We are actively working to name the priorities that will guide our planning and resources (allocation of money, staff time, volunteer time, and facilities use) for the 2025 – 2026 Congregational Year. While there are core ministries and functions that we always include, it is helpful to articulate some specific aspects of our congregational life that we hope to enhance in the coming year.  For example, in this year’s 2024 – 2025 Priorities, we listed under Spiritual Growth – Support community building among the visitors, members, and friends worshipping online. Next week, Jen Thomas and I will be launching a…

How do we plant seeds of hope as we cross the threshold of a new presidential tenure, which represents a season of loss and harm for so many? One answer is to find nourishing individual and communal spiritual practices that will cultivate resilience within our lives and within our community.Last Sunday, in our multigenerational service we shared the following message about prayer followed by a candle lighting ritual, which invited us to commit to countering racism, militarism, poverty, and environmental degradation.We share the words again below, so you can read them, and to invite you to consider lighting candles at…

January is often a season of envisioning the journey of the year ahead, including making resolutions. As you do these things, I hope you will include something about your commitment to your spiritual life and your commitment to our common spiritual home. Your personal spiritual life – the practices that help you to make meaning out of the brokenness and out of the beauty of living – is a vital part of your health and wellbeing. Our common spiritual home – a community that partners with you to offer experiences of grounding, growth, inspiration, and activism – is a vital…

Our 2024 – 2025 annual spiritual theme is “Join the Journey,” and this month we are exploring the topic of threshold. It is a fitting theme for January when we cross the threshold of a new year; a point in time which feels pregnant with potential. What will 2025 bring to our lives? What can we bring to 2025?Now, I know that some of you (likely many of you) are feeling some level of dread about our country’s presidential transition. Given the threats the incoming president has made against immigrants and LGBTQ2SIA identified folks, as well as anyone who disagrees…

To get everyone in the mood for our winter solstice service, we offer this poem. Let us welcome the spirit of this season! The Shortest Day, by Susan CooperAnd so the Shortest Day came and the year diedAnd everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white worldCame people singing, dancing,To drive the dark away.They lighted candles in the winter trees;They hung their homes with evergreen;They burned beseeching fires all night longTo keep the year alive.And when the new year’s sunshine blazed awakeThey shouted, reveling.Through all the frosty ages you can hear themEchoing behind us—listen!All the long echoes, sing the same delight,This…

I first felt a call to ministry on August 27, 2017 (coincidentally, my very first sermon with you all was on August 27, 2023). The call was sudden and clear, seeming to come from somewhere deep inside and far beyond at the same time. It was during a Sunday service at All Souls in Washington DC, but it did not happen during a rousing sermon, a moving piece of choral music, or a moment of prayer. It came during a child dedication. It came to me in the midst of a ritual rooted in community, where we recognize our interdependence…

Beginning next month I'll be taking a four month sabbatical leave from my responsibilities at the church. This was originally planned for a year ago but superseding issues in the congregation made it clear last year was not the right time. The leave will begin on January 6 and I'll be back at the end of April. I'm still finalizing plans for the leave but it will likely involve some travel and time for rest and renewal. Mostly I'm looking forward to being away from the day to day demands of emails and other responsibilities.  This spring will be my…

We give thanks for the feast of lifeFrom our youth to our elderhood. We celebrate the tastes and the pairings: Of energy and passion,Of wisdom and compassion, Of curiosity and growth,Of loss and new beginnings. We give thanks for the feast of loveThat extends from kin and stranger alike.  We set a table to host and to honor: The people we love and who love us in returnOn days when it’s easy and days when it isn’tAnd people whose work sustains and nourishes us, Who we may never meet and could never be without.  We give thanks for the feast of foodThat fills our spirits and…

Thank you to all who joined us to rededicate Eliot Chapel in celebration of 100 years on this block! Scroll down to view images from the ceremony on Sunday, November 17, 2024. Our ministers Rev. Thomas Disrud, Rev. Alison Miller, and Danielle Garrett leading the procession to Eliot Chapel. Rev. Alison speaking at the rededication ceremony in Eliot Chapel, joined by Rev. Tom, Board Moderator Leslie Pohl-Kosbau, and some of our youth. Our youth holding historic banners. The cornerstone at SW 12th Ave. and Salmon St., laid by Rev. William G. Eliot in 1924.

You can read below or watch the full sermon, “Now What,” Rev. Alison shared last Sunday following the election as she oriented towards our shared calling in the weeks and months and years ahead.Dear Ones, I love you. I grieve with you. I am angry with you. I am sad with you. I am scared with you. I am getting ready with you. I will act with you. Will you act with me?  I love you. It warrants saying out loud from time to time, and maybe more often than we do. Throughout this election there have been deep messages…