People's History of Social Justice
Click here to read about the history of social justice at People's Church.
British Author Returns to People's— Come Meet Imran Ahmad,
Tuesday, June 12, 7:00 PM aAt People’s Church
The Perfect Gentleman: A Muslim Boy Meets the West
Co-sponsored by: The Anti-Racism, Anti-Oppression, Multi-Cultural Committee of People’s Church of Kalamazoo and our local Muslim community
Saturday Workdays, 10 am-12 noon
With a growing need to make sure our worship space is clean and ready for Sunday services, the church is organizing clean-up workdays on upcoming Saturdays.
Please sign up in the foyer or contact the church office, if you’d be willing to help.
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Mindfulness Meditation
Silent Retreat – Saturday, June 9
Come join us for a time of sharing the silence together. We will gather from 9:00 am until Noon for a time that includes sitting meditation, walking meditation, and perhaps a few other mindfulness practices. No previous meditation experience is necessary. If you are a beginner, and would like a primer on vipassana meditation, please arrive at 8:40 for a short orientation.
Bring your own meditation cushion if you wish. If you don’t have a cushion, a folded blanket can serve as a workable alternative. Chairs are available in the space.
If you are an experienced meditator, and would like an extended experience of silence on this day, you are invited to arrive around 7:00 am for an additional 90 minutes of silence before others begin arriving for the 9:00 session.
For more information, contact Carolyn Heineman.
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Navigating UU Blogs - Tim Bartik, Board President
 I find a lot of great discussion is going on all over the place about Unitarian
Universalism that is interesting to read and consider.
Among older sermons, I like the collection of
A. Powell Davies sermons at http://www.dmuuc.org/message_davies.html#axzz1mwvUEZBb
I particularly liked "People Ask About God", although I disagreed with the crucial part of it. I also liked his April 4, 1954 sermon (a little more than one week after my birth), entitled "The Unitarian Faith."
I liked The Rev. Christine Robinson's (Albuquerque, NM) Minns lecture, http://minnslectures.org/2011Talks/RobinsonTalk.pdf
and a recent blog post she had on it, although
I posted a comment suggesting we go further in defining shared beliefs:
http://iminister.blogspot.com/2012/02/whats-unitarian-universalists.html
Another interesting recent sermon was by The Rev. James Ishmael Ford, a leading Buddhist UU, entitled “One World at a Time: A Meditation on Unitarian Universalism, Rational Religion & the Great Humanist Way”: (Jill gives this a thumbs-up too.)
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/monkeymind/2012/02/one-world-at-a-time-a-meditation-on-unitarian-universalism-rational-religion-the-great-humanist-way.html
On the other hand, I strongly disagreed with this sermon by the Rev. Anthony David, and thought it was antithetical to what I see as the core of UUism, which is that our religious practice is based on the here and now, not on metaphysical assumptions that cannot be proven (or disproven either, for that matter). I think this path is how the Universalists historically got in
a little trouble.
http://anthonyuu.wordpress.com/2012/02/12/does-reincarnation-matter
A useful news aggregator for UU blogs is at UU
Updates: http://uupdates.net/ This news aggregator provides a title and link to all new blog entries
by participating blogs—many per day.
UU World does a summary of some noteworthy blog entries once a week at “Interdependent Web”: http://blogs.uuworld.org/web/
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Between Us
 The annual meeting of People’s Church takes place on Sunday, May 20, following the Sunday service.
Do you have it on your calendar? Have you scheduled other things around it, knowing that it is one of the very
important parts of being a member of this congregation? And if not, why not?
It is no small thing, no insignificant detail, that the life of this congregation is governed by a demo-cratic process. How we decide on our mission and goals and priorities is up to us, the members of the church. Remember, the church is not a show or a spectator sport, it is not just a social club nor a political party, not just a place or community to use as you like, and it is certainly not
a “they.” This church is only “we” – the members and friends, working together to live in the best ways we can. Working together. If you are a member of the congregation, your participation in the annual meeting is needed.
We will also welcome new members that day during the Sunday service, for the third time this year. To join means to take a stand, or to reaffirm where you stand, in a world full of brokenness but also full of promise and of love. With our new members, I hope we can all take a moment to reflect, and to remember, the importance of this choice.
And we also welcome the Rev. Andy Burnette, from Danville, Indiana. I met Andy a few years ago when he came to his first meeting of UU ministers. His stories of moving from evangelical Christianity and ministry in the Nazarene Church, to Unitarian Universalism, and his sermons, have inspired me many times. He has just been called to the Valley UU Congregation of Chandler, Arizona, and I wanted you to be able to meet him and hear him preach before he goes, as I expect he will become one of the well-known UU ministers of his generation.
The regular church year is drawing to a close, the building project is getting close to being done, our summer schedule—when services start at 10 am instead of 10:45 am—will begin on June 17. We have done so well in this year of change and upheaval, of dust and dirt and noise, of not knowing where to find things, of trying to find space for everything. We have continued to do the things which are most important; to worship and work together, to meet and greet newcomers, to reach out into the communities around us. In a few months we will celebrate our expansion, and re-dedicate ourselves to our mission and goals. There is much to celebrate now
as well. Keep coming!
See you Sunday—Jill
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