USH-Enews April 1, 2010 Print Only Edition

USH-Enews is a weekly email newsletter produced for members and friends of the Unitarian Society of Hartford. The USH web address is: http://www.ushartford.com/ Check at the end of this USH-Enews for information on submissions, subscriptions and escape from the mailing list or to find past issues of the weekly USH-Enews click here.

Sunday 4 April - A Three Sunday Series (4/4;4/18;4/25): Religious Naturalism: Loving Pachamama, Our Mother the Earth - Religious naturalism, a once-forgotten option in religious thinking, has made a revival. Very close to religious humanism, perhaps overlapping it, it seeks to explore and encourage religious ways of responding to the world or at least ways that are analogous to what we traditionally call religious.

The difference between religious naturalism, as Rev. Jamestone defines it, and the humanism of classical humanists is a richer sense of our response to the world. Words like "mystery" and "openness" are more likely to be used by religious naturalists. In the debates between humanists and theists (classical or reversionary) religious naturalism as a viable option has often been forgotten, but no longer. - Rev. Jamestone, PhD

Before the series begins, consider purchasing and reading a fine book by our very own Karl Peters: Dancing with the Sacred: Evolution, Ecology, and God - Here is a quick overview.

Music - Easter Sunday music will be lively and swinging. Guest musicians Anna Norland, trumpet, and Conor Lyman, tenor sax are from our own congregation, and guest drummer Joe Ganci will join pianist Mark Child on some jazz tunes during the service. A quartet of section leaders sings an arrangement of the gospel-style "Hold On to God's Unchanging Hand," and our Cantor Melissa Paul leads the hymns. Be prepared to dance out the aisle during the Postlude!

Any visitors or newcomers are invited to come to the First Sunday USH Connections session held after the service this coming Sunday at 11:45. No need to register – just come! You will have the opportunity to share your thoughts about what you are looking for in a religious community and explore ways to become more connected here at USH. Interested members/friends are welcome to drop in, as well.

Bring your coffee and join us between the stairs in the lower lobby lounge area. Childcare will be available, if needed, and light snacks as well. We will plan to wrap up by 1:00 at the latest.

Multigenerational Service
This Sunday, we will be having a multigenerational Easter Hilaritas service for the entire congregation. Come dressed in your Easter bonnet, bunny ears or other springtime finery and share in the joy of powerful worship, fine music and the welcome of three new babies to our congregation!

There will be no individual classes this week, but childcare for children under three will be offered in the nursery. Babies are also welcome to attend the service.

Easter "Egg" Hunt - At noon, following our Hilartias service, we will have a social action Easter egg hunt! Canned goods will be hidden on the church grounds for children to find, and can then be turned in for candy, cookies and prizes. All treats will be peanut and tree nut free. The cans will then be exchanged for Easter treats, and the cans will be donated to the Horace Bushnell Food Pantry.

Easter "Egg" Hunt Contributions Needed - On Easter Sunday, the Religious Education program will sponsor a unique Easter hunt. Rather than searching for eggs, our kids will search for canned goods. We are in need of contributions and volunteers. Please contact Gail at: dre@ushartford.com if you can offer to:

What You Can Do For USH

Remember to bring canned goods for the Easter "egg" Hunt (see above).

From the Editor: Suggestions for Contributors.

This Week’s Feature Articles

Stewardship Pledge Drive to End Soon
An Easter Hilaritas
Building and Grounds Work Day a Success
Twice Green, or More
Dimensions of Stewardship

Eight Days Left in Stewardship Pledge Drive- There is only one week and a day left before the Stewardship Drive will end. Have you sent in your pledge card yet? If not, please do so immediately – or you can call the office and tell our Business Manager, Brian Mullen of your intended pledge for the upcoming year.

Most of our revenue comes from our pledge drive. Your pledge matters. We need to know what our expected revenue will be so that the Finance Sub-Council and the Board can begin to make plans for the final budget.

As of 3-31-10, we have received 106 pledges totaling $252,396. There are still as many as 87 pledgers we have not heard from.

For all those who have not sent in your pledge card, we look forward to hearing from you within the next week. For all of those who have already pledged, thank you for your support and commitment. - Sue Kinney

An Easter Hilaritas: It’s not your Mother’s New Easter Bonnet! - Some of you recall Easter traditions from childhood, like wearing new clothes or hunting Easter eggs. As UUs today, we celebrate Easter because in our culture it captures a core human experience: the yearning for renewal and resurrection - the possibility of life prevailing over death -- in all the ways that can be possible for us.

The promise of Easter is captured in the word “Hilaritas" - the name of the ancient Goddess of mirth. Appearing on Greek coins, she was depicted with children at her feet, and Springtime greenery all around. Early Christians used her name as a greeting. The shout of “Hilaritas” was an encouragement to live joyfully with integrity, whatever ones circumstances.

The story of the stone rolled away from the tomb of Jesus that first Easter is a reminder that, in order to experience Hilaritas, one must "roll away the stone" of dark thoughts, habits, and attitudes preventing the emergence of "new life." for us. Last Easter you may have received a small stone as ritual reminder of the Easter invitation to "roll the stone away" from some tomb place in your heart, and to dare proclaim "that it is being made new!” We continue that tradition in worship this year.

You can help to strengthen the joy of Spring renewal among us on by wearing something to church on Easter which suggests your own faith in the joy of Spring and new life — an Easter bonnet? Some bunny ears? What about a daffodil boutonniere or corsage, or some bright Easter egg or Spring pastel colored garment? - BJ

Building and Grounds Work Day a Success – After an unseasonably cold night of temperatures in the 20s, Saturday March 27 dawned clear and cold. Long scheduled as the spring Work Day, a substantial group of dedicated USH folks showed up to clean up the Meeting House and grounds for spring. Can you link the names below with the images above?

Under the seasoned foreman skills of Ed Sax, arriving workers were promptly assigned to various tasks.

With 50 bags of mulch pre positioned on the Memorial Garden Patio, Briana Brittel, Marye Gail Harrison, Celeste Smith, Barbara Prine, Ron Friedman, Bill and Louise Willett and the Newtons pruned away dead growth, extracted weeds where possible from the frozen ground, removed tree debris and spread flash frozen cedar mulch on the garden in preparation for the growing season.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen under the supervision of Peter Magistri, Sue Kinney, Carol Sexton, Cyprian Martin and Bev Prager removed and cleaned ceiling panels and the area above, and put certain rodent restricting barriers in place. Elsewhere in the Meeting House, Ellie and Jim Venneman did some annual cleaning of various windows and doors while Bill Alexander worked on the floors.

Outside on the north driveway, Geralyn Laut and Laurie Rollins tided up the sidewalk and areas adjacent to the driveway while Zean Gassmann and Ginny Allen did the same for the areas adjacent to the parking lots. Roy Cook and Deb Meny removed tree debris from the front birch and hemlock trees. Meanwhile Stu Spence helped where needed and Andy Hahn surveyed the sidewalk repairs to date and planned solicitation of bids for further sidewalk repairs of a major nature. Bev. Prager worked around the building edges tending to the spring flowers and consulted with Stu on what to do with the old chimney stub below the lower entry and Chapel sectors. The consensus was that it might make a nice fire pit for youth overnighters and annual picnics.

Various plumbing and drainage issues were studied for future corrective actions.

The Meeting House aesthetics and function would not be sustainable without the efforts of these dedicated and enthusiastic volunteers. - Ed Sax & David Newton

Twice Green, or More - In the beginning, there was the Meeting House Messenger, written as Meetinghouse Messenger for some important reason now lost in obscurity. Then one day it was partially replaced by the USH-Enews. The budget line in the Community Within budget for printing promptly disappeared along with the costs of postage, folding the document, delivering it to the Post Office and and related driving too and fro from the Meeting House to assemble the document. In doing this, USH took an important step in conservation of resources, trees, and petroleum (gasoline) and recycling effort, none required for electronic screens.

The remaining cost other than volunteer effort to produce the weekly USH-Enews would be mostly the cost to drive the remote servers that send documents to your computer upon request, and the electricity driving your computer. As of now, if you will look at the USH home page at the bottom (You can click on the symbols), you will see our server power is essentially all green, i.e., wind power. So, now we are at least doubly green in this effort.

And, when you use electricity for your home derived from photovoltaic cells on your roof, as your editor does, or wind, water or other green power source, the activity will have been mostly green, at least so it seems.

We are making very good "green progress." - David Newton

Nancy Mandly Testimonial - Dimensions of Stewardship - Good morning, my name is Nancy Mandly and I am a member of the Stewardship committee.

Although I was not able to attend, I heard that a great time was had by all at the Stewardship event last Saturday.

As of this past Friday Brian had tallied our total pledges to be $239,336 so we are still about $106,000 short of our goal.

So if we don’t have your pledge yet, please contact Brian in the church office and give it to him verbally, which will expedite the process, And Stewardship will be getting back to you with progress reports until the end of our campaign, April 9?

A while back, Diane Cadrain solicited me to be on the Stewardship Sub-Council. Although I’ve served on many different groups here at the Meeting House over the years, that was the LAST group I ever wanted to be on. Asking folks for money, or being asked for money, or talking a lot about money, is WAY outside my comfort zone.

But she said that I definitely had gifts to offer, so….

I began to look at what a good steward really means.

I turned to Google where I found some great stuff on stewardship, the best story being one of two friends who are stuck on a desert island. One of them is pacing anxiously, afraid of never being rescued while the other is relaxing in the sun without a care. When the anxious one asked how his friend could possibly be so relaxed in such dire circumstances, he replied…”It’s easy, I make over $100,000 grand a year and I tithe to my church…I have no doubt that my stewardship committee will rescue me!”

Google also gave me a great definition of a good steward as being someone who is doing the best they can with the things that they have been given.

That really impressed me…it helped me as I thought about my own pledge and as I considered joining the stewardship team.

As many of you know, I retired from a long working career about a year ago and began living on a fixed income, which required me to reduce my pledge. In terms of pledging that meant that in the past two years, my new pledge has been reduced by more than 50%. Even though financially I am still giving my fair share, it did not make me happy to not be able to pledge what I had been used to giving for so many years. But it was my reality.

After that definition of stewardship helped me with my own financial picture, I began to think that joining the stewardship group just might be “the ticket” for me doing my part to be a good steward: “someone who is doing the best they can with the things that they have been given.”

And guess what folks? I actually feel good about being on Stewardship, because I have had the opportunity to be a part of a dedicated and hard working group and I also have been given the gift of watching many of you in this community give in dollars and in service above and beyond your comfort zones.

Then I actually volunteered to do this testimonial … again, way outside my comfort zone. Why have I volunteered to do these things which I do not do with ease?

And here is the one word answer….YOU. YOU…my circle of care…you folks who come to this place and give to me the gift of community and family.

As with my own family of origin, and probably yours too, I am not always 100% happy with everything that happens as we endeavor to grow and live together. Just as I did not agree with my son piercing his nose when he was a teenager, I have not always agreed with some of our Board decisions, or I may not love every piece that Mattie chooses for the choir to sing. But what I do know for sure about this Society is that it provides a steady loving community for me and I suspect that it does for you as well.

This community provides a myriad of opportunity for us all to be goods stewards whether it is in dollars or in service. And what it gives back to us cannot be measured alone by graphs and balanced budgets but by the sheer knowledge that we all are providing a home for each other where we are indeed enveloped in a circle of care…. A welcoming, imperfect home where we can rest easy when we walk through the doors to be with one another.

I am most thankful for the gifts that you all have provided to build and sustain this home, for me, for us. - Nancy Mandly

What Else is Happening

Diane Cadrain's sermon from last week is now available on the web.

Social Justice Journeys (From the UUA) And from USH

Sign up early for the Peace Train going to the May 2nd NYC Rally for disarmament ! This will be an international rally for disarmament.

People from the Hartford area who wish to car pool on May 2nd to meet the Peace Train in New Haven will be meeting at the Parking lot of Conard High School at 9 AM (West Hartford) We will meet near the Tennis Courts. The Peace train will take us to the rally for Disarmament in NYC.

Please sign up for the Peace train as soon as possible. See rally info below Peace Train info.

Peace Train Information
Sunday, May 2
New Haven to NYC: 10:55 am
NYC to New Haven: 6:07 pm
R/T Adult: $25
R/T 18 or under: $13
Paid before April 25
Limited scholarships available.
Register and Pay Online at : Here
Or send a check to Greater New Haven Peace Council * PO Box 3105 * New
Haven, CT 06515-0205
info: Henry Lowendorf: grnhpeacecouncil@gmail.com

The Peace train will be going to the rally for disarmament in NYC
Sunday, May 2nd @ the UN

Info - http://peaceandjusticenow.org/

Wars are Killing Hundreds of Thousands.
Global Economic CRISIS is Devastating Tens of Millions. Climate Change and Nuclear War Threaten Us All.

DEMAND

o End the Afghan, Iraq Wars and Military Occupations!

o Concrete Steps to Abolish All Nuclear Weapons!

o Cut $1.5 Trillion Global Military Spending Every Year!

o Free Funds For Human Needs And To Address The Environmental Crisis!

IASC

Protecting the Freedom of the Press - Monday, April 12 at 7PM UCONN School of Law, Starr Hall Reading Room. Featuring John Nichols (Nation Magazine), Robert Corn-Revere (First Amendment attorney), moderated by Don Noel. For more information visit acluct.org. - Joan Kemble

In May, the UN will review the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The nuclear weapons states have failed to meet their obligation to negotiate destroying the weapons under the NPT.

To stop this madness, many political leaders are calling for nuclear abolition now. There is no time to delay.

Sign the global petition to abolish nuclear weapons to be presented in May to the United Nations: Click here - Joan Kemble

photo

Green Topics - Did You Know? - You can help children at the Village (next door to USH) garden? Pick up a volunteer application at the Green Table to be a part of this important endeavor.

photo

Collage with Paper and Found Objects.
Saturdays, April 10 and 17.
Time: 10 AM - 2 PM.
Fee: $30.00 per class or $55.00 for the two classes. More

Adult Programs
photo

Please call or e-mail Janice Newton if you are planning to attend the Collage course April 10 and/or 17, and no later than Monday, April 5th, to attend the Friday Dinner and Movie, April 9. There will be no Programs Table on Easter Sunday, April 4. In the meantime, for additional information, you may refer to the complete description of classes, programs, and events on the web.

Coming Events:

photo

The Reader to Be Shown at USH on April 9 deadline for registration, April 5 More

Collage with Paper and Found Objects, Saturdays, April 10 and 17, 10 AM - 2 PM. (More)

Painting with Watercolors, Saturdays, May 8, 15, 22, and 29 - 1:30 - 4 PM.

Please, if at all possible, register for programs in person during coffee hours on most Sundays. If you cannot register in person, please email Janice Newton dcnewton(at symbol)snet.net and note registration in the subject line, or call 860.677.1121 and leave a message (if we are not home) rather than calling the office. This procedure will be followed for all programs including Small Group Ministry. Your cooperation is deeply appreciated.

Coming soon…..a new class for those seeking peace and tranquility, gentle exercise for the body and mind, a time for moving and meditation. We will be offering a TaiChi class from 5:00PM to 6:00PM on Wednesdays during the month of May. More to follow.

Village Garden Project - Last year a few of us grew a garden with children at The Village for Children and Families (next door to USH) More

Kingian Non-Violence Training at USH - To be held Saturdays April 17 and 24 at USH. More

Our USH Community Numbers

* Sustaining: Members (229) Friends (9)

** Supporting: Members   (58) Friends (11)

*** Ministerial Exemptions:         0

Sub -Total: Members (287)    Friends (20)
****Total USH Community   307

*Sustaining members donate more than $250 per year per person, and are reported to UUA.
**Supporting members donate from zero to $249 per year per person.
***Exemptions: those who consult with minister and make a service pledge in lieu of financial donation.

**** The total USH community--those who consider USH to be their religious community when they have need of a religious community or minister.

Attendance for Sunday, March 28, 2010
Worship =133
Average Attendance for February = 142
Religious Education Attendance = 29
Average RE Attendance for February = 31
Visitor forms completed 3/28 = 4
Visitor forms completed February = 9
Offering for 3/7 = $1,099
Members Joining January: 3

Caring Network - A friend is a gift you give yourself. Robert Louis Stevenson - If you know of any member experiencing some difficulty, please contact Diana Heymann, Chair of the Caring Network heydiana(at symbol) comcast.net 860.461.0908 or call the office so we can provide some assistance.- before 10:30 on Sunday. A wide range of community services is also available to those in need by calling InfoLine at 211. Please contact Diana if you are able to volunteer your services.

Further Down The Road (About 30 Days)

Economic Conversation Planned - We will have an Economic Conversation on Sunday, May 2, after the service, to talk about the development of the 2010-2011 budget. Please join us to learn more and to provide feedback on the process.

On the Calendar - Please notify Brian Mullen of all additions or changes to the calendar. Follow this link to all our scheduled events

A Matter of Opinion

External Events and Educational Notes