It felt good to “launch” a new church year last Sunday, even if it was, once again, at a distance. We were able to see our choir singing via video—not the same as in person but we were at least able to have an image of our singers there together in community. And it was felt good imagining all of you out there gathered on Sunday morning. That imagination has been one of the things that has sustained me in these months when we have not been together in person. In the spirit of reminding us of the blessing we have…

This coming Sunday, Unitarian Universalist churches around the country will be gathering to begin another church year, Homecoming Sunday.   Why call some Sunday in the early fall Homecoming, some of you may ask? Worship, pastoral care and programming continue through the summer. It has been a long time since Unitarian churches closed during July and August. Are we simply reflecting the school calendar, with students re-gathering in person this fall? For a community that values education so highly, following the schools would seem almost natural.  The truth is that the language of “Homecoming” is a residue of the time when…

If you are reading this, you are alive. Let’s celebrate that! Take a full breath. Let your face find the shape of a soft smile of contentment. Inhale another breath of celebration: “I am alive.” Exhale with gratitude. How does that feel? What possibilities does connecting through your breath open for you? Yesterday I began writing this Staying Connected piece about anxiety, about the constancy of collective stress, fear and struggle in these times that weighs on each of us, and about the anatomy of my own struggle with anxiety over my lifetime. I wrote about how “possibility” seems distant…

Diverse and Revolutionary Unitarian Universalist Multi-Cultural Ministries. DRUUMM for short. This national organization invites Unitarian Universalists who identify as African American or from other parts of the African Diaspora, Latinx, Asian and Pacific Islander, South Asian and Indian, Native American or from other Indigenous Cultures to come together for mutual support and collective spiritual growth. It is an organization for Unitarian Universalists who identify as other than white. DRUUMM is one of many organizations in our faith centered on particular identities. There is an active DRUUMM presence here in the Pacific Northwest and active DRUUMM participation at First Unitarian. But…

This weekend, my housemate got word of a neighbor in distress. Her yard, driveway, and sidewalk were being overtaken by great lavender bushes! So, we pulled together a rescue squad, armed with garden shears and cotton bags, to liberate as many of the little purple flowers as we could. Now I love lavender. Sitting there, gathering it into bouquets, the smell washing over me, I remembered so many sweet memories: of an old friend who made the best lavender shortbread, of similar moments surrounded by lovely people picking chamomile on a farm I lived on a few years ago. And,…

Dear Members and Friends, I think I have mentioned in one of these before that I am a natural risk-taker. I think I’ve also mentioned that I am not a particularly hopeful person, generally. I usually believe that hope breeds disappointment and nurtures complacency. In any case, whether I’ve mentioned these things or not, I would doubt that any of this is a surprise to most of you by now. And yet, as we approach September 1st - the day choir rehearsals are scheduled to begin for our in-person worship services that soon follow - I find that both of…

Dear Members and Friends, This week Senior Minister, Rev. Bill Sinkford, offers a reflection: A few evenings ago, stepping out my front door, I was surprised to find two deer at the top of my driveway. Both were young males with new antlers budding on their heads. They were “playing” with each other, butting each other, head-to-head, as if testing strength and testing what these new growths could do.  They looked toward me across the 40 or 50 feet that separated us and decided that my presence was not reason to stop their play. Their testing of one another reminded me so…

Dear Members and Friends, This week Director of Family Ministries, Cassandra Scheffman, offers a reflection: Spanish American philosopher George Santayana (also an atheist), may be best known for his work The Sense of Beauty (1896). He said, “Beauty as we feel it is something indescribable; what it is or what it means can never be said.”Recently, I have been thinking a lot about beauty―more specifically, our perceptions of beauty. What do we find beautiful, what do we find not beautiful (or ugly...if that is even an accurate antonym) and why? Certainly, among us we have infinite ideas of what beauty is and…

Dear Members and Friends, This week Director of Social Justice, Dana Buhl, offers a reflection: Last weekend, I completed the Jubilee 3 weekend anti-racism workshop, along with nine other congregants from First Unitarian Church. I’m both tired and inspired at the late hour. I was touched by the integrity, vulnerability and courageous leadership of our three facilitators, Paula Cole Jones, Lutricia Callair and Leon Spencer, all African American UUs with a deep love of our faith community, respect for each other, and brilliance in creating space for each person to dig deeply, vulnerably, honestly into the painful truths of white…

It has now been a couple weeks since we experienced the terrible heat wave, aka “the dome,” and the reality of its impact on our lives. It took a few days for us to learn about the number of human deaths, mostly of those most on the margins. Those included a farm worker from Guatemala who died on a farm in Marion County. Those included many elderly and houseless people. And I expect in the days and weeks ahead we will learn about many more. And likely we will never know the full toll from all of this on human…