar, March 11, 2020
Mar 12, 2020 | Green Tips
Harvesting of peat moss destroys bog ecosystems. Substitute these materials: compost, leaf mold, sawdust, shredded bark or wood chips. Another option is coir dust or cocopeat from coconut husks.
