Mid-Missouri PrideFest is coming up Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 28-29, and volunteers are needed for our presence there. Here are three ways you can participate:
Planning Team – Email Rev. Molly if you’d like to help her finish planning details of our presence.
Staff Our Table – Sign up here for a two-hour shift to help set up and/or staff our table at PrideFest.
Join the Parade – Line up with us in the Armory Parking lot by 11:30 a.m. Sunday, Sept. 29. You can meet us there, or carpool with us from church. The parade will start at noon. Let us know if you’ll be joining us for the parade.
The time has come once again to sign up for new and continuing 2024-25 UUCC Chalice Circles. You can use the button link above, or the button links that appear on the Home page and Chalice Circles page.
Chalice Circles are a small-group ministry of the church designed to build community, foster connections between members, and provide opportunities to share your heart in a safe, brave space.
Groups of no more than 10 members are led by fellow UU volunteers and topics are planned to complement the monthly themes of the church year. A Chalice Circle commitment is for one cycle of nine sessions, though some circles may elect to continue in some form over the summer. Groups will meet once or twice per month for an hour or two from September 2024 to May 2025.
If you have questions, you are welcome to email the Chalice Circles leadership team that consists of the Rev. Dr. Molly Housh Gordon, Gretchen Maune, and Crystal Paddock Buffaloe, or call or text Crystal at 573-289-9705 (please leave a message!)
We look forward to a fun, connected, meaningful year ahead!
Our congregation last adopted Mission and Vision statements more than a decade ago, in May of 2013, after a large-scale listening campaign. Since then our Mission and Vision statements have served us well and guided us through a decade of work together, but also the world has changed dramatically!
Last year our Board of Trustees decided that the time had come to re-visit our Mission and Vision statements through another large-scale process of congregational discussion and discernment. The board recruited and charged a Mission and Vision Task Force to help lead this process. Members are Taylor Gill, Holly Daily, Gretchen Maune and Rebecca Graves, with the support of Rev. Molly.
This is a process that will take all of our input in order to truly reflect the direction of our congregation. We want to learn about your hopes and dreams for our world, for our community, and for our congregation.
To accomplish this, we are planning a series of small group “cottage meetings” this fall and winter, some one-to-one conversations as desired, and a survey to finish the process in the spring. There will be lots of different ways to engage, and we need your help making this effort a success!
After a robust process of as many conversations as possible with members, friends, visitors, stakeholders, and community partners, we will be sharing what we learn with the board and congregation. The board will then develop an edited or brand new Mission and Vision statements, gather further feedback, and eventually bring the Mission and Vision statements before the congregation for a vote.
Possibly more important than the end product of this process are the conversations, thoughts and ideas that will connect us more deeply to one another along the way. We ask everyone affiliated with the congregation to engage with this process to help launch us into the next era of our congregation.
We also invite your volunteerism! We need hosts and facilitators for in-home meetings and facilitators for meetings on Zoom and at church. Contact us by email to volunteer to host, facilitate, or both, and let us know if you have any questions.
Thanks!
Taylor Gill, Holly Daily, Gretchen Maune, Rebecca Graves and Rev. Molly
I first became acquainted with UUCC when I heard a radio announcement about an interesting activity here. During that activity, I learned that UUCC needed volunteers in order to provide
hospitality to guests needing shelter from cold winter nights. I was both interested and intimidated. I had no idea what to expect. Volunteering overnight when most guests were asleep
allowed me to dip my toe in. That initial step led to rewarding associations with UUCC.
I learned to work Sudoku. We discussed the books we were reading. I saw the care that the other volunteers had for our guests. I began attending services.
Soon, I was comfortable with our guests. I volunteered during other shifts which allowed us to become better acquainted. One night, a guest called the attention of others to the writing by the
doors of our church, “In the spirit of courageous love, we forge a community of radical welcome and deep connection that moves us together to heal the world.” A spirited discussion followed.
They were impressed, and many voiced the opinion that the phrase “a community of radical welcome” was especially cool. Our mission statement has been dear to me ever since. I often wonder over the wisdom and heart of the community that labored together to create such a statement.
Now, our Mission and Vision Team is busy planning wonderful ways to engage the congregation in a review and revision our Mission and Vision Statements. I look forward to experiencing this process with you and to the cool results.
In 2023-24, we spent the September-May program year talking about how to move together well through precarious times. For 2024-25, we’ve zeroed in on “Care” as one of our most powerful responses to all that is uncertain and unsettled and still possible and emerging all around us. Care is an active and responsive kind of love. It is attentive and and nurturing. Care is gentle and rigorously committed to thriving. Wherever we are headed together, “Creating a Culture of Care” will be one of the things that sustains us.
In so many conversations about the future we are co-creating, we are being offered a choice between care and control. Care for or control over our bodies, our spirits, our neighbors, the land, the creatures around us, the collective, and the very future we all share. As Unitarian Universalists we strive to choose care. Yet, we know this is not always the simple choice we make it out to be. It bears deep examination and continual re-commitment.
This year we’ll thinking about care together, talking about care together, and also building and re-building real, embodied relationships of care and mutuality in our community. What does a culture of care look like and feel like and act like in our life together, and how does it then extend beyond our walls? Let’s figure it out together!
Jamila Batchelder, Director of Religious Education
We are focusing this year on creating a culture of care, and I personally think there is no better way to care for our community than to get involved in our children’s programming! We have a lot of ways to get involved. Here is some of what we have planned this year.
Sunday Morning Programming
Potter Class: Our preschoolers will be doing the important work of learning about friendship and community building, as well as celebrating the wonders of our world.
Barton Class: Our Kindergarten through second grade class will be learning about our newly articulated seven values through a lego-based curriculum.
Latimer Class: Our third and fourth graders will be learning about famous UUs and how they were inspired by their UU values.
Adams Family Class (joined by Young UUs): Our fifth through eighth graders will be watching Star Trek episodes and discussing some of the big ideas and questions presented in them.
Sunday Afternoon Teen Programming
YRUU: The high schoolers in our YRUU program will design their own curriculum and mixture of fun activities, service projects, workshops and discussions.
Second Friday Evenings Middle Schoolers Programming
Junior Youth: The middle schoolers in our Junior Youth group meet for a variety of fun activities and service projects.
R.E. Family Parties (last Saturday evening of the month)
We had an amazing R.E. Kick-Off Party in August, and we are planning another one for the end of October. If you would like to get involved in helping to plan R.E. Family Parties, please let DRE Jamila Batchelder know – she would love the help!
September’s Faith-to-Action collections will be going to support the work of the UUCC Honduras Team. The team is going to go on its sixth trip to the El Cangrejal River Valley to assist in building latrines and doing other projects that the community has identified as most pressing. The team also sends $400 a month to the El Pital health clinic for basic supplies. Faith-to-Action contributions will go towards all these projects.
Recent Faith-to-Action collection results:
September: $537 for The Center Project
October: $736 for Heart of Missouri CASA (Court-Appointed Special Advocates)
November: $1,454 for the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund. Combined with the Chili Fund-Raiser, that makes a total of $5,174 for PCRF.
December: $888 for First Chance for Children
January: $721.58 for MADP (Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty. Ms. Elyse Max thanks us and is grateful for our continuing support.
February: $1,080.12 for Minority Men’s Network
March: $1,101.77 for our Sanctuary and Immigrant Justice Team.
April: $997.99 for River Relief
May: $487.36 for our Honduras ministry
June: $1,096.91 for Loaves and Fishes
July: $862.06 for Mobility Worldwide
2025 Honduras Service Trip News
Monthly meetings are well underway to plan the sixth UUCC Service Trip to Honduras. But it is not too late to join us! We will be traveling to Honduras during Spring Break 2025 to build latrines and do other projects the community desires and we can offer. Scholarships are available.
Cito, our foreman on the ground in Honduras who leads our projects, has recovered from Hepatitis C and is feeling so much better. The cost to treat Cito was enormous, but thanks to very generous donors, he could get his full treatment, leading to full healing.
Cito says that going through first Dengue and then Hepatitis C was very difficult but also very important in order to learn to be a better person every day and to learn that he can do much more to serve others. Cito is a very remarkable person who even before his illnesses was doing SO much for his community. We really couldn’t do our Honduras ministry without him.
September is Honduras month at UUCC! Faith-to-Action collections will go towards building latrines and buying health clinic supplies in El Pital, Honduras. We will be selling delicious crêpes after worship on Sept. 22. Please join us at the Honduras Ministry table at the Activity Fair on Sunday, Sept. 8 to learn more about our ministry.
Mark your calendars for Nov. 16 for our next Trivia Night!
Please email Allie Gassmann if you would like to get involved, join us on the trip and/or have questions and ideas.
Thanks for feeding our food barrel
Last month Joan and Steve Mudrick took 112 pounds from our food barrel to the Food Bank Market, as it is now called. Thanks to those of you who feed the barrel, so it can help feed the Market/ Hunger continues around us. Thanks to all who help.
May was the end of UUCC’s third year of sponsorship of Lilly Ortiz Valiente and her children Manuel and Lakshmi. As reported in the August Searchlight, the consensus of the Sanctuary and Immigrant Justice Team (SIJT) is that it is time to phase out our financial sponsorship, at least in the ways we have been managing it. Three years of sponsorship is an unusually long time for sponsoring asylum seekers, although with a single mom and two small children we anticipated a longer period of assistance than usual likely would be needed.
Also, in the previous newsletter we mentioned the need of a replacement vehicle for the 1998 car generously gifted to Lilly by Meredith Donaldson. It was a wonderful and very useful gift, although it became in need of repairs too costly to afford. We were fortunate to find a reasonably priced replacement vehicle. In an effort to move toward a different way of assisting Lilly, on behalf of UUCC the SIJT gifted about half of the expense of the car, insurance, title, and registration and then provided a no-interest loan for the other half. Although we are phasing out our financial sponsorship of the family, it is difficult when the family has financial challenges. We are not abandoning the family and will attempt to appropriately respond to emergencies. And one of those emergencies may be providing transportation for the family when repairs are needed for the replacement vehicle. So if you are available to provide some transportation, please contact Ruth Milledge (573-268-9591).
At this time there has been no decision by the SIJT to commence another sponsorship, although the team has discussed that possibility. We will continue to explore the direction of the work of the SIJT while we continue to be responsive to immigrant justice and assistance work.
Recently we were able to provide some financial assistance to Edler and Yadira Umanzor and their three daughters when they were in need of a replacement vehicle. UUCC has previously assisted this Honduran asylum-seeking family, and the family has been to UUCC on several occasions. Many thanks to Dottie Mathews and Rosie Geiser who have stayed closely connected with the family and brought this need for a replacement vehicle to the attention of the SIJT.
With continuing gratitude for the support of the UUCC Community, please let us know if you have any questions about this update or the work of the SIJT, including any questions about the team’s financial information. Contact Allie Gassmann by email for information.
Allie Gassmann and Dave Gibbons
Co-Chairs of the SIJT
“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.” – Gandhi
Shortly after I had begun attending services at UUCC, I decided I wanted to support this amazing group of humans. Although I wanted to support the church, I knew I was a commitment-phobe. What if I join a team and realize it’s not my thing? What if I bite off more than I can chew? What if I sign up and then have to cancel? What if they ask for more than I can give? What if? What if? What if?
Around that time, the Searchlight newsletter mentioned that hands were needed to pull weeds, and I thought “Perfect, how hard can that be? I know what a dandelion is.” I started my service at UUCC on the grounds, not the Grounds Team, just the incredible force of Joann and Jim Vest. We sweated and pulled weeds and would occasionally stop and listen to one of Jim’s jokes as he mowed. I got to know Joann better through our weed-pulling experience. I enjoyed our time together and learned there was more than one type of weed. Who knew? Soon it was recognized that a team was needed, and the Grounds Team was born. I met people who shared their vast knowledge of plants, soil, and insects, and I met some like me who didn’t know a Serecea lespedeza from anaromatic aster.
Since then I have been involved in many teams and events at UUCC, and it has been a beautiful way to get to know an amazing group of people and help heal this world. My “what ifs” have been calmed by these kind and caring people. I believe I am a more loving person due to UUCC.
I invite you to connect with a service opportunity. Opportunities abound, and if you can’t find what you are looking for, please reach out.
I hope to see you at the Sept. 8 Activity Fair!
Be well.
Patty Daus
Membership Team
Our next membership cycle – September
Membership 101 – History of Unitarian Universalism – 7 to 8:30 p.m. Sept. 5 – register
Membership 102 – History of UUCC – in person after worship – Sept. 8 – register
New Member Ingathering during worship – Sept. 22 – register
Plants. They refresh our air. They recycle our water. They sustain a livable climate. They are the base producers of all our food. They meld with sky and earth to create our most beautiful surroundings.
People. We UUs are open to deeper understanding of this living planet and, as individuals, many of us explore our roles by engaging with a wild place or a garden. As a group, our Grounds Team strives to connect people with plants in a respectful dance of giving and receiving. We periodically organize small work parties to care for and learn from the plants that are living here on our grounds.
You are invited to join us by reaching out to Carol Arnold or Patty Daus, in person or by email. You may choose to participate just once or many times. Either way, we welcome you to join us in our ongoing exploration of plants and of working together in community.
If you have an interest in exploring or taking part in this project, we hope you will let us know!
When Rosie and I moved to Columbia in 2015, we were thoroughly delighted to find this vibrant, committed faith community to join, and it has been my honor to serve as your Affiliated Community Minister for these eight and a half years. For those who may not know, that role simply means that the justice work I do is done with the support of — and as an expression of — UUCC’s dedication to help heal the world.
For several years, my primary volunteer effort was working with congregations (like ours) that were/are sponsoring asylum seekers through the UUSC’s Congregational Accompaniment Program for Asylum Seekers (CAPAS). Recently, I have had the opportunity to offer the learnings and experiences I gained through CAPAS to help support internal refugees within this country. By that, I mean our trans and queer siblings who are fleeing domestic locations in which they are not able to live their lives in safety and where access to their needed gender-affirming care is being threatened or outright denied.
In response to the nearly 600 anti-trans legislative bills that have been introduced nationwide in the last year, the Pink Haven Coalition was formed as a collaboration between national trans organizers and people of faith (very significantly the UUA and the UU Service Committee). There are many groups and individuals across the country who are building networks to welcome trans folx with offers of housing, transportation assistance, financial support and a variety of other acts of solidarity. This is good and faithful — and NECESSARY — work.
You can read more about the Pink Haven Coalition at PinkHaven.org and in the profile of the PHC highlighted in the Spring/Summer2024 issue of the UU World. If you are moved to donate to support this crucially important justice work, you will find a donation link on the PinkHaven.org webpage.
As I do this work, I am grateful to carry with me YOUR commitment to help create a world that offers dignity and respect to all. If you would like to know more about the work of the Pink Haven Coalition, please send me an email.
The path to membership at UUCC begins differently for each of us. Maybe you wanted to explore SolarPunk, or you learned of UU in a class, or heard The Rev. Dr. Molly Housh Gordon preach at a social justice event, or Googled non-denominational churches, or visited for a celebration of life, or were invited by a friend. Whatever road brought us here, or how often we attend, we stay for the feeling of community and the potential for a better world.
Have you ever wondered about the path to membership at the UUCC?
Visitors are invited to sign the visitor connect book online or on paper. They then receive a welcome letter with an offer of a name tag. When they are ready to move forward they enroll in Membership 101 which explores the history of the Unitarian Universalist faith. Membership 102 speaks to the history of our own beloved congregation. Following Membership 101 and 102 they are welcomed to our church during the Ingathering ceremony. Members and visitors are all welcome to attend the membership classes. I learn something new at every class and enjoy getting to know others more deeply.
All are invited to serve as a greeter. It’s a great way to get to know people, it’s a fairly low time investment, and there is on the job training. Sign up to greet: https://uucomo.org/blog/sheet/sunday-greeters/
Please email any questions, comments or updates on your name tag to the Membership Team.
Our next membership cycle – September
Membership 101 – History of Unitarian Universalism – 7 to 8:30 p.m. Sept. 5 – register
Membership 102 – History of UUCC – in person after worship – Sept. 8 – register
New Member Ingathering during worship – Sept. 22 – register
By an affirmative vote of 80.2%, delegates to the 2024 Unitarian Universalist Association General Assembly in June adopted revised “Principles and Purposes” as part of Article II of the UUA Bylaws. The revisions required approval by a two-thirds vote. Read more on the UUA website.
While the revised principles will replace the Seven Principles that were adopted in 1984, individual UUs and their congregations are welcome to continue to hold and value the Seven Principles and Six Sources as a meaningful part of the faith, just as some have adopted the Eighth Principle on their own. The Eighth Principle specifically calls out antiracism and anti-oppression as central to congregational life and UU values.
Here is the text of the revised Article II as adopted:
Article II Purposes and Covenant
Section C-2.1. Purposes.
The Unitarian Universalist Association will devote its resources to and use its organizational powers for religious, educational, and humanitarian purposes. Its primary purposes are:
to assist congregations in their vital ministries,
to support and train leaders both lay and professional,
to foster lifelong faith formation and spiritual development,
to heal historic injustices,
to support and encourage the creation of new Unitarian Universalist communities, and
to advance our Unitarian Universalist values in the world.
The Unitarian Universalist Association will actively engage its members in the transformation of the world through liberating Love.
Section C-2.2. Values and Covenant.
This image is of a chalice with an overlay of the word Love over the flame, with six outstretched arms that create a circle around each of the core values and form a six-petal flower shape. Each arm is a different color, and clockwise they are: Interdependence (Orange), Equity (Red), Transformation (Purple), Pluralism (Blue), Generosity (Green), and Justice (Yellow).
As Unitarian Universalists, we covenant, congregation-to-congregation and through our Association, to support and assist one another in our ministries. We draw from our heritages of freedom, reason, hope, and courage, building on the foundation of love. Love is the power that holds us together and is at the center of our shared values. We are accountable to one another for doing the work of living our shared values through the spiritual discipline of Love.
Inseparable from one another, these shared values are:
Generosity
Pluralism
Transformation
Interdependence
Justice
Equity
Interdependence. We honor the interdependent web of all existence. With reverence for the great web of life and with humility, we acknowledge our place in it. We covenant to protect Earth and all beings from exploitation. We will create and nurture sustainable relationships of care and respect, mutuality and justice. We will work to repair harm and damaged relationships.
Pluralism. We celebrate that we are all sacred beings, diverse in culture, experience, and theology. We covenant to learn from one another in our free and responsible search for truth and meaning. We embrace our differences and commonalities with Love, curiosity, and respect.
Justice. We work to be diverse multicultural Beloved Communities where all thrive. We covenant to dismantle racism and all forms of systemic oppression. We support the use of inclusive democratic processes to make decisions within our congregations, our Association, and society at large.
Transformation. We adapt to the changing world. We covenant to collectively transform and grow spiritually and ethically. Openness to change is fundamental to our Unitarian and Universalist heritages, never complete and never perfect.
Generosity. We cultivate a spirit of gratitude and hope. We covenant to freely and compassionately share our faith, presence, and resources. Our generosity connects us to one another in relationships of interdependence and mutuality.
Equity. We declare that every person is inherently worthy and has the right to flourish with dignity, love, and compassion. We covenant to use our time, wisdom, attention, and money to build and sustain fully accessible and inclusive communities.
Section C-2.3. Inspirations.
Direct experiences of transcending mystery and wonder are primary sources of Unitarian Universalist inspiration. These experiences open our hearts, renew our spirits, and transform our lives. We draw upon, and are inspired by, sacred, secular, and scientific understandings that help us make meaning and live into our values. These sources ground us and sustain us in ordinary, difficult, and joyous times. We respect the histories, contexts, and cultures in which these sources were created and are currently practiced. Grateful for the experiences that move us, aware of the religious ancestries we inherit, and enlivened by the diversity which enriches our faith, we are called to ever deepen and expand our wisdom.
Section C-2.4. Inclusion.
Systems of power, privilege, and oppression have traditionally created barriers for persons and groups with particular identities, ages, abilities, and histories. We pledge to replace such barriers with ever-widening circles of solidarity and mutual respect. We strive to be an Association of congregations that truly welcome all persons who share our values. We commit to being an Association of congregations that empowers and enhances everyone’s participation, especially those with historically marginalized identities.
Section C-2.5. Freedom of belief.
Congregational freedom and the individual’s right of conscience are central to our Unitarian Universalist heritage. Congregations may establish statements of purpose, covenants, and bonds of union so long as they do not require that members adhere to a particular creed.
When you sell items on EBay or Facebook, you can now donate some or all of the proceeds to UUCC using the Paypal Giving Fund.
You will need to select an option in EBay or Facebook to donate a percentage of sale proceeds to charity. When you do that, at the time you complete a sale you can search for our church to designate it as the recipient. You’ll see several UU churches listed – select the one labeled “Unitarian Universalist Church.”
Thanks to Larry Lile and Church Administrator April Rodeghero for their work setting up this new giving option.
The Planned Giving Work Group of the Stewardship Team has been busy this past year and has launched a renewed planned giving program at UUCC.
During many past Founder’s Day celebrations, we have shared the story of how our founders hand-carried water to nourish the young trees on the site where they planned to build our first sanctuary. Those founders had a vision to support our church well into a future they only envisioned. You can join this long line of givers by acknowledging your planned gift and water the roots they laid down for future generations of our beloved congregation.
If you have given thought to the financial legacy you want to leave behind, we invite you to consider UUCC as part of that legacy. The Water Bearers Society is a new way our congregation gratefully recognizes those who have committed resources to our long-term mission.
To understand more about UUCC’s Planned Giving Program, go to https://uucomo.org/plannedgiving/. There you will also find an electronic Intent to Give form to make your commitment known to our team so we can include you in the Water Bearers Society. You can also contact us by email for more information.
In Service of your Generosity,
Rosie Geiser, Planned Giving Work Group
Thanks to everyone who put non-perishable food items in the barrel at the upstairs elevator doors over the last few months. Joan and I took 90 pounds to the Food Bank Market on Jan. 26.
The need continues. Please, everyone, continue to feed our barrel, which helps feed our neighbors, and maybe some of us.
The menu system on our website has been simplified and reorganized to make it more friendly for those viewing the site on their smartphones. The number of items on each menu tab has been reduced, leaving only the most important.
Also, most tabs now have a “More…” option. If you select “More…”, you will see links to all pages in that category.
If you can’t find something through the menu system, don’t forget our site’s excellent search feature. The search dialog appears at the upper right corner of the screen on all pages of the site.
Staff and volunteers successfully completed a CPR and AED course with the American Red Cross on Oct. 29, so we are feeling more prepared for any medical emergencies that may come our way.
UUCC staff members have been working on creating a visible area for the supplies needed in these life-saving treatments. The photo at right shows a first aid kit, AED, Skills Cards, and an Opioid Crisis Kit. These are all located just inside the doors to the Sanctuary on your right when you enter. They are placed high on the wall to prevent children from playing with them.
Expect to hear more in the future about safety plans and drills. We want everyone to know what to do in case of an emergency.
Also, we want to know if you are certified in CPR, AED or First Aid with any organization, even if you didn’t attend our training. If so, please email Church Administrator April Rodeghero and let her know about any current certifications you have.
In the past UUCC used a key system for exterior doors. We have now fully transitioned to an automatic lock system to make our church more secure. Each week, Church Administrator April Rodeghero will update the schedule so the exterior doors will unlock and lock for scheduled activities.
Staff members, lay leaders and organizations that rent space in the church will have a code to unlock exterior doors using a keypad in order to enter the building at other times. As a backup, April has an app on her smartphone that can lock and unlock doors remotely as needed when other methods do not work.
All those who now have a key to the exterior doors are asked to turn in their keys and begin using the keypad codes that will be provided to them. Keys should be turned in to April in person or labeled with your name or group and put in April’s mailbox.
It is important to turn in exterior door keys because each time a key is used, it overrides the system and causes the automatic locks to reset. This results in the doors being locked or unlocked at unscheduled times. Thus, if you are the last person to leave the church and the exterior doors are not locked, be aware that:
The doors will lock at the scheduled time.
A key should not be used to lock the doors because that will interrupt the schedule.
Those who have keys to interior doors in the church may keep those keys, but they are asked to inform April that they have such keys.
Our church sponsored one of the markers on the African American Heritage Trail in north-central Columbia. The marker commemorates the historic Douglass High School football field, four blocks west of Douglass High School.
A dedication ceremony was held on Tuesday, June 13, 2023 at the marker location at the corner of Oak Street and Unity Drive. UUCC Board of Trustees member and Social Action Team Chair Fred Young represented the church, and several other church members were present. Also attending were various city and county dignitaries, Sharp End Heritage Committee members, Chamber of Commerce Ambassadors, and alumni of the Douglass Bulldogs from the late 1950s.
In the slideshow below, click the right or left arrows to see other photos.
Front of marker
Rear of marker
Fred Young, UUCC Board of Trustees member and Social Action Team Chair, center, helped wield the scissors during the ceremonial ribbon-cutting.
Among UUCC members at the ceremony were, from left, Steve Mudrick, Pam Springsteel, Fred Young, Susan Even and Caya Tanski. Photo by UUCC member Dave Gibbons.
During our Oct. 23, 2022 worship service, our Affiliated Community Minister, Rev. Dottie Mathews, was recognized for her past work as coordinator of the Congregational Accompaniment Project for Asylum Seekers (CAPAS), a program of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC).
As part of the recognition, it was announced that the UUSC has started a fund to support congregations as they welcome asylum-seekers into their communities and named it Dottie’s honor. The Dottie Mathews Congregation Action Fund will provide startup money to congregations who decide to take a leap of faith into immigrant justice work.
Jessica Sapalio, Dottie’s successor as CAPAS coordinator, made the announcement. Here are Jessica’s remarks:
I know that many of you are aware of the incredible dedication and many years of her life that Dottie has given to immigrant justice work and to designing the nationwide CAPAS program. Through her vision and the partnerships that she has built at many congregations and with many organizations, hundreds of asylum-seekers and families who were separated at the border have been met with welcome and solidarity in an otherwise dehumanizing process.
I first met Dottie when my congregation became interested in hosting a CAPAS program. New to immigrant justice work, we were so grateful for Dottie’s knowledge, guidance, and grace in helping us establish a local program to offer solidarity to asylum seekers, which is very similar to the amazing program that you run here under Dave and Allie’s leadership. In January of this year, I had the great honor of getting to try to follow in Dottie’s footsteps by becoming the CAPAS coordinator at UUSC to carry on the incredible program that she created. My daily mantra has become “What would Dottie do?”
In the meantime, I have become a huge fan of your congregation, often watching services remotely, so I was excited to accompany Rosie and Dottie here today, but I’m also here because the UUSC would like to officially honor the incredible contribution that Dottie has had to the immigrant justice field. Dottie, would you please come up?
Dottie is a true justice warrior who has changed the lives of so many involved in this program. In recognition of this, UUSC has started a fund to support congregations as they welcome asylum-seekers into their communities and named it in her honor. The Dottie Mathews Congregation Action Fund will provide start up money to congregations who decide to take a leap of faith into immigrant justice work.
We have also put together a book of messages from many CAPAS congregations, including yours, and partners throughout the country who wanted to express their gratitude.
I wanted to thank you all for having me today, for those of you who helped work on the surprise, and to Rev. Molly, who I am so sad to have missed. I wanted to send special love and thanks to Rosie who through her love has supported Dottie through this journey and therefore all of us, to all of you and your congregation for your commitment to supporting asylum seekers.
By the time you see this article, the backyard meadow at church is likely to have received its maintenance-mowing and may look like a blank space or a poor excuse for lawn. But, I hope you have seen, can imagine, or will see the wonderful plants that are still alive and well beneath the ground.
There are Common Milkweeds that support traveling Monarchs, Baptisia that bloom with blue flowers above silver-leaved mounds, tall slender-stalked Grayhead Coneflowers, and bunches of fragrant Slender Mountain Mint. There are prairie grasses: Big Blue Stem with its turkey-track seed heads, dense clumps of Switch Grass that form airy panicles of seed, Indian Grass with golden plumes, bright orange-flowered Butterfly Weed, colonies of Ashy Sunflowers, Compass plants that point North and South, Obedient Plant, Rattlesnake Master, Goldenrod, Gum Plant, Blue Sage, Willow-leaved Sunflowers, and multiple species of Asters and Eupatoriums.
This meadow is the result of a human-driven transformation, part accidental and part intentional. When our UU forbears arrived and put up the building in 1969, the current meadow space was home to a woodland community. Then, in 1998 as we put on an addition, a big “bulldozer-oops” occurred, clearing a chunk of woods from the flat area and on down the hillside. We responded with attempts to help the land heal by nurturing a native, shrubby, woods-edge/hedgerow-type community on the hillside, with a native prairie plant community on the flat area that we now call our “meadow”.
Scientists use the words “disturbance” and “succession” in describing the transformation of ecosystems over time. In this particular instance, and so many others, we humans were careless disturbers. But disturbance in ecosystems is not always a bad thing. It can also be regenerative. Now, we are trying to work with natural succession and to steward the land toward health and abundance. We are attempting to partner with diverse life forms, all of whom we will never completely know, but whose basic roles and presence we can at least try to appreciate and support. We aspire to minimize our disturbance and to practice respectful nurturance of a healthy ecological community. Sometimes that requires active labor on our part, but it also asks of us an unhurried presence and an open mind toward recognizing and understanding all that this other-than-human community brings to us. There have certainly been many blunders along the way, but it is our hope that as we observe and learn from direct experience, and listen to naturalists and scientists, we are becoming more attuned to this plant community and are growing in solidarity with it.
It is the hope of our Grounds Team that those who spend time here will be touched by the presence of this rich multi-species community, and that they will return over and over to be connected with its rich transformative presence.
The Grounds Team would like to introduce you to some of our trees and invite you to share your love of our trees and woods on the UUCC Facebook page.
Shingle Oak – Wood from this oak can be split into thin sheets, which used to be made into shingles.
White Oak – These oaks can live for more than 300 years and are found throughout Missouri.
Shagbark Hickory – Its wood makes excellent, slow-burning charcoal, its nuts are edible, and its wood is used for many implements. Wildlife from moths to squirrels to bats appreciate shagbarks, too!
Sweet Gum – The star-shaped leaves of sweet gum become even more striking in the autumn, when they turn various shades of gold, red, pink, and purple, often on the same tree – sometimes even on the same leaf!
Ginkgo – A non-native tree, the ginkgo’s combination of resistance to disease, insect-resistant wood, and the ability to form aerial roots and sprouts makes it durable, with some specimens claimed to be more than 2,500 years old.
We are excited to announce that we have launched a new system giving our members and friends the ability to give to the Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbia by:
Text message from your smartphone, or
Online
This new system has been arranged through the Breeze Church Management System, our new church database. It replaces our previous Paypal portal, which is now inactive.
As fewer people are using checks or carrying cash, we wanted to offer a safe, secure and convenient way to easily support our church through giving by text message or online.
As some of our members, friends and visitors are continuing to stream our worship services online, we hope this new system will be more convenient than mailing a check or using our previous Paypal portal.
Our new system will allow you to give using a credit/debit card or bank ACH transfer. The system will ask for your card or bank account information the first time you use it, and you can change that information later. You can use the system to give whenever your choose, and you can also set up automatic recurring gifts.
Our church will pay a small transaction fee to process online payments, but we feel the fee is well worth the convenience. If you choose, you will be able to cover that fee for the church when you make an online gift.
We believe these new tools will allow us to continue to serve you well. We want you to know we greatly appreciate you and your spirit of generosity as you continue to support UUCC and our mission of radical welcome and deep connection that moves us together to heal the world.
The UU Life Writers’ Group is pleased to announce the publication of its second anthology, Stories, Just Stories. The stories are mini-memoirs about family, growing up, social activism, romance and pets. A big section of poetry is included. The anthology also contains tributes to those writers no longer with us.
Copies are $8 and can be ordered by email to Fran Reynolds. Pay on the UUCC donation page by selecting the “Other” option and specifying “Life Writers Anthology” as the purpose of the donation.
March is Women’s History Month. UU Life Writers will be writing stories about women who have been important to them, the church and the community. Everyone is welcome to join us on Zoom. We will meet March 6 and 20 at 10:30 a.m. For more information contact Fran.
We in the Reparations Working Group have begun our work! Just what exactly is that work? Our charge, first articulated by Rev. Molly in her February 2019 sermon, “Reparations and Soul Repair,” is to conceive of a small-scale, hyper-local reparations project. How might we leverage and redistribute a portion of our congregation’s resources to African American residents of Columbia and/or Boone County as an admittedly small act of repair to the systemic impacts of slavery and ongoing racial injustice? We will grapple with this question and present a detailed project proposal to the congregation by late fall 2020.
To get from here to there, we have formed sub-teams in these three intersecting areas:
Truth Telling: How have white residents suppressed black residents throughout the founding and growth of Columbia and Boone County? How is that past still present in our community today? We are diving into Columbia’s history (including archival research and oral history gathering) to uncover and to shift the narrative of race in our community.
Project Dreaming: We are researching examples of other reparations projects around the country to inspire and inform us as we envision and plan our own small scale project.
Relationship Building: We will identify and deepen relationships with black community members who are willing to offer insights into the history and the effects of systemic oppression in our community and to advise us on project design.
We are clear in understanding that our work:
Must go beyond apologies, however heartfelt, and enter the realm of physical, material repair.
Will be small in scale and cannot undo generations of past suffering.
Involves, for those of us who identify as white, humility and an ever-deepening understanding of our own individual and familial roles in historical and present-day systems of racial oppression.
We move forward with this hope – that the work of small-scale repair, while modest, can still be profound. Small steps can also be bold. We meet twice monthly.
Working Group members are Amie Burling, Andrew Twaddle, Charles Swaney, Dan Bugnitz, Dave Gibbons, Fred Young, Gretchen Maune, Kim Wade, Rev Molly Housh Gordon, Sam Otten. Let Rev Molly know if you would like to join us.
On Sunday, March 24, the Accessibility and Inclusion Ministry (AIM) Team presented the lay-led service, “Living Up to Radical Welcome,” and made a small change in the sanctuary while we were at it. As we’ve heard a number of questions about this change, we thought it was about time we shed some light on it.
If you’ve been to services during the past couple of months, you have likely noticed a section of chairs in the back of the sanctuary topped with yellow pillowcases. This sunny addition was inspired by feedback we’d received from congregants who have fragrance and chemical sensitivities. These individuals had been unable to enjoy services because of the migraines, allergies, and other reactions caused by these products, which many of us don’t think twice about applying. While we can’t control what products each person uses before joining us for worship, we can create a space in which people who live with sensitivities or allergies to those products can, hopefully, be more comfortable and feel more radically welcome.
The AIM Team requests that the fragrance-free seating area be reserved for individuals who are not wearing perfumes or scented products. We thank you for your help with this step towards being more accessible to and inclusive of all members and guests.
– Gretchen Maune, Chair
Accessibility and Inclusion Ministry Team
After a two-year lapse in the availability of UUCC T-shirts, the UUCC Social Action Team now has three designs of T-shirts available for purchase at $20 apiece. The shirts are perfect for rallies and other activities and events. Look for them in the Greeting Area.
Some of the shirts feature the design that first became available in 2017 before the UUA General Assembly. On the front this design includes the official church logo and the church motto. On the back, it features the logo and the following words from our Mission Statement: “Courageous Love, Radical Welcome, Deep Connection – Healing the World.”
The other two designs are specific to the Social Action Team.
You can see the shirts in the photo slideshow below. Click the arrows to see the next or previous photo.
The Social Action Team (SAT) has a variety of UUCC T-shirts available.
Allie Gassmann is one of the SAT members selling the shirts.
From left, Allie Gassmann, Caya Tanski and Fred Young modeled some of the shirts available.
Showing off their UUCC T-shirts, from left, were Caya Tanski, Sarah Wolcott, Allie Gassman, Desi Long, Joan Mudrick, Steve Mudrick and Andrew Twaddle.
Alan Arnold was a satisfied T-shirt customer.
Steve Mudrick modeled the front of his new T-shirt.
Our YRUU youth carried our church banner in the banner parade at the opening
session of the UUA General Assembly in Kansas City, Mo. on June 20. In the first part
of this short video, they are seen on their first pass through the convention hall.
After the transition, they are seen on their way out of the hall.
The Unitarian Universalist Association General Assembly was held this year from June 20 to 24 in Kansas City, Mo. What is GA? It’s part inspiration and spiritual sustenance. It’s an opportunity to mingle with UUs from all over the country and some other countries and engage in issues important to our UU faith. But also, it’s a time to conduct a lot of the business of the association.
This year there were 2,814 registered attendees, including 134 youth. 522 congregations from all 50 states, D.C., Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Mexico were represented by 1,570 delegates, including 199 off-site delegates.
Our voting delegates this year were Rev. Molly, Todd Iveson, Peter Holmes, Gretchen Maune, Connie Ordway, and Steve Scott. About 15 other members of our church also attended all or part of GA, and a number of them served as volunteers performing various tasks to keep the show running, in exchange for which they received free registration for GA. For example, Maria Oropallo and Kathie Bergman staffed an information booth to answer questions from attendees, and Larry Lile assisted with the tech staff that provided audio/video services.
The business of the General Assembly takes place in General Sessions. All registered attendees are welcome at these sessions, but only voting delegates can vote.
At the business sessions there was broad consensus for aggressively challenging the criminalization of migrants, people of color, and indigenous people. Delegates overwhelmingly selected “Undoing Intersectional White Supremacy” as a multiyear Congregational Study/Action Issue.
Delegates also endorsed three Actions of Immediate Witness, which all emphasize the urgency of supporting people of color and indigenous people. The first calls for congregational action to draw attention to predatory medical fees charged to incarcerated people, who are disproportionately people of color; the UUA’s Church of the Larger Fellowship developed the resolution in partnership with its 870 incarcerated members.
A second resolution pledged solidarity with indigenous “water protectors,” who have been fighting the placement of liquid natural gas pipelines near Native American lands and who face federal charges for disrupting construction of the pipelines.
The third resolution demanded immediate action to improve U.S. treatment of asylum seekers and migrant families to keep families together. Among other demands, the resolution advocates the abolition of Immigration Customs Enforcement “and the implementation of a system that understands the causes of migration, provides a non-carceral solution while asylum seekers await a decision on their case, and has a fundamental commitment to keeping families together.”
Delegates also approved a group of bylaw changes to bring the UUA’s governing document up to date with current understandings of gender diversity. A proposal introduced last year to change Unitarian Universalism’s “Second Source” from “words and deeds of prophetic women and men” to “words and deeds of prophetic people” passed easily.
A second bylaws amendment changed all gendered pronouns in the bylaws to the gender-inclusive “they/them/their.”
A third bylaws amendment will allow religious educators who are active members of the Liberal Religious Educators Association to serve as voting delegates at future GAs.
The assembly also approved bylaws changes adding two youth trustees to the 11 at-large trustees on the UUA Board of Trustees; allowing the role of moderator at GA to be filled by more than one person; modifying the length of terms of service on committees; and simplifying the social witness resolutions process.
Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray was selected by delegates as the first elected woman President of the Unitarian Universalist Association at the June 21-25 General Assembly in New Orleans. She had been the lead minister of the UU Congregation of Phoenix, Ariz., where she became well known for her work on behalf of immigrants, since 2008. Read more.
More than 4,000 UUs attended G.A., including some 1,800 delegates from more than 500 UU congregations. UUCC’s delegates were Rev. Molly Housh Gordon, Patty Daus, Tracey Milarsky, Jeanne and Dennis Murphy, and Gena and Steve Scott.
Also attending from UUCC were DRE Jamila Batchelder along with four YRUU members and one 9-year-old. The young people carried our UUCC banner in the banner parade at the opening celebration on June 21. Five of our young people lined up to carry our UUCC banner in the banner parade at the UUA General Assembly. See them in action in the video below.
Our UUCC banner was carried by five of our young people in the banner parade at the Opening Celebration of the UUA General Assembly (G.A.) in New Orleans on June 21, 2017. In this short clip they are seen entering the Great Hall of the New Orleans Convention Center and later proceeding out of the hall.
Read more about the many important actions taken by delegates and the UUA Board of Trustees at G.A.
