Sept. Parish Messenger

Rev. Justine’s Message

We’re all in this thing together
Walking the line between faith and fear .

Old Crow Medicine Show

The first time I heard that song, it was performed by Norah Jones at a benefit concert for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The concert was televised, and it was a beautiful outpouring of support for people who had lost everything. The concert raised money, but perhaps even more importantly it created a sense of community, of us belonging to one another. “This life don’t last forever. When you cry I taste the salt in your tears.”

I see that kind of commitment to and care for one another in this congregation. Even in a pandemic, you offer rides and meals, cards, good thoughts. You have managed to hold onto one another, and you have extended great kindness to Dale and me.

In this second year of our two years together, we will continue the work that this time offers: looking and who you have been and who you might be together. You will continue to ask the question, “who are our neighbors, and how are we called to be neighbors to them?” And lots of other nitty gritty questions, too.

But for many of you, and in many ways for me, this second year feels like a beginning. There are so many of you whom I have not yet met, and there are many of you who did not find your way into the virtual world at UUCB and have been hanging on for the return of in-person gathering. As I write this, we are on track to gather in person for worship starting on September 12. There will be some limitations, necessary because of the pandemic and because of the emergence of variants that are more contagious than the original coronavirus. We’ll have to spread ourselves out a bit more, wear masks, and we may have to delay things like coffee hour and receptions with food following memorial services. And most heartbreaking of all to me, it may not be safe to sing together for a while. We will make these accommodations, though because they will keep us all safe and because they will make it possible for us to gather. Something happens when we gather, as many of you have heard me say.

So let’s get together. Let’s work this out, and let us continue, begin, and begin again – in love and with curiosity for what the future holds. It is my great joy to be with you during this interim time.

I am in touch with Rev. Sylvia and she and I are thinking together about the best time to have an in-person celebration of her ministry with you. Given the current state of things with Covid, we are on hold for now, but rest assured, we will celebrate Sylvia and Steve in style with hugs, food, and singing – when it is safe to do so!

A quick update from me: the wonderful place I’ve been living in this year in Brunswick was only available for one year, so I am in the process of moving (surrounded by boxes as I write this). I have found a lovely place in West Bath with a view of Back Cove, but I will be a bit betwixt and between in the first few weeks of September. All will be well, but I may need to conduct more of our conversations online or on the phone until I am all moved in (September 18). I want to hear from you, though, and if you can manage one more month of Zoom or FaceTime, we can at least see and hear each other while we speak.

How we are together is at the heart of our faith and it is central to the work we are called to do in the world. At our ingathering service on Sunday, September 12 – our first time back in the sanctuary since March of 2020 – we will celebrate our connection to each other and to this faith. We will meet and celebrate our new Board of Trustees, those newly elected and those continuing their terms, and they will help us acknowledge and honor the many leaders in this community of faith who have helped to hold us all together during this time of the global pandemic. The service will be simultaneously livestreamed for those unable to attend in person. It will be so good to see you all.

In faith and service,
Justine

UUCB Services in September

Sundays at 10:00 a.m.

Sept 5 — Labor Day Service
Guest Cynthia Phinney, president of the Maine AFL-CIO, will share a reflection about the state of labor in Maine and the U.S. This is our last online service on YouTube.

Sept 12 — Ingathering: Welcome Home!
Rev. Justine Sullivan. We will meet and celebrate our new Board of Trustees, both newly elected and continuing. This will be our first meeting in the sanctuary since March 2020, and it will be simultaneously broadcast for those who cannot attend in person.

Sept 19 — Beginning Again
Rev Justine Sullivan will (re)introduce herself to us and will outline the work that is already underway in this interim time and look at what lies ahead. We will meet and celebrate our Ministerial Search Team who were elected at an online congregational meeting this spring.

Religious Education

Wow! Summer is flying by and the 2021-22 Religious Exploration year is just weeks away! I can hardly believe it.

Over the last year and a half, the children and youth of UUCB and their families have shown incredible resilience and flexibility as we worked to stay in connection and learn together. I, like so many of you, was very much hoping that, with vaccinations available, we’d need far less of that resilience and flexibility throughout the upcoming RE year.

Unfortunately, the virus had other plans and, as we plan for RE, we continue to have to take things a week at a time. Luckily, we have two wonderful teachers, Tammis and Carol, who are coming back to lead various RE lessons, whatever form they come in. We also have a dedicated and hardworking RE Committee who are working with me to come up with the best ways possible to keep our kids connected and engaged with UUCB and our Principles while also keeping them safe.

I have no doubt that we are going to make the best of things this year. And I can tell you from experience, our best is pretty amazing!!

Pastoral Care Notes

Martha’s Obituary

Board Update

I’m writing this article from a hotel room in Los Angeles. Diane and I will be attending her nephew’s wedding tomorrow and decided that we would come a few days early to visit Sequoia National Park. The park is a place that we’ve been talking about visiting for the entire 30 years of our marriage but haven’t found the time to visit until now. It was amazing and we should not have waited 30 years. We’re talking about where to go next year now.

As much as we’ve enjoyed ourselves, given the progress of the pandemic, it’s a trip that’s been fraught with difficult decisions about what type of masks to wear, when to wear them, where to eat, how to travel, etc. These are the same type of decisions our Reopening Task Force is facing right now. We are still planning to have our first live service on September 12, though we may have requirements regarding masking, spacing, singing, coffee hour, and such. The task force will meet on August 26 to look at the current data to give us more clear direction. They are comparing the UUA and Reston, VA church’s recommendations for programming decisions based on infection rates, and positive test rates to the current data for Cumberland County. According to Bill Clark, this week the data look pretty good but not clear or decisive. We are lucky to have Bill and the rest of this task force’s wisdom guiding us toward as safe of an opening as is possible.

At the August meeting last night, the Board of Trustees approved formation of a Music Committee. The purpose of this committee is to ensure that the music programs and activities of UUCB enhance the mission and vision of the entire church community. It’s been some years since we’ve had a committee focused solely on music, and with music being such an important part of life at our church, we’re delighted to move forward in this way.

Creation of the Music Committee is part of an overall change in staffing for the UUCB music program. The board has approved the creation of a part time Music Director position. The Music Director would serve as both Choir Director and Pianist. We are beginning the process of looking for candidates and exploring how to fund the position over the long term. As it may take some time for this to come to fruition, we are looking for a pianist to replace Derek in the short term. You may have seen the advertisement on our website or Facebook.

Lastly, UUCB has been given and accepted the opportunity to help our good friends at the Beth Israel Synagogue. Many of you will remember that they took us in for 3 years when our building burned about 10 years ago. They are renovating the Minnie Brown center and need a space with classrooms to hold their Hebrew school one day a week. They reached out to us, and we are delighted to be able to offer them the use of our space once our Reopening Task Force feels that it is safe to do so.

I am typically not one to jump with joy or outwardly exude extreme excitement, but I am absolutely ecstatic about the possibility of seeing you all on September 12!

Board Chair,
David Kew

Help Wanted: Church Pianist

Search Team Update

The UUCB Ministerial Search Team is celebrating the completion of our retreat with UUA Coach, Amanda Schuber. During our retreat (via Zoom) we got to know each other better, created a covenant for our work together, learned about the committee member roles needed to conduct a thorough search, and identified our roles. Our work starts right now!

We know you will be interested in updates as our work progresses, so we will keep you informed through the Parish Messenger. Also, you can help us in our work by completing an upcoming survey. Be on the lookout for details very soon!

Irene Austin, Stephanie Bernier, Nathan Haynes, David Juhlin, Mary Larson, Betsy Roper, Tom Rumpf

Have Jewelry for the UUCB Fair Jewelry Table?

Fall cleaning? Downsizing? Keep your eyes open for jewelry you no longer want. At some point we WILL have another fabulous Jewelry Sales Table as part of a church fair or festivities. As always, its success depends on the donations of costume jewelry from all of you. The jewelry team will clean and polish your long-loved treasures, and then will present them beautifully for someone else to purchase and love. Donations do not need to be elegant!

You can hold onto it for now, or drop it off at Lisa Durrell’s, or let her know if you’d like it picked up. Once in-person services start, there will generally be a jewelry basket in the back of the church. If you’d like to be part of the Jewelry Team and help with the sorting/polishing, we’d love to have you! Please email Lisa Durrell,

WORKING FOR JUSTICE

Charities with Soul

Wabanaki REACH is a Native-led non-profit organization working toward truth, healing, and change. REACH provides educational programming about our shared history, trauma and its continued impacts on us today. Our most visible piece of work to date has been the establishment of the Maine Wabanaki-State Child Welfare Truth & Reconciliation Commission whose work is documented in the Emmy award winning documentary, Dawnland: A Documentary About Cultural Survival and Stolen Children (2018) [www.dawnland.org] “Wabanaki” in the language of the indigenous people refers to both people and place – the Tribes (Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Micmac, and Maliseet) located in their ancestral homelands of present-day Maine, and the land itself.

REACH work is carried out in neighborhoods, prisons, schools, faith communities, workplaces, universities; and in civic, political, conservation, environmental, and peace and justice groups. Each year, our workshops reach hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of people. Our wellness work in Maine tribal communities focuses on restorative practices, healing strategies, and decolonization. It includes Peace and Healing Circles with Native men and women incarcerated in Maine prisons; food security, gardening and decolonizing our diets; and trainings in tribal communities, such as Indigneous Peacemaking, whose ripple effects are immeasurable. Last year in response to the global pandemic Wabanaki REACH created a giving program and raised funds to directly support 95 tribal households located in Maine with emergency relief. Our giving program is called “Grandmother’s Love” and highlights Wabanaki cultural values of caring, sharing, and helping one another in times of need.

Wabanaki REACH envisions a future when Maine and Wabanaki people join together to acknowledge truth and work collectively toward equity, healing, and positive change. We aspire to restore right relations, responsibility, compassion, love, reciprocity, abundance, and joy.

The Teen Center

The Teen Center continues to attract new teens and supporters, this year alone 22 new teens joined. A former staff member of the Center, Melissa Orth, and now the Young Adult librarian at Curtis Memorial Library, stopped in to collect photos of the masked teens for display in the YA area at the library. Stop by the library to see the photos.

The teens’ choices for lunch outings include the food carts on the Mall, Big Top Deli, Gelato Fiasco, and Portland Pie. UUCB supported the August “downtown meal” at Gelato Fiasco. On the way back from lunch one day the teens stopped into the bookstore Twice Told Tales, where many of them hadn’t been before. One of them purchased a book for 5 cents.

It’s time for the “Back to School” letter to all supporters so if you are one of those lucky people, please be generous as the Center is a very worthy cause.

After an enjoyable summer of, in Jordan’s words, “root beer floats, walks downtown, crafts, video games, making new friends and learning how to play pool,” the teens will now get ready for school. The Center is closed for its summer break and will reopen on Monday August 30^th, 2:30-5:30pm. Stay tuned to see what they’ll be up to this coming year.

MAINE UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST STATE ADVOCACY NETWORK

MUUSAN September Network Meeting –Sept. 11

On Saturday, September 11^th the MUUSAN Network Meeting features UUCB’s own Bill Clark as the guest speaker. The title of his talk is:

Healthcare For All Maine – We Have the Money, Do We Have the Will?

Bill will discuss the status of LD 1045 – An Act to Support Universal Health Care legislation in Maine that was passed into law in the 130th legislative session. However, final enactment is based on the passage of federal legislation and so the ballot initiative – a Resolve of Maine HealthCare Action – remains active. Bill will explain how you can be involved. Dr. Clark is sad about healthcare injustices, distressed that US healthcare outcomes rank so low and hopes Maine Healthcare Action, Maine AllCare and MUUSAN can assist in establishing universal healthcare in Maine.

William D. Clark, MD was graduated from Harvard Medical School, served in the Epidemic Intelligence Service at the CDC, and did a fellowship in Health Services Research at Harvard School of Public Health.

At Cambridge Hospital 1971-1987, he directed the Medicine Residency and was Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard. Dr. Clark practiced general medicine in Bath and was Medical Director of the Addiction Resource Center in Brunswick (1987-2005). He is a founding member of the Academy on Communication in Healthcare, President from 2005-7, and copy editor of DocCom: An interactive resource for Healthcare Communications.

A Legislative Forum – Oct. 24

The MUUSAN team members of Working for Justice invite you to a Legislative Forum on Sunday, October 24^th. (Time to be determined dependent on in person or zoom event.) We’re calling it

The Legislative Process: How it Works and How You Can Be Involved

Is the topic of how a bill is passed through the Maine legislature a mystery to you? Want to learn how it is done? Here’s your chance!

Walk away from this one-of-a-kind opportunity actually knowing what the dialogue means for things like Cloture? Revisors office? LR versus LD? If any of that is Greek to you, SAVE THE DATE, October 24, to find out what it all means. Learn how ideas become policies and laws in Maine from two experts: Representative Joyce “Jay” McCreight lives in Harpswell and represents Harpswell, West Bath and northeast Brunswick in the Maine House; and Dan Ankeles, a legislative aide and former field organizer helping Maine House candidates running for office. Dan serves on the Brunswick Town Council and is running for another term. He is also a candidate for House District 50, part of Brunswick.

Learn how each one of us can make a difference. Don’t let Maine’s legislative process be Greek to you any longer! Watch for more details coming soon.

Concerts for a Cause

See Concerts for a Cause

UUCB Art Gallery

Izzy Schinofen Paintings

Church school student Izzy Schinofen is going into the fourth grade at Harriet Beecher Stowe Elementary. She is also an alumna of Robert P.T. Coffin School and Learning Land Nursery School. She enjoys ballet, Harry Potter, selling Girl Scout cookies, friends, and her new BFF is Dewy, a Gypsy Cob she is currently learning to ride.

Sept. Parish Messenger

Rev. Justine’s Message