Wednesday, 70+group
Meets at 11:30am
This week’s theme is “farewells”
This Sunday is our RE Sunday
Our Religious Education Director, Naomi Yoshida
And the RE Committee
Are putting that together.
Celebration of our Children’s Religious Education program
For the last year
Including a bridging ceremony for two of our youth
Two other announcements for this weekend
After worship this Sunday, June 14th 11:30 am – 1:30 pm
Racial Justice Workshop via ZOOM
What will we do as a faith community about the systemic racism in U.S. society?
Let’s gather to talk about our commitment to racial justice and how we will manifest this in our lives, our congregation, and our community.
There’s also a google group you can join
If you want to discuss
Send an Email to UUCLBracialjustice@gmail.com to be added to the group.
Small Group Ministry (SGM)
a program which deepens members’ and friends’ experiences of “church” through their participation in lay led small groups.
UUCLB’s SGM Summer Zoom Edition includes six groups
that will meet every other week
with meetings lasting approximately 1-1/4 hours so as to avoid “Zoom fatigue.”
There’s a meeting for every day of the week except Monday
Morning, afternoon, and evening times are available
More information is available in your weekly email announcements
Which will be in your email inbox this Thursday
You must sign up by June 15
Some of the groups are filling up
So please include a request for a 1st choice
And a second choice
And if you want to enroll right now
Send an email to
smallgroupministry@uuclb.org with your 1st and 2nd choice and telephone number
This will be the last week that I do these messages
I will give my last message on Saturday, 1pm
I need to turn my attention to some other closing business
And I need to start my leave-taking
The week of the 15th
I’ll attend the Board meeting
I’ll attend the Pastoral Care meeting
I’ll lead the weekly staff meeting
I have a sermon to write for June 21
And I’ll finish the communication I’m preparing for Lissa.
June 21, is my last day preaching to you
Then for the last week of the month
I will participate in some of the GA and Ministry Days activities
I will finish cleaning out my office
So we are really coming to the end now
And thinking about making an end
I’m thinking about what we accomplish during a Memorial Service
How healing, and helpful it is,
To make a thoughtful, considerate end
The major part of a Memorial Service
Is storytelling
Sharing our stories
Sharing our memories
And in particular,
There’s an element of the story-telling
That has to do with the deliberate
Framing of the story
In a way that we can hold on to
I’m thinking about clearing out my office
And how there are a few objects I will hold on to
As symbols of our time together
How I will let just one or two things
Move with me into the future
And how most will be left in the past
At a memorial service, we know
We can’t hold on to the fullness of a life
And this is true of any experience
Even a short experience
It never takes as long to describe some fun thing you did
To a friend
As it did to do the thing
Every experience becomes a short story
Sometimes just a sentence
Or an image
And certainly a long one experience
Like a life
Or a two-and a half year interim
Cannot be contained in its wholeness
So we engage in an act of interpretation
Or meaning-making
It’s not so much summing up
As it is reducing our life experiences to the essential
We don’t try to hold on to the whole story
But we search for a memory
That we can fit into a pocket of our brain
And bring out again when we need to.
What is the story
You’re going to tell
After this experience is over?
What is the image, or sentence
You will hold on to?
And the other learning from a memorial service
Is that not everyone has the same story
And that’s OK
We didn’t all have the same experience, exactly
And the experiences we shared didn’t feel the same way to all of us
And we had different lessons we needed to learn
The satisfying part of a Memorial service
Is bringing all those different stories together
And getting a fuller picture of the person
Knowing that our story isn’t the only story
Our truth, isn’t the whole truth.
As we come to the close of the interim
You might spend some time
Naming your story
What will you save
About this time between Rev. Mitra’s departing
And Rev. Lissa’s arriving?
And what will you allow now to slip away into the past?
See you Tuesday, 1pm.