Bee Vigilant!
Read labels of products you use in your landscape. Avoid products containing neonics. These are chemicals that are lethal to bees. FMI: BeeAction.org.
Welcome to the month of play! Juguemos!
Play. Jugar. An appropriate theme for this month when many of our children and families begin summer vacation. A time to take a break from zoom and hopefully some down time for parents. Those of us without children at home are also planning outings and exploring ways to re-enter into and reconstitute community after over a year a staying close to home and physically distancing from each other. May we all find ways to engage in play, jugar this month.
What does play mean to you?
A few definitions of play from our Soul Matters resources:
“Across the globe, many of the etymological roots of the word ‘play’ locate it in the visceral: ludere in Latin refers to leaping fishes and fluttering birds. The Anglo-Saxon lâcan means to move like a ship on the waves, or to tremble like a flame. The Sanskrit kridati also, as in Germanic languages, describes the movement of wind. In play, we are rarely immobile. We’re alive.”
SOURCE: https://aeon.co/essays/play-is-cathartic-allowing-people-to-sit-with-their-shadows
In rare moments of deep play, we can lay aside our sense of self, shed time’s continuum, ignore pain, and sit quietly in the absolute present, watching the world’s ordinary miracles. No mind or heart hobbles. No analyzing or explaining. No questing for logic. No promises. No goals. No relationships. No worry. One is completely open to whatever drama may unfold.
Diane Ackerman
To play is to listen to the imperative inner force that wants to take form and be acted out without reason. It is the joyful, spontaneous expression of oneself.
Michelle Cassou and Stewart Cubley
One of the highlights of this month will be meeting with “The Wildflowers” the first covenant group I have co-facilitated at UUCA. As this month’s theme suggests we will spend some time playing a game, sharing jokes, and exploring play. Below are a few questions we will be considering from our Soul Matters packet:
- What makes something play for you? When you feel free from the burden of producing an outcome? When creativity is involved? When you lose time? When you can just be yourself? All of the above? Something else?
- What did you learn from the games you played as a child? Monopoly, King of the Hill and Dodge Ball certainly instill different lessons than Red Light; Green Light, Clue, Jump-Rope, Pictionary or Hopscotch. What lessons from your favorite childhood games do you notice “playing out” for you in the present?
- What would it look like to sneak a bit of playfulness into your daily chores? Your dinner prep? Morning commute? Exercise routine? Workday? Your relationship?
- Can worship be play?
- Can play be a form of political resistance?
Beloveds, go forth and play this summer! Juegen, querides!
Rev. Claudia
Refulgent Still
Sunday, June 13, 2021
Rev. Mark Ward, Lead Minister
For my last service at UUCA, I chose the same title as the first sermon I ever preached in Asheville, when I was candidating to become your minister. The language borrowed from Ralph Waldo Emerson still resonates, but my time with you has added so much more.
Siding With Science
We have a Reopening Task Force put together and you will soon be getting a survey that will provide us with information we will be needing to make some decisions about how we will proceed. With your input and the wisdom of the Task Force, we will come up with the “rules of engagement.”
Right now, I want to explain MY thinking. This is NOT an opinion of the Task Force and I expect the Task Force to give this opinion no more consideration than that of any other Task Force member. (That’s why we have committees, doncha know.)
These are the facts I am working with:
- Vaccinated people will very rarely get sick and will not get sick enough to be hospitalized even if they have a breakthrough infection. These vaccines are by far the most effective ones ever created.
- Vaccinated people do not pass along “silent” infections.
- Everyone over the age of 11 can be vaccinated.
- A very small proportion of the population cannot be vaccinated for MEDICAL reasons.
- People who are immune-compromised have lots more to worry about than COVID-19 viral infections and therefore would not normally be attending indoor public gatherings of any sort.
- All of our worship services and some of our adult programs will be available online, both live and recorded (worship services only).
- UUCA’s air-handling equipment in all three buildings will be modified to include UV-C light treatment and more air filtering.
- The world is NEVER a safe place, viruses and bacteria are around all the time, people drive and ride in cars, go up ladders, etc.
With that set of facts, MY conclusion is that we can resume normal activities RIGHT NOW (though I’d rather wait for the HVAC upgrades). I know it feels uncomfortable, but a vaccinated person can sit in a room full of singing people and be fine. The vaccinated person does not need to have the other people be vaccinated.
So, what about the younger kids? In this case, I think it will be up to parents to decide how they feel about it all. The teachers in the room will be vaccinated, so they are safe. I’ll leave it to our survey and the Task Force to decide if we will require younger kids to be masked or socially distanced.
I also want to point out, in case it’s not obvious, that this is a response to conditions as they are now. Should other evidence present itself, such as fading vaccination protection or variants that elude the immunity of the vaccines, we will be FLEXIBLE! We know how to lock down. What we seem to have forgotten is how to resume normal life.
Linda Topp, Director of Administration
Go Native
Replace turf grass with native species of grass. Native lawns use fewer resources and improve the habitat for wildlife. Check with local garden centers and native nurseries for information on native grass species.