Topic: Living in Love

Love Within Me (UUA Common Read, Love at the Center)

“Love calls forth our best selves and invites us back, again and again, to attend to our personal pain. In this Love, we find a sanctuary where our armor can be pierced by our pain, allowing the softness of the heart to heal us.” – “Love as a Call to Action,” Rev. Abhi Janamanchi, Love at the Center

Children’s program:
All month long, we are exploring the theme of Healing. This week, we are looking at the hurt that arises from seeing your life as “a glass half empty,” and how we can heal this through gratitude. As we do that, we will have the chance to focus on Thanksgiving, and its invitation to pause and give thanks. The Living Our Values activity will lift up our UU Value of Generosity, and its call to “cultivate a spirit of gratitude.”

Building Bridges

​​​ After growing up in a liberal community, I grew outside of my comfort zone by having conservative allies in challenging life situations. My own biases were changed, and as a result, my beliefs altered. I will share life-changing moments that have opened my heart and mind.  

Children’s program:
All month long, we are exploring the theme of Healing. This week, we are looking at the hurt that arises from exclusion (including the many forms of bullying) and how we can heal the hurt from that through acts of inclusion. As we do that, we will have the chance to talk about the Transgender Day of Remembrance, which honors transgender and gender-expansive people whose lives have been lost to violence and hatred. The Living Our Values activity will lift up our UU Value of Justice

“Exploring the Rings of Love (UUA Common Read, Love at the Center)”

This year’s UUA Common Read is Love at the Center: Unitarian Universalist Theologies, edited by the Unitarian Universalist Association president Rev. Dr. Sofia Betancourt. Instead of an adult Spiritual Exploration book discussion this year, we’ll have an interactive sermon series to explore the many facets of love.
The Rings of Love model offers five lenses for noticing how Love moves in our lives: the Love within me of inner spiritual life, the Love between us of close relationships, the Love among us of congregational life, the Love beyond us of our public presence and justice work, and the Love holding all that is ground of our being. All are happening at once, and experience travels inward and outward like a spiral, so that what happens in one sphere continually shapes and is shaped by the others.