School Year Sunday Schedule

8:30 a.m. second Sunday of the month
Forum in Fellowship Hall
10:00 a.m.
Service in Folgelson Hall (child care available)
11:30 a.m.
Service in Folgelson Hall
Religious Education in Fellowship Hall

Summer Sunday Schedule
(First Sunday in June to First Sunday after Labor Day)

10:00 a.m.
Service in Folgelson Hall (child care available)
Service in Folgelson Hall
Children and Youth Summer Program, World Religions and Cultures, in Fellowship Hall

The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Santa Fe » Community Outreach

First Sunday Giving - July 6, 2008

For this July, First Sunday Giving is donating to “Creativity for Peace.” This organization brings young women from Palestinian and Israeli communities to Santa Fe, where they will meet local girls and share experiences for two weeks.

When they return to their own countries they will have a better understanding of the different nations and cultures, which will lead to more peaceful relations as they spread their knowledge and friendships.

Dottie Indyke heads this nonprofit organization. She will use our donations for airfares and other expenses.

We gave generously last year. Let’s do so again! Please make your checks out to Creativity for Peace for the collection plate or put your money in the box for giving in the foyer. Many thanks!

Evelyn Cole
First Sunday Giving Coordinator

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Seeking Transportation to Summer Services

We are seeking one or more volunteers who would be willing to give Inga Thompson a ride to and from UUCSF for summer services. Inga lives on Camino Lejo, about a mile and a half from UUCSF. If you can help out with this request, please call me.

Phyllis Arlow
Member of Bridges, the Pastoral Care Team

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Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation Steering Committee News

Our retreat at Ghost Ranch was a huge success. Pat Simon and Linda Whittenberg led an inspiring and fun-filled program. Based on feedback from participants, we are exploring moving the date of the 2008 retreat to October to avoid the no-see-ums, crowds, and heat.

The Steering Committee had its final meeting on June 17. We distributed some of the remaining year-end funds to local charities. Each of the following groups received $200: Santa Fe Planned Parenthood, Youth Shelters and Family Services, Santa Fe Women’s Health Committee, and Girls Inc. At Christmas UUWF members contributed $256 in cash as well as tangibles to Esperanza Shelter for Battered Families. Early in 2008 we donated $300 (with the help of Pat Jonietz) toward National UUWF Grants. We are exploring the possibility of writing a grant that would give us matching funds from National UUWF for a local project to benefit women, and we have reserved $500 for this purpose.

Phyllis Arlow and Evelyn Cole are our new Program Committee co-chairs. Please give them your ideas for luncheon programs. In September we will kick off the year with a cookout on the back patio hosted by the Steering Committee. We will gather at 11:30 on Saturday, September 20. As we cook and assemble a variety of burgers, you can renew friendships and make new ones while enjoying beverages and hors d’oeuvres.

We are exploring the possibility of providing childcare beginning in September. If this would make a difference in your ability to attend, please let us know. Our luncheons are always on the third Saturday of the month. UUWF is the easiest and best way to get to know the women of the congregation. If you are member who has never attended, we welcome you with a free first luncheon. We hope to see you in September!

Joan Farnum
President, UUWF

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We Light a Candle in Our Hearts for…

Sorrows

Concerns

Joys

A Note about Joys & Sorrows

The spoken Joys and Sorrows at our Sunday services are an important way for members and friends to stay in touch with one another. Please also remember that you may write in the Care Book available near the front of the sanctuary each Sunday. The written notes in this book serve a valuable purpose in letting the minister and other caregivers know of important happenings within the congregation.

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Social Justice Committee News: Anti-Torture Campaign

As you may have noticed, the Social Justice Committee, on behalf of the congregation, has had a banner placed at the corner of Barcelona and Don Gaspar. Our banner, along with those of 300 congregations in all 50 states and D.C., including Temple Beth Shalom in Santa Fe, provides a powerful public witness against torture. (Thanks to Pete Vogel for placing the banner in this great location.)

With the help and resources of Trish Steindler, chair of the Publicity Committee, we are now moving towards sponsoring an event to give greater publicity in Santa Fe to our position against torture. At this time, it looks as though we will be able to bring together a panel of experts for a presentation/discussion on the issue of U.S. torture policies. I believe this is an exciting opportunity to bring a local focus to this issue that has raised outrage across the world.

The anti-torture event will take place in late July if we can get all the suggested participants lined up. We’ll keep you posted on time, date, and place.

Finally, the committee has a couple of members out of action for a while due to health problems. The committee would welcome anyone who would like to fill these vacancies on a permanent or temporary basis. Interested? Give me a call.

Peace,
Dennis Bianchi
Chair, Social Justice Committee

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UUCSF Environmental Task Force News

EERC Volunteer Presenters Training

As part of our support program, along with Interfaith Power & Light, of the Environment Education Resource Center at our SF Southside Branch Library, we will start training volunteer presenters of outreach programs in mid-July. The programs will be based on the center’s expanding collection of climate-change-related materials and will be available to schools, congregations, and other ecology-minded groups and organizations.

If you would like to be involved in this exciting new environment-oriented program and be notified of the first July training/orientation date, please sign up in the UUCSF foyer or email me with your name and e-mail address. The EERC program promises to be eco-rewarding for both you and our climate-threatened environment.

Increased Focus on SF County Gas/Oil Drilling

With the imminent end of the State’s moratorium on gas/oil drilling in New Mexico, pending additional scientific research, our UUCSF Environmental Task Force is additionally focusing on what we can do to further educate congregation members on the environment-threatening possibility of gas and oil drilling in Santa Fe County. Our primary concerns are drilling’s possible impact on our diminishing water supplies, fire dangers, tourism, health effects, noise, air quality, and especially upon our area’s property values. In cooperation with other concerned organizations, our Task Force is: a) actively helping to survey citizens as to their feelings and opinions about the situation, b) expanding public information programs, c) providing information regarding the determination of who controls the mineral rights under your property, and d) bringing appropriate pressure on state and county governments to tightly control any drilling’s possible negative effects on public safety and well-being.

Our latest information indicates that oil company interest and leasing involvement in our area extends far beyond just the Galisteo Basin, extending to an inclusive area from Socorro to Española. Additional information, from the government’s Energy & Information Administration, indicates that drilling in the U.S., whether it be offshore or land-based, would have little or no effect on high gasoline and natural gas prices for a number of years. Given that information, the Task Force feels it is very important for us to take an active role in the gas & oil drilling situation.

We will be holding an information and orientation meeting in early July, after the Fourth. All interested congregation members may get on the notification lists by emailing me with their name and e-mail address or signing up in the UUCSF foyer.

Doug Stewart
Chair, UUCSF Environmental Task Force

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Music on Barcelona, Friday, May 30, 5:30

The ninth concert of the seventh season of Music on Barcelona’s Soirée Musicales will take place on Friday, May 30, and will continue the tradition of unusual and varied programming on this recital series. The hour-long concert begins at 5:30 and features Sextet in B-flat Major, op. 6, for piano and woodwind quintet by Ludwig Thuille. Members of the sextet are: Ann Hodde, piano; Susan DeJong, flute; Gerald Fried, oboe; Jim Preus, clarinet; Steven Ovitsky, horn; and Richard Hall, bassoon.

Also on the program is Theme and Variations for Flute and String Quartet, op. 80, by Mrs. H.H.A. (Amy) Beach. Performers include: Susan DeJong, flute; Marla Karmesin and Janet Cordova, violins; Britt Ravnan, viola; and Dina Matz, cello.

The Soirée Musicales are presented in an informal setting, and the public is invited. A free will offering will be taken.

Bob Jones
for Music on Barcelona

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Membership News: New Members Dinner, June 6

An informal dinner for new members who have joined the congregation during this past year will be sponsored by the Membership Committee at 6:00 p.m. on Friday, June 6, at UUCSF. Invitations will be sent shortly to our new members.

Sherry Kraemer
Chair, Membership Committee

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What Social Justice Action Is Important to You?

Since being reconstituted in 2007, the Social Justice Committee has spent a considerable effort in defining our mission, determining how we should conduct business, and developing general policies and procedures. In between, we spearheaded several weekends of “UUCSF in Action” that began in February and included, among other activities: “Bring a Buck for Peace,” a food drive; a health care “write-in,” a blood drive, and assistance with vision screenings at De Vargas Middle School.

And, on May 11, we co-sponsored the Mother’s Day Peace Rally. We now want to hone our social justice focus on an issue(s) on which we can center the energy of the entire congregation over the next 9-12 months. To determine this focus, we will need your help and input. This means that over the next month or two your Social Justice Committee will be soliciting your opinion as to what you believe is the social justice issue/cause of most importance to you and the congregation in the coming months.

Your Social Justice Committee is now developing a strategy to gather your thoughts on this and you can expect to hear from us in the near future. In the meantime, please feel free to email me with any suggestions you want to get out sooner than later. Please look for us in El Centinela and visit us on line 24/7: www.uucsfsjc.blogspot.com.

Peace,
Dennis Bianchi
Chair, Social Justice Committee

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Dates for Welcoming Congregation Workshop Changed: Saturday, June 14, and Saturday, June 21, 9:00 am-5:00 pm, Fellowship Hall

The dates for the Welcoming Congregation Workshop have been changed to two successive Saturdays, June 14 and June 21, both days from 9:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. in Fellowship Hall at UUCSF.

What have you always wanted to know about the lives of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered people, and others with alternative lifestyles, and not had a safe place to ask? We can’t honestly welcome folks we don’t understand. So come participate in this fun, interactive workshop. People from other welcoming congregations in Santa Fe are also being invited. Please sign up on the sign-up sheet in the foyer, and call me at 438-1898 if you have any questions.

Be educated! Come and listen to the Sunday Service organized by the Welcoming Diversity Committee at 10:00 a.m. on June 15.

Gene Farnum
for the Welcoming Diversity Committee

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Environmental Task Force News

First Sunday Giving Thanks!

Our Environmental Task Force and the UUCSF Environment Education Resource Center volunteers wish to thank everyone who donated to the First Sunday Giving program on May 4! With the matching-fund grant, UUCSF raised over $700 for the EERC collection of the latest books and materials on global warming/climate change and mineral extraction (gas, oil, mining) in our environment.

The many students, teachers, researchers, media, congregations, “green” organizations, and general public who will use this unique public collection at our Southside Branch Library also thank you. And additional thanks go to our UUCSF Social Justice Committee for significantly helping to make it happen.

The use of the collection to supply information for church congregations will be facilitated by the NM Interfaith Power & Light organization, of which UUCSF is an active member, making this a wonderful environment education combination all around.

Late EERC News

The Southside Branch Library has announced that Senator Jeff Bingaman will be bringing a group of up to 75 American and Canadian officials on a tour of the library and the Environment Education Resource Center on Sunday, May 18. Part of the program will include an explanation and materials as to how such a unique public/private team and collection can be established in the visitors’ home areas.

UUCSF members who would like to participate in the EERC educational programs for schools and other organizations are very welcome. Training sessions will be held the latter part of June or early July, when the latest materials have arrived for the collection. The sessions are not long or involved and the work with the library is both fun and rewarding — and in the greenest public building in Santa Fe.

If you are interested in joining the team, please emailme (I coordinate the program).

Doug Stewart
Chair, UUCSF Environmental Task Force of the Social Justice Committee

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Forum News, Sunday, May 11, 8:30 a.m.

Greg Mello, director of the Los Alamos Study Group, will discuss the unprecedented crises that threaten all of humanity and much of the life around us. These crises, and American global power in decline, open new political and moral possibilities. Redirection of policies is critical and tied to the issues of “national security” and nuclear “deterrence.” Come and join this important discussion.

Laura Clarke
Chair, Sunday Forum

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Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation, Saturday, May 17, 11:30: Psychiatrist Eliza Schmid: As We Age…The Changing Faces of Depression

Eliza Schmid is a “Renaissance” woman. With a medical career—first in pathology, then in psychiatry—and now a full-time painter, Dr. Schmid exemplifies the essence of the phrase “living life to the full.” She hikes, she leads German conversation groups here at UUCSF, and shortly she will be flying to Berlin for the opening of an art exhibition where her works will be featured.

Beginning her medical studies in her home country of Austria, Eliza Schmid studied to become a physician. Prior to that, during her first marriage, she had three children. In 1971 she received her M.D. degree at the University of Vienna and remained in that city for her internship and residency in pathology.

By 1976 she had received a fellowship to Stanford University in anatomic pathology. After one year, she moved to Los Angeles where she worked as a pathologist at Cedars Sinai Hospital. It was there that she made a drastic change.

As Dr. Schmid says, “My guardian angel suggested to me that in America I could actually do what I had always wanted to do, which was psychiatry.” By 1981 she completed her new training at the University of California and became board certified in psychiatry. “Between 1981 and 2002, when I moved to Santa Fe,” she says, “I never worked in private practice.” Rather, she chose to work in the state hospital, the county hospital in L.A., walk-in clinics, and the California prison system. She received additional training in neuropsychiatry, which she says enabled her to treat “patients with chronic neurological problems who often end up in psychiatry.”

We are honored that she has agreed to speak to us on a topic that is near to her heart, depression. Everyone has been affected by this phenomenon, either personally or through a friend or family member. And its reach seems to be ever-widening.

Eliza Schmid loves to paint and in the last three years has had art shows somewhere most every month. She is presently showing at the Verb Gallery in Albuquerque.

We know Dr. Schmid will have something of value to share with each of us! We look forward to having you join us on May 17. For reservations, sign up on the clipboard in the foyer, call Juniper Stein at 986-1722, or e-mail her. Lunch is $6.00 for members of UUWF, $8.00 for nonmembers. Yearly membership dues are $30.00.

Pat Kutay, Karen Armitage & Dona Durham
Co-Chairs, Program Committee

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Report on Green Transport Sunday

Kermit the Frog notwithstanding, it seems to be getting easier to be green, judging from the high participation in our Green Transport Sunday celebration of Earth Day on April 20. We had 110 participants, 63% of congregants attending that morning. The most popular modes of transportation were carpooling, walking, bicycling, and “hybriding.” Green Transport Sunday is now an annual event. Each year we’ll try to raise the stakes a little (we hope to achieve 100% participation) and add new challenges.

If you have friends who attend other congregations, churches, or temples, please try to recruit them to organize some kind of green event in their organization. Though it is only a token in terms of the immensity of the change required, the act of translating intention into reality actually does change behavior (it has changed mine). We all know that our self-indulgent life styles will have to be modified. Ours is a small effort, but we believe it is worth doing.

Thanks to all of you who so cheerfully participated and got into the spirit of the event. Special thanks to all of you who worked to make the day a success:

Onward! Let’s keep plugging away at reducing our carbon footprint. And let’s do whatever we can to elect leaders who will actually take on this issue, the most urgent challenge of our time.

Trish Judd
for the GTS Committee

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First Sunday Giving, May 4

We have chosen the Environmental Education Resource Center for the month of May. UUCSF’s own Doug Stewart is the Project Coordinator for this center, which is located in the Southside Branch Library. It provides the latest information on our rapidly changing environment to students, teachers, and interested individuals and groups. Global warming is a primary concern and materials are available in Spanish and English for all ages. There is also an outreach program for groups outside the library, with videos, films, speakers, etc., available. No charge is made for these important services to our community. We hope that the congregation will provide a generous contribution to support the work of the center.

Please make your checks out to Environmental Education Resource Center to put into the donation basket or the box in the foyer. Cash is also very welcome. Many thanks!

Evelyn Cole
First Sunday Giving Coordinator

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Music on Barcelona, Friday, May 2, 5:30

The eighth concert of the seventh season of Music on Barcelona’s Soirée Musicales will take place on Friday, May 2 (note this is a change from the usual last Friday of the month), and will continue the tradition of unusual and varied programming on this recital series. The hour-long concert begins at 5:30.

Featured will be a Beethoven clarinet trio (Jim Preus, Tom Terwilliger, Jack Anderson); a Baroque ensemble under the guidance and direction of Robert Shlaer, performing a quartet by Telemann; and the Santa Fe Flute Choir, under the direction of Carol Redman, performing a transcription of a Haydn symphony and Monochrome V by Peter Schickele.

The Soirée Musicales are presented in an informal setting, and the public is invited. A free will offering will be taken.

Jim Preus
for Music on Barcelona

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From Your Community Minister: An Apology

OK. It is time for me to face the music, to practice what I preached, and say I’m sorry for botching my last note to you in El Centinela. I failed to nuance my version of South Africa as I made the point that self-knowledge is necessary for reconciliation. I suggested that because South Africans endured a public confessional process, they would be better able to hear Jeremiah Wright’s comments, if they were about South Africa, than we have been able to hear them in America.

While I was arguing for a fuller understanding of ourselves, I painted a limited view of South Africa. I practiced the very thing I was speaking against — presenting images that don’t reflect the whole.

I do believe that South Africa’s confession of the wrongs of apartheid is a key aspect of their hope for tomorrow; their hope to right some wrongs so their country can live past the anguish that still shows itself in racist attitudes and actions. Confession, like its friend, conversion, is only a gesture if it is not acted upon year after year to prove itself valid. With its many limits in size and scope, the confessions in the Truth and Reconciliation process, reported widely within the country during its operation, and compiled in a 2,739 page report, helped make a nation aware of its abuses.

Still, any attempt to picture South Africa must be profoundly complex. Nelson Mandela rose to the challenge of transforming cultures and blazed a trail on which the humanness and the dignity of a nation could walk, without denying the reality of either. Unfortunately, national struggles can’t be resolved quickly. Severe poverty in black townships continues to shatter upward mobility and prompts crime. Many of the problems that persist in other governments, such as government corruption, nip at the heels of South Africa. Only now are black women voicing the oppression they suffered at the hands of black men. Feminism is becoming a hot word in South Africa.

With abounding difficulties bubbling in a national cauldron, hope abides, but is not secure. The work of reconciliation continues. On Friday, May 16, 2008, South Africans will be gathering in small diverse groups in community spaces to personally hear each other’s stories, with the hope that listening to each other’s stories will create new pathways for reconciliation and nation building. The idea of telling stories is an international phenomenon supported by the Museum of the Person and Center for Digital Storytelling. Doing that as an act of nation building seems characteristic of South Africa’s conscious intent to remember its history and learn to transcend it.

This is the part of South Africa that resonates with the ministry of pastoral counseling. It resonates with UU principles and with our own struggles to reconcile differing views both within and beyond our congregation. I have to smile when I think of us hosting a fundamentalist speaker. This must be a kernel of what it is like for South Africans to sit in a circle and tell each other their stories.

Leona Stucky-Abbott
Associated Community Minister

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News from the Social Justice Committee

Celebrate Peace on Mother’s Day

Remember that the UUCSF Social Justice Committee is one of many co-sponsors of the Peace Rally on Sunday, May 11, from 1:00-4:30 p.m. on the Plaza. There will be music, poetry, flowers, and inspirational oratory. Mayor David Coss will proclaim Mother’s Day to be “Peace Day” in Santa Fe and there will be a beautiful, diverse group of people with whom to celebrate. Please spend at least part of your afternoon with us on the Plaza.

NRCAT

At its April meeting, the Social Justice Committee agreed that the committee would become co-sponsors of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT). This is in keeping with the Action of Immediate Witness (AIW) passed at the UUA 2007 General Assembly which reads in part:

Therefore, be it resolved that the 2007 General Assembly reject torture by anyone for any purpose under any circumstances without exception. Be it resolved that the 2007 General Assembly stand in opposition to all U.S. sponsored torture, secret prisons, and rendition for torture…

The committee will be bringing more information about this issue to the congregation in the coming months and the stopping of torture is an important focus of the Mother’s Day Peace Rally.

We are looking for volunteers to help staff a table at the May 11 rally. To volunteer or to comment on the UUCSF-SJC co-sponsorship of NRCAT, please send us an email.

More information about the National Religious Campaign Against Torture can be found at the NRCAT website.

Stay current with your UUCSF Social Justice Committee online at our blog.

Fran Martone

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Still Time to Sign Up!

We currently have three of the six delegates we can send to General Assembly in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, June 25-29. Congregational delegates are eligible for some financial support from the congregation, and this is a wonderful opportunity to mix with UUs from around the continent and world! Information and registration are available at the UUA’s General Assembly website. Please contact me if you are interested in attending, either as a delegate or individually.

We are also hoping to send someone to Russell Lockwood Leadership School in Alta, Utah, in July. This is UU-specific leadership training, by one of the best leadership schools in the country. There will be financial assistance available, both from our congregation and from the Mountain Desert District. Registration is due in early May. Please get in touch with me for more information.

Marcia Bowman
Chair, Denominational Awareness Committee

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Membership News

The final Newcomer Orientation series of the congregational year will be held on May 11 and May 18, with new members to be introduced to the congregation at the Ingathering on May 25.

The sign-up sheet for the series is in the foyer. We encourage anyone who is interested in the Unitarian Universalist faith, as well as those contemplating membership, to attend this discussion series to get to know our movement, philosophy, and congregation. Child care is available if requested in advance.

Sherry Kraemer
Chair, Membership Committee

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