Church was great Sun.! A reminder to myself about the fullness of experience.
It was such a wonderful & busy day Sun. that I didn't have a chance to blog about it. It's the winter holiday season, but many of the great experiences I had there are similar to many or most Sun.'s at church & I need to remember them when I'm not feeling like going.
On Sat. when the snow was falling and my car was covered with 2+" of snow and I heard predictions of overnight freezing conditions, I dreaded the idea of either preparing for church on Sun. & then having it cancelled or having to get up early & deal with cleaning off my car and possibly slippery conditions on the church driveway. Well, I need to remember that early snows like this don't stick much or freeze on the roadway or gravel driveway since they still contain a good amount of heat. I woke up Sun. to sunshine and clear roads, though I still had to spend ~20 mins. cleaning off my car - it was worth it!
The joys of church on Sun. (briefly, because I could almost write a book):
* the choir was singing very uplifting music (challenging, but I was prepared)
* singing with some people with beautiful voices and upbeat attitudes
* there was hot water ready before service & a new flavor of herb tea to try - sugar cookie sleigh ride (or something like that) - very tasty!
* joys and concerns were shared by people I consider friends and people I've yet to get to know well, including small children
* the "story for all ages" was about our work with children at an inner city community, which I worked with from its start and then for about 10 yrs. (youth still get hit by stray bullets occasionally, but it's so much better than it used to be), and then we trimmed a mitten tree with donations for them (see Mitten Tree)
* the sermon was about beliefs in God (the text of the sermon will be here soon and the audio will be here)
* the minister shared about Unitarian history and told about his own story of how his beliefs were formed (he said he considers himself a "mystic" - believing in the experience of "God" [something more than we generally pay attention to on the surface, but something within that is greater]; I consider myself a "mystic agnostic") - the story contained humor, too, so we all had a good laugh
* the hymns contained words of diverse beliefs and one was a poem written almost 100 yrs. ago, "A Firemist and a Planet" which includes, "a crystal and a cell,... caves where ancients dwelt; the sense of law and beauty,... some call it evolution and others call it God."
* there were announcements about many enjoyable activities that the church has available, though I certainly don't attend them all
* after the service, I talked with friends and met newcomers - one spoke of her active search on the internet for something a former Catholic and pagan could attend together with their children and how our church was friendlier to military people than others they had visited & I felt good that my work with a large group of UUs, who helped to put the information on the internet about our faith so people could find us, was useful to these seekers
* I stayed late talking to friends about life and church business - hearing about how volunteers had understood the democratic process that caused them to lose a fundraiser they were working on due to our fiscal problems in this recession and were going on to volunteer to do fundraisers for the general fund...while I watched the children have a trim-a-tree party (see Christmas Tree)
* lastly, I stayed a little later after I heard some banging noises in the back and discovered that there were people working to fix up the class rooms and one volunteer needed a ride home. We had a nice talk as I drove him home.
On Sat. when the snow was falling and my car was covered with 2+" of snow and I heard predictions of overnight freezing conditions, I dreaded the idea of either preparing for church on Sun. & then having it cancelled or having to get up early & deal with cleaning off my car and possibly slippery conditions on the church driveway. Well, I need to remember that early snows like this don't stick much or freeze on the roadway or gravel driveway since they still contain a good amount of heat. I woke up Sun. to sunshine and clear roads, though I still had to spend ~20 mins. cleaning off my car - it was worth it!
The joys of church on Sun. (briefly, because I could almost write a book):
* the choir was singing very uplifting music (challenging, but I was prepared)
* singing with some people with beautiful voices and upbeat attitudes
* there was hot water ready before service & a new flavor of herb tea to try - sugar cookie sleigh ride (or something like that) - very tasty!
* joys and concerns were shared by people I consider friends and people I've yet to get to know well, including small children
* the "story for all ages" was about our work with children at an inner city community, which I worked with from its start and then for about 10 yrs. (youth still get hit by stray bullets occasionally, but it's so much better than it used to be), and then we trimmed a mitten tree with donations for them (see Mitten Tree)
* the sermon was about beliefs in God (the text of the sermon will be here soon and the audio will be here)
* the minister shared about Unitarian history and told about his own story of how his beliefs were formed (he said he considers himself a "mystic" - believing in the experience of "God" [something more than we generally pay attention to on the surface, but something within that is greater]; I consider myself a "mystic agnostic") - the story contained humor, too, so we all had a good laugh
* the hymns contained words of diverse beliefs and one was a poem written almost 100 yrs. ago, "A Firemist and a Planet" which includes, "a crystal and a cell,... caves where ancients dwelt; the sense of law and beauty,... some call it evolution and others call it God."
* there were announcements about many enjoyable activities that the church has available, though I certainly don't attend them all
* after the service, I talked with friends and met newcomers - one spoke of her active search on the internet for something a former Catholic and pagan could attend together with their children and how our church was friendlier to military people than others they had visited & I felt good that my work with a large group of UUs, who helped to put the information on the internet about our faith so people could find us, was useful to these seekers
* I stayed late talking to friends about life and church business - hearing about how volunteers had understood the democratic process that caused them to lose a fundraiser they were working on due to our fiscal problems in this recession and were going on to volunteer to do fundraisers for the general fund...while I watched the children have a trim-a-tree party (see Christmas Tree)
* lastly, I stayed a little later after I heard some banging noises in the back and discovered that there were people working to fix up the class rooms and one volunteer needed a ride home. We had a nice talk as I drove him home.