ASTORIA Coffee Klatch
WOWEE! The Astoria coffee klatch on July 2 had a great discussion about many topics, but the things that stand out in my mind are these:
1) we want more young people in our congregation——how can we bring them in?
2) can we subsidize a local day care center so that young families can have that service?
3) where to find young people (CCC) and young adults (CUUPS).
4) let’s re-up our Religious Education program so we have kids at church when we are all together.
5) let’s look into having a Croning ceremony for our women who are moving into elderhood; let’s look also at ways of rewarding our men for being honest, faithful, and caring—starting a Men’s group;
6) how can we better serve young boys and men so they have caring male adults in their lives?
Looks like PUUF is energized to find new ways to enliven our Fellowship!
We are going to meet at Susan’s home in Astoria in August; more later.
PENINSULA Coffee Klatch
Here’s my rundown on what we talked about today: we started off with Terri’s announcement about the Board’s deciding to select a Budget committee and also a Visioning committee/task force. That was a good starting point!
Since Madeline is expecting to have knee surgery in a week or so, we brainstormed ways to be helpful to her during her recovery period: dog walking, companionship, some meals/snacks, mobility and transportation needs. Madeline will make a list of what she thinks she’ll need.
We then brainstormed about what we could do on the peninsula that would be helpful to residents and ourselves: volunteering to help elders at daycare residences; volunteering at the senior center; working with the Pacific Immigration council to adopt a family or sponsor a child in daycare; we need a carpool from the peninsula to assist with transportation to church and activities. Carpooling is saving the planet and we might be able to connect with new people.
How about sponsoring movies at the Senior Center, with the PUUF logo visible and info available.
What can we do to help young boys and men who are struggling find a good path for their lives? Can we someday have an OWL class? Can we give scholarships for day care students? How about helping teenagers find paying jobs in the community which would connect them with the social justice mission of PUUF?
We need to do some research on the health of religious congregations in the US/WA. Is the UUA growing or shrinking?
TILLAMOOK COUNTY Coffee Klatch
We started off with a little more info from Susan D. about the beeswax/shipwreck history—very interesting! It morphed into revelations about how intertwined Reed College, Unitarianism, 1St church ministers, and Neahkahnie settlement are. Susan is always a fount of historical info!
From there, we talked about how orthodox Christianity/Unitarian Christianity developed the tension that still remains to some extent in several ways, particularly between the Congregationalists and Unitarians on the person/godhead of Jesus. Often the minister fostered a transition to Unitarian Christianity away from Congregationalism.
Scientific revelations have fostered the transition as well, from a miracle-based and mythical set of stories to a more rational approach to Jesus’ life and ministry.
What causes conflict in churches we have been part of? Trump’s election brought new members to Willamette Falls UUs; a new minister was not a good fit; an unwelcoming attitude toward newcomers; sense of classism (?); spinoffs into fellowships from a larger, more formal liturgical church.
What is the correlation between change and trauma? How does it work? We need groups.
QOTD: “trauma is a change that comes without a choice”.
South County Coffee Klatch
Nancy has a new swing in her backyard! We all admired it and took turns trying it out. Gorgeous! Other early topics: bread preferences (what is this Killer Bread stuff?); brief discussion of the Jan. 6 hearings; the Dough Dough goodies and a bowlful of strawberries and a bowlful of cherries!
Moving on to the issues of the day, we reviewed what has been discussed in the other coffee klatches, which are detailed in this monthly News from the Pews bulletin.
Some of the conversations from other CKs struck a chord and we spent some time talking about a few of the multiple and simultaneous challenges PUUF has had over the years, some that caused a variety of wounds and an awareness of how important it is to have policies that lay out the groundwork for making major changes, to communicate and to be open and honest in communication. Informal groups within the congregation sometimes act to change things without realizing the impact of a major change. A difficult search process ended in the minister-candidate’s resignation after a few months, made more difficult by the pandemic. PUUF lost several members for various reasons (search results, moving to a different facility, hurt feelings, the demands of technology because of the pandemic, etc.). And we have also welcomed several new members who are already pitching in to help out!!!!!!
It was agreed that we as a congregation need good negotiating skills to deal with some of the communication kerfuffles that come up. And we need to consider the ways we may need to heal from the traumatic experiences we have had as individuals and as a congregation, so that we can continue to build with our seven principles as guidance.
ALSO: Is PUUF just a social group? NO!