Children’s RE to Host May 2019 Art Wall Exhibit Reception on May 5, Noon, Forbes.
Children’s RE to Host this Month’s Art Wall Exhibit
SANTA MONICA - This Sunday’s Art Wall opening reception, Kathleen Hogue, Director of Religious Explorations, members and friends will gather at Forbes Hall after both services to celebrate yet another way for children to experience and learn from the community about the value of art, for one of Hogue’s final projects before her departure.
The collection reminds the viewer of the connections to one another, home on earth and what completes so-called life.
Teri Lucas, Assistant to DRE, said the kid’s work is one of the best in years since the art wall started featuring work by kids, “It’s not often our hard-working art director takes breaks from her rigorous curation all year-round.”
The art pieces are one of a kind, generational contribution to the church and represent the devotion to kids in a knit-tight community, and proceeds will benefit the RE Assistant fund to support the program that at the moment is lacking funds.
The art wall will feature collaborations and sculptures by the young artist throughout the program, decorating the hall of pleasant spring tones, as a little reminder of the fragile environment they will inherit.
The art wall for the month of May features works created individually and collaboratively by UU Santa Monica children, youth, teachers, parents, and staff that will begin promptly at noon, after Reverend Greg Ward’s “Enthousiasmos” sermon, Sunday, May 5.
Reverend Greg Ward at UU Santa Monica said there are a lot of exciting new things happening to the church, as and thanked the Kathleen, Teri Lucas, and the kids for their contribution to the art wall this month.
Adult Programs - UUA Common Read Group
Date / Time:
Sunday, April 28, 2019 - 3:00pm - 5:00pm
Contact Name:
James Witker
Healthy Congregation Council Listening Circle: Transitioning with Love and Hope
April 30, 2019
7:00pm
Forbes Classroom 4. Mural Room.
Please join the Healthy Congregation Council in reflecting upon transitions occurring at UUSM. We will have the opportunity to listen to one another as we share our thoughts, concerns, challenges, expectations and aspirations for the coming church year. Please sign up at the Right Relations table, email us at RightRelations@uusm.org or speak to a Council member about your interest.
Contact Audrey Lyness.
Date / Time:
Tuesday, April 30, 2019 - 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Contact Name:
Audrey Lyness
Book Group: How To Be Less Stupid about Race (Postponed to June 3 for Memorial Day)
Update from Laura Matthews: Please note that the Book Group: How To Be Less Stupid about Race will be skipping a week because of Memorial Day, so the third and final meeting will be on Monday, June 3 rather than May 27.
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How to Be Less Stupid about Race: Book Group. Come explore this important new book in three weekly 2-hour sessions starting Monday, May 13, 7:00pm, in Forbes Hall. Register for this series either at the RE table or by emailing discussion leaders Audrey Lyness or Laura Matthews.
From the UUA website:
“How to Be Less Stupid About Race is your essential guide to breaking through the half-truths and ridiculous misconceptions that have thoroughly corrupted the way race is represented in the classroom, pop culture, media, and politics. Combining no-holds-barred social critique, humorous personal anecdotes, and analysis of the latest interdisciplinary scholarship on systemic racism, sociologist Crystal M. Fleming provides a fresh, accessible, and irreverent take on everything that’s wrong with our national conversation about race.”
We’ll discuss how the ideas speak to us (if at all), what the ideas might mean in practical application, and how they are or are not useful in our fight against racism. Everyone is welcome to audit the discussion; if you’d like to participate, please be sure to have read the Introduction and the first two chapters for the first session.
Copies of the book are available online or for $17 at the RE table after the Sunday church services. Our hope is that the discussion will be informative, positive, and practical, with all of us learning from the book and from the perspective of others.
Date / Time:
Repeats every 7 days until Mon Jun 03 2019 except Mon May 27 2019. Also includes Mon Jun 03 2019.
Monday, May 13, 2019 - 7:00pm - 9:00pmMonday, May 20, 2019 - 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Monday, June 3, 2019 - 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Monday, June 3, 2019 - 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Room:
Contact Name:
Audrey Lyness
Laura Matthews
FIA: Peace & Social Justice
The Peace & Social Justice Committee (PSJ) puts our UU principles of justice, human rights and sustainability into action in our local community and beyond. We organize activities and support campaigns in the areas of labor and economic issues; racism, police brutality, and mass incarceration; immigration and immigrant detention; and resisting war. We work with community partners such as CLUE (Clergy & Laity United for Economic Justice), OFA (Organizing for Action), the ACLU, and the Sunrise Movement. We also collaborate with the UUSM Green Committee on issues relating to environmental justice and climate change. People of all faiths and none are welcome to join us in working to heal our world. Contact: justice@uusm.org
The Peace & Social Justice Committee meets on the 3rd Sunday of every month after second service. New members are welcome and needed. For more information please email Dierdra Deitel. If you do not have email, please stop by the Faith in Action table in Forbes Hall.
Date / Time:
Sunday, May 5, 2019 - 12:45pm - 1:45pm
Room:
Contact Name:
Deirdre Dietel
The Rapture
Theme:
Curiosity
Sunday, May 26, 2019
Rev. Greg Ward
Worship Associate:
Leon Henderson-MacLennan
In the 'Left Behind' series, author and minister Tim LaHaye talks about the rapture. The rapture, for those of us who haven't spent time in the south or who don't listen to Garrison Keillor, is the apocalyptic accounting of the end times where good souls are swept up and taken to heaven and 'non-believers' are 'left behind.' Where are Unitarian Universalists in the rapture. In this exploration of apocalyptic thinking, we will endeavor to find our place in the end of times.
Summer schedule: one service at 10 a.m.
Our Connections Make Us Whole - All RE Service (Summer Schedule Begins - One Service at 10 a.m.)
Theme:
Curiosity
Sunday, May 19, 2019
Rev. Greg Ward, Kathleen Hogue and RE Children & Youth
Worship Associate:
Natalie Kahn
What defines us and makes us who we are?
When we bring our whole selves together in a shared community we different perspectives, pasts, diversity and vision. In doing so we are able to create something special- a loving community that is whole because of its many parts.
This service will include our annual bridging ceremony and volunteer recognition.Come help us celebrate and recommit to Religious Education at UUCCSM"
One service at 10 am...then please stay to join in our 93rd Annual Congregational Meeting.
Caring for Our Caregivers
Theme:
Curiosity
Sunday, May 12, 2019
Rev. Greg Ward
Worship Associate:
Alison Kendall
What happens when those who raised us – those we’ve turned to for Love – suddenly start turning to us? As we honor Mother’s Day, we’ll look at the unconditional love and sacrifice which nurtured us, and the love and sacrifice our parents may require as they age. We will explore the impact of Alzheimer’s and other dementias as well as other limitations of chronic and life-threatening illnesses. How we support each other with the very human gifts of recognition, affection, and understanding is a central question at the heart of our belief in the inherent worth and dignity of all beings. Besides honoring mothers and caregivers, we’ll also acknowledge the work of our Care Ring Team.
Services at 9 and 11 a.m. (last week of our spring schedule; summer schedule begins on May 19).
Enthusiasmos
Theme:
Curiosity
Sunday, May 5, 2019
Rev. Greg Ward
Worship Associate:
Sue Bickford
What is that thing that calls us to live larger than the fear we've known allows us to live? What breeds the risk and courage great lives need. The Welsh used to call it 'Hwyl' - a contagious fervor for Love. The Scottish used a more familiar word: 'gumption': a stubborn determination that won't be denied. The French call it Joi de vivre. UU's sometimes call it the 'divine spark.' But it's the Greek word I like the best: Enthusiasmos. What is this force of life? How do we harness it? And what does it ask us to do?
During the 11 am service, we'll hold a ceremony welcoming our New Members.
Journey of the Universe: An Earth Sunday Screening
Journey of the Universe: An Earth Sunday Screening
Join us on Sunday, April 28 at 1 pm for a special Earth Sunday screening of Journey of the Universe, a unique odyssey of cosmic, biological, and cultural evolution that offers insight and inspiration for our present ecological challenges. In a single 60-minute narrative, writer and host Brian Swimme guides us through a scientific and spiritual Great Story, from the birth of the universe to the emergence of complex structures, from the dawn of life as we know it to the conscious present moment. The whole experience is framed by a single day on the Greek island of Samos, a crossroads of history and discovery.
Different from purely scientific approaches, Journey is the first film to integrate arts and humanities into the cosmic big picture. Drawing on the work of the late Fr. Thomas Berry, a cosmologist, historian, and eco-theologian, Journey won an Emmy Award for Best Documentary in 2012 and has birthed an online video series and podcast, as well as a sequence of online courses through the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology.
Learn more and see the trailer at the official website: https://www.journeyoftheuniverse.org/
(This event is sponsored by AAHS.)
More information from the filmmakers:
Journey of the Universe narrates the 14 billion−year story of the universe’s development, from the great flaring forth at the universe’s inception to the emergence of simple molecules and atoms to the evolution of galaxies, stars, solar systems, and planetary life of greater complexity and consciousness. This is a story that inspires wonder as we begin to understand such complexity through science and appreciate such beauty through poetry, art, history, philosophy, and religion. It also awakens us to the dynamic processes of evolution that are chaotic and destructive, as well as creative and life-generating.
Journey of the Universe is a cosmology, although not just in the scientific sense of the study of the early universe. Rather, it is a cosmology in the sense of being an integrated story that explains where both humans and life forms have come from. All cultures have had such stories. We now have the capacity to tell a comprehensive story drawing on astronomy and physics to explain the emergence of galaxies and stars, geology and chemistry to understand the formation of Earth, biology and botany to envision life’s evolution, and anthropology and the humanities to trace the rise of humans. Journey draws on all these disciplines to narrate a story of universe, Earth, and human evolution that is widely accessible.
Journey weaves science and humanities in a new way that allows for a comprehensive sense of mystery and awe to arise. Such an approach expands the human perspective beyond an anthropocentric worldview to one that values life’s complexity and sees the role of humans as critical to the further flourishing of the Earth community.
Date / Time:
Sunday, April 28, 2019 - 1:00pm - 2:30pm
Room:
Contact Name:
James Witker