UU Church of the Palouse · June 10, 2018 Opening Words Our nation’s in a bit of a mess. You may have noticed. We have big problems, from the epidemic of mass shootings to storms and flooding caused by global warming. Health care is a mess. The immigration system is a mess. The people who…
Earth Day UU Church of the Palouse · April 22, 2018 Opening Words I don’t know about you, but I go back and forth between trying to make changes in how I live so as to walk a little lighter on the earth- and feeling terrified that all of these changes won’t make enough of…
UU Church of the Palouse · April 8, 2018 Audio File: Our Flourishing is Mutual (Braiding Sweetgrass) Opening Words I walk around a lot of the time worried about the future. It’s clear to me the planet can’t sustain our current way of life indefinitely. It’s equally clear that attachment to our current way of life…
UU Church of the Palouse · April 1, 2018 Meditation “Who are we at Easter?” by the Rev. Barbara Pescan, Who Are We at Easter? Readings from “A Broken Hallelujah” by Barbara Merritt, A Broken Hallelujah “Blessing for a Broken Vessel: For Holy Saturday” by Jan Richardson, Blessing for a Broken Vessel Sermon It’s not a bad…
UU Church of the Palouse · February 25, 2018 Audio File: Opening Words It’s Jazz Fest weekend at the University of Idaho! And I am a proud jazz Mom. My younger son, Daniel, plays piano and/or vibraphone in both of the Moscow High jazz bands and the two combos as well. He even has a…
Audio File: Opening Words Author E.B. White once wrote of the dilemma that faces us all: “If the world were merely seductive, that would be easy. If it were merely challenging, that would be no problem. But I arise in the morning, torn between a desire to save the world and a desire to savor…
Audio File: Opening Words Tomorrow is International Darwin Day- on the 209th anniversary of Darwin’s birth, people all around the world are reflecting on his legacy, which is, primarily but certainly not exclusively, the theory of evolution. Darwin’s insight offered us an important piece of the vast and complex puzzle that answers, ‘Who are we? …
Audio File: Time for All Ages There’s a question- an important question- that we need to think about our whole life long. It’s a question people have been asking themselves for thousands of years. It’s a question people will be asking themselves thousands of years from now. It’s not the kind of question that has…
Audio File: Opening Words I’m actually not entirely sure it’s appropriate for us as Unitarian Universalists to celebrate a traditional Christian Epiphany. There are actually two different understandings of the historical roots of the holiday…some Christians lift it up as the anniversary of the day the wise men arrived in Bethlehem, having followed the Star. …
Opening Words In the year 167 BCE, the Greek king Antiochus Ephiphanes attempted to Hellenize Jerusalem. Jewish practices, including the observance of Shabbat, were forbidden. The Temple in Jerusalem was co-opted and used to worship the cult of Zeus. A small band of guerilla fighters known as the Maccabees rose up to fight the Greeks,…
Opening Words When I work on crafting a service, one of the first steps I take is to look through my files to see what I’ve said on that topic before. I wouldn’t want to bore you. I’ve been here for five years now, and for most subjects, I find one or two other…
Opening Words Today is the first Sunday of Advent- a season of expectant, hopeful waiting. For Christians, expectations and hopes for peace, love, joy, and justice live in the story and the person of Jesus of Nazareth. While Unitarian Universalism grows from Christian roots, our hopes and expectations have gotten bigger and messier through the…
