This Sunday, for our final week on "Mystery" and our final Sunday of 2018, we welcomed local Disciples of Christ minister and justice advocate Rev. John Bennett.  He reflected on the call of faith in our current historical moment, a time fraught with discrimination, climate catastrophe, political polarization, and more.  As a Christian, he looked to Biblical metaphors of the Hebrews' times in the wilderness and in exile; how should we sing the song of our faith "in a strange land"?  Rev. Bennett keeps himself centered with scriptural words about what faith requires: "to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God."  For him, that walk means acting in faithful resistance, walking in solidarity with all who are suffering, in the belief that divine mystery is always working to liberate all.

Next Sunday, January 6th:

Adult Forum - 9:15 am
"Open Mic New Year," Frank Rycyk
Bring your goals and visions for the future, anything you would care to share

Service and Religious Education - 10:30 am
Message: "Genghis Khan’s Role in the History of Religious Liberty," Rev. Mike Adamek
The Puritans came to North America is search of religious liberty. The hung a Jew and Quaker for not being Puritan. Is it possible that hundreds of years before the Puritans, Genghis Khan showed a better way to govern a polity marked by religious liberty?
If you have a joy or concern that you would like to have read during the Service, please submit it by noon on Friday through our website: http://uufjc.org/joys--concerns.html

Plus Children's RE --- "The Possibility of You"

UUFJC News and Events this week:

Our January newsletter and print calendar are ready.  Paper copies are available in the wall box near the coat rack, and electronic copies are available to view or download: Newsletter, Calendar.

Our Members and Friends Directory has been updated.  Paper copies are available at the Fellowship near the phones, and paper and electronic copies are available on request from the Administrator ([email protected]).  The directory is a voluntary resource to make your contact information available to other members and friends; remember that you can contact the Administrator to update or add (or remove) your directory information at any time.

This Thursday, January 3rd, the local chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America meets in our building at 7 pm.  Contact Susan Randolph.

This Friday, January 4th, our building is reserved by a community group starting at 6:30 pm.  Please allow privacy.

Community Events this week:

This Friday, September 4th at 7 pm in their Art Gallery, Missouri River Regional Library presents their First Friday Film: "Unbroken."  Angelina Jolie directed this film based on the heroism and courage of Louis “Louie” Zamperini, an Olympian and army air corps lieutenant whose plane crashed at sea during World War II. He survived seven weeks on an open raft and two years of physical and psychological torture by the Japanese. Contact Madeline Matson.  For more library events, visit MRRL.org.

This week, Capitol City Cinema presents "Chef Flynn" (Thursday through Sunday).  For showtimes, more events, and more information, visit capitolcitycinema.org.

For yoga and even more events, see our online calendars:

UUFJC Events
Affiliated Events 
Religious Education
Building Use (other)
Community Events  

Have a great week and a Happy New Year!

​This Sunday, we came together for a cozy holiday service at which various members shared holiday messages.  As a centerpiece of the service, we were asked to reflect on the question, "What Gifts do you Bring?" and what that question meant to us.  Those present wrote their thoughts on gift tags and had a chance to share them from the mic and hang their tags on our holiday tree.  Many and varied gifts emerged, such as: Caring and Support, Peace, the Wisdom of past mistakes and experience, Engagement and Joy, Patience, Listening, Dedication, Hope, Connection, and the simple and vital Enjoyment of each other's company.  We hope that we are able to share gifts like this with our Fellowship and our community during the winter Holidays and throughout the year!

Next Sunday, December 30th:

Adult Forum - 9:15 am
"Lessons from Death", Bob Boldt
Death -- the ultimate mystery. What is it death can teach us about how to live our lives more fully?

Service and Religious Education - 10:30 am
Message: "A Theological Reflection on Our Nation's Political Crisis," Rev. John Bennett
If you have a joy or concern that you would like to have read during the Service, please submit it by noon on Friday through our website: http://uufjc.org/joys--concerns.html

Plus Children's RE

UUFJC News and Events this week:

Our Members and Friends Directory has been updated.  Paper copies are available at the Fellowship near the phones, and paper and electronic copies are available on request from the Administrator ([email protected]).  The directory is a voluntary resource to make your contact information available to other members and friends; remember that you can contact the Administrator to update or add (or remove) your directory information at any time.

We need someone to step forward and coordinate our Salvation Army meals.  The coordinator will have a lot of help learning the ropes and providing the food.  If we don't have a coordinator by the end of this year, we will probably have to give up this longtime community service of our Fellowship.  If you are willing to step forward, please contact Roberta Dunkel.  (Note, we are not serving at the Salvation Army this month due to the holidays.)

This Thursday, December 27th, our building is reserved by a community group starting at 6:30 pm.  Please allow privacy.

The Soul Matters Small Group is scheduled to meet next Sunday, December 30th from 2-4 pm.  To participate in the group, please contact Jim Davis.

Community Events this week:

This week, Capitol City Cinema presents "Chef Flynn" (Thursday through Sunday).  For showtimes, more events, and more information, visit capitolcitycinema.org.

For yoga and even more events, see our online calendars:

UUFJC Events
Affiliated Events 
Religious Education
Building Use (other)
Community Events  

Have a great week, and Happy and Safe Holidays!

This Sunday, we were honored to welcome Rev. Dottie Mathews, a Community Minister from the UU Church in Columbia.  Many of us have been touched, angered, or saddened by news of suffering at our nation's border, and Rev. Dottie shared the life-changing experience of witnessing the situation of these immigrants firsthand on a pilgrimage with rabbis and supportive clergy of various faiths.  She shared a reading by a UCC minister asking: who are we waiting in this blessed Christmas season?  For a child denied room in the inn and left to sleep in a manger, but still blissfully silent?  For a child who will save us without making us hear the cries of the outcast?  Rev. Dottie reflected that we live in difficult times when the needs of compassion and justice can easily drain us, but although we can't do everything, we have a responsibility to do our part.  We must realize the dissonance of celebrating a season of peace and love while closing our nation's doors to those in danger and in need, and hear that dissonance not as noise to be avoided, but as a call to live our values.

Next Sunday, December 23rd:

January News Due.
Please submit your items for our January newsletter and print calendar to Laura Gilkey by e-mail ([email protected]) or in writing.

Adult Forum - 9:15 am
"Awakening to the Mystery of Life", Betty Cooper
The title of Rabbi Michael Lerner’s editorial in the fall edition of Tikkun was: “Don’t Let the Light Go Out.”  These six words are meaningful to me.  In March, I felt as if my “light for living” had “gone out.”  Immediately I began listening to tapes and reading books from “Wisdom Writers.”  During the process, I felt as if the “mysteries of life” were inside “loving, compassionate, caring words.”  In this session we’ll discuss “Wisdom Ideas” and discern if they reveal “the mystery of life.”   Come prepared to share ideas that have awakened you to the “mystery of life.”

Service and Religious Education - 10:30 am
Message (corrected 19 Dec): "What Gifts Do You Bring?"
A holiday service with presentations by various UUFJC members.
Also including an opportunity to hang gift tags with your own gift reflections written on them, on the tree near the piano.
If you have a joy or concern that you would like to have read during the Service, please submit it by noon on Friday through our website: http://uufjc.org/joys--concerns.html

Plus Children's RE

UUFJC News and Events this week:

We are migrating our weekly e-mail list to a new Google Group.  If you have suddenly stopped receiving our weekly e-mails or just wish to start receiving them, please use our contact form and ask to be added.

We need someone to step forward and coordinate our Salvation Army meals.  The coordinator will have a lot of help learning the ropes and providing the food.  If we don't have a coordinator by the end of this year, we will probably have to give up this longtime community service of our Fellowship.  If you are willing to step forward, please contact Roberta Dunkel.  (Note, we are not serving at the Salvation Army in November or December due to the holidays.)

The Membership Committee is looking for people willing to give rides to members and friends who can't drive to church on Sundays.  We currently have three people needing rides.  If you can help even once a month, please contact Bob Antweiler.

This Friday, December 21st, our building is reserved by a community group starting at 6 pm.  Please allow privacy.

Community Events this week:

Monday, December 17th at 7 pm in their Art Gallery, Missouri River Regional Library hosts an Author Talk: "American Honor: The Creation of the Nation’s Ideals during the Revolutionary Era."  The American Revolution was not only a revolution for liberty and freedom. It was also a revolution of ethics, reshaping what colonial Americans understood as “honor” and “virtue.” Dr. Craig Bruce Smith, assistant professor of history at William Woods University, will discuss his new book, American Honor, which focuses on prominent Americans who came of age before and during the Revolution—notably John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington—and shows how a colonial ethical transformation caused and became inseparable from the American Revolution, creating an ethical ideology that still remains.  Contact Madeline Matson.  For more library events, visit MRRL.org.

This week, Capitol City Cinema presents "Beautiful Boy" (Thursday through Sunday).  For showtimes, more events, and more information, visit capitolcitycinema.org.

For yoga and even more events, see our online calendars:

UUFJC Events
Affiliated Events 
Religious Education
Building Use (other)
Community Events  

Have a great week!

This Sunday, Rev. Nancy TannerThies continued our monthly theme of Mystery.  Often we associate not knowing the answer with failure, but Rev. Nancy cited Carl Sagan saying that if we come to a point where we think we know everything, that's when we have truly failed.  For all our learning, we can only understand a fraction of our universe, and it is the "flirtation with mystery" that fuels exploration and creativity.  The search is valuable, and its fruits have come to us as our cultural heritage, but mystery is not valuable only as fuel for discovery.  There are some things we can only find by letting go of the search for a while and simply living in the moment, in its mystery and wonder.

Next Sunday, December 16th:

Adult Forum - 9:15 am
"The Real Reason They Hate Trump", Frank Rycyk
The President of the United States is a mystery to many people.  Computer scientist David Gelernter states, "He's the average American in exaggerated form -- blunt, simple, willing to fight, mistrustful of intellectuals."

Service and Religious Education - 10:30 am
Message: Todos Somos Migrantes, Rev. Dottie Matthews
UUFJC welcomes Rev. Dottie Matthews, UU Community Minister from Columbia.  As all around us, we see sentimental nativity scenes visible in front yards, on mantles and in front of many churches, we invite you to come hear Dottie as she shares her reflections after returning from Tornillo, Texas, where our government has NOT offered care to the traveling stranger, but has instead interned a over a thousand children (and is literally adding bus loads every day). The plight and suffering of our immigrant and refugee friends is escalating daily and, so, we must ask what does our Unitarian Universalist faith call us to do in response to this humanitarian crisis?
If you have a joy or concern that you would like to have read during the Service, please submit it by noon on Friday through our website: http://uufjc.org/joys--concerns.html

Plus Children's RE --- "The Mystery of Us: The practice of seeing divine in others and ourselves"

UUFJC News and Events this week:

Thank you to everyone who helped with or attended our annual Chili Fest yesterday evening!  Our Treasurer and event organizer Bob Antweiler estimates that the Fellowship made about $600, and reports that lots of people provided lots of good help!  If you lent tables for the event, thank you; you will find them ready for pickup near the entry door.

We are migrating our weekly e-mail list to a new Google Group, through which you're receiving this very e-mail.  This group will only receive the weekly e-mails and occasional high priority announcements.  If you know someone who is missing the weekly e-mail, please spread the word and put them in touch with the Administrator ([email protected]).

We are beginning to include a printed version of our Sunday Morning announcements in the Order of Service.  We will also continue verbal announcements for now, but we may consider switching to paper-only in the future.  Please let us know what you think!  Contact the administrator ([email protected]) or a member of our board.

We need someone to step forward and coordinate our Salvation Army meals.  The coordinator will have a lot of help learning the ropes and providing the food.  If we don't have a coordinator by the end of this year, we will probably have to give up this longtime community service of our Fellowship.  If you are willing to step forward, please contact Roberta Dunkel.  (Note, we are not serving at the Salvation Army in December due to the holidays.)

The Membership Committee is looking for people willing to give rides to members and friends who can't drive to church on Sundays.  We currently have three people needing rides.  If you can help even once a month, please contact Bob Antweiler.

The Art Committee is planning a work day to finish putting up holiday decorations at the Fellowship this Wednesday, December 12th from 3-5 pm.  Helping hands are welcome!  Contact Patt Behler.

This Thursday, December 13th, our building is reserved by a community group starting at 6:30 pm.  Please allow privacy.

Also on Thursday, at 7 pm, the local chapter of the American Association of University Women may be meeting in our building in the Forum Room.  Often the organization takes a break in December, so please contact Charlotte Parsons before attending.

Next Sunday, December 16th, our building is reserved for a private event from 2pm to 3:30 pm.

The Worship Service Committee meets next Sunday, December 16th at 6 pm.  To get involved in creating our Sunday services, see our Vice President, Lisa Sanning.

Community Events this week:

This Tuesday, December 11th at 7 pm, Missouri River Regional Library hosts a presentation on "Gender and the Holocaust."  Women and men were both persecuted and killed by the Nazis, yet their experiences of these events differed according to their gender. Think about accounts you might know well such as Elie Wiesel’s Night. Consider why it is important that the author was male and that he is describing the dynamics of a father/son relationship. How might the experience have been different if he were female? Dr. Shelly M. Cline, historian at the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education, will address such questions and the assumed universality of survivor testimony.  Contact Madeline Matson.  For more library events, visit MRRL.org.

This Wednesday, December 12th at 7 pm, MRRL presents "Reel Life Cinema: Dukale’s Dream."  Description:Actor Hugh Jackman and his wife traveled to Ethiopia to meet with a big-dreaming coffee grower in this award-winning documentary. After spending a day with Dukale, Jackman learns the importance of fair trade coffee, leading to an inspired journey which culminated in his speaking out at a United Nations Climate Week and creating a coffee trade company of his own to help make the world a better place for coffee farmers. (Copyright World Vision Australia, 2014. All rights reserved. Used by permission. Source: www.worldvision.com.au).  Contact Madeline Matson.

This week, Capitol City Cinema presents "Beautiful Boy" (Thursday through Sunday).  For showtimes, more events, and more information, visit capitolcitycinema.org.

For yoga and even more events, see our online calendars:

UUFJC Events
Affiliated Events 
Religious Education
Building Use (other)
Community Events  

Have a great week!

Sunday morning, Rev. Mike Adamek began exploring our theme for December: Mystery.  Even for those of us who don't believe in the supernatural, Rev. Mike said, the world still surrounds us with awe-inspiring mystery.  Even as we are called use our gifts of reason to know what we can, a full understanding of reality is beyond our grasp, and there is a place in our lives for embracing this mystery, not only for unraveling it.  In moments of awe at nature, in those moments when things fall into place in a way that feels beyond coincidence, we can feel ourselves connected to a unity that we can't fully know.  These moments remind us that our lives don't follow a mechanistically determined path, but take shape slowly as encounters beyond our control break through to re-enchant our lives.  Rev. Mike urged us to stay open to the mysteries and happy accidents that open us to new possibilities.

And don't forget the Annual UUFJC Chili Fest this Saturday, December 8th from 5-8 pm!  Our theme will be more of a meal-and-market this year, and we are still hoping for lots of help to make the event happen.  We need chefs to provide chili, soups, and hot dogs for the dinner as well as baked goods and other treats to sell, we are asking for donated items to sell by silent auction, and the more people helping with setup and takedown, the better.  To help out, contact Bob Antweiler ([email protected]).

Next Sunday, December 9th:

Adult Forum - 9:15 am
"Be Like Jumping Mouse", Stephen Carew
Are you ready to live like Jumping Mouse?  This Native American story tells us about a mouse who wants to find his way to the Sacred Lake that is the source of all things. It is a story of personal awaking that metaphorically traces every step on the way to enlightenment. 

Service and Religious Education - 10:30 am
Message: Rev. Nancy TannerThies
If you have a joy or concern that you would like to have read during the Service, please submit it by noon on Friday through our website: http://uufjc.org/joys--concerns.html

Plus Children's RE --- "Mystery All Around Us:  The practice of seeing miraculous in the ordinary"

Potluck Lunch after Service - Please bring a favorite dish!

UUFJC News and Events this week:

We are beginning to include a printed version of our Sunday Morning announcements in the Order of Service.  We will also continue verbal announcements for now, but we may switch to paper-only in the near future.  Please let us know what you think!  Contact the administrator ([email protected]) or a member of our board.

We need someone to step forward and coordinate our Salvation Army meals.  The coordinator will have a lot of help learning the ropes and providing the food.  If we don't have a coordinator by the end of this year, we will probably have to give up this longtime community service of our Fellowship.  If you are willing to step forward, please contact Roberta Dunkel.  (Note, we are not serving at the Salvation Army in November or December due to the holidays.)

The Membership Committee is looking for people willing to give rides to members and friends who can't drive to church on Sundays.  We currently have three people needing rides.  If you can help even once a month, please contact Bob Antweiler.

This Thursday, December 6th, the local chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America meets in our building at 7 pm.  Contact Susan Randolph.

This Friday, December 7th, our building is reserved by a community group starting at 6:30 pm.  Please allow privacy.

Community Events this week:

This Friday, December 7th at 7 pm in their Art Gallery, Missouri River Regional Library presents their monthly First Friday Film: "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society."  Based on the worldwide best-selling novel, the film follows a British writer who forms a life-changing bond with an eccentric group of Guernsey residents and their book club, established during the occupation of their island by the Nazis during World War II. Both drama and mystery, the film demonstrates the power of literature to comfort and create community during hard times. With an all-star cast of British acting luminaries.  Contact Madeline Matson.  For more library events, visit MRRL.org.

Next Sunday, November 9th, MRRL will present a Local Authors Showcase at 1:30 pm.  Come meet and talk with local authors about their work and network with authors from the mid-Missouri region. Their books will be available for purchase—just in time for the holidays.  Contact Madeline Matson.

This week, Capitol City Cinema presents "Border" (Thursday through Sunday).  For showtimes, more events, and more information, visit capitolcitycinema.org.

For yoga and even more events, see our online calendars:

UUFJC Events
Affiliated Events 
Religious Education
Building Use (other)
Community Events  

Have a great week!