Sermons & Newsletter – UU Church of Rutland

November 4th: Joe Kraus: “Project Vision: One Town’s Innovative Response to Decline and Addiction” This will be a brief overview of how Project Vision came to be, what it has achieved and the challenges that remain.

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“Go Tell Mary: a Reflection on Service, Sacrifice, and Burn-Out”
As UU’s, our calling is to make love effective in the world through service to others and opposition to injustice. It can be fulfilling, but it can also wear us out. Rev. Barnaby Feder reflects on some ways to embrace that reality.

We live in what is perhaps the most individualistic country in the world, yet our UU principles call on us to attend to, and draw strength from, the larger community. Resolving this conflict is important to our personal happiness and our spiritual growth.

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The past forty years have seen a dramatic increase in the accumulation of wealth and political influence in the hands of relatively few Americans. Beginning with the onset of deregulation and the abandonment of the Bretton Woods system in 1974, wealth inequality in the United States has skyrocketed to the point that the wealthiest 1% of the population owns more wealth than the bottom 50%. This talk examines the origins and fallout of that process, and identifies the fundamental disconnect between the values and morals of American capitalism and democracy.

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May 27th: Nancy Banks
“The Challenge of Change: A Call to Action”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. exhorted people “to stay awake, to adjust to new ideas … and to face the challenge of change.” For most of us this challenge can be daunting. On Sunday May 27th, Nancy Banks, former Executive Director of UU Mass Action, will talk about how UUs around the country have created to state advocacy networks to wake up to the possibilities of action that are needed today.

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May 13th: Rev. Barbara Threet
“Women! In the Pulpit!” – In the late 19th century, group of women became Unitarian ministers in what was then the Wild West (Iowa, Minnesota, and the like). In honor of Mother’s Day, we’ll learn more about this group of our foremothers, and how they influenced our faith.

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May 6th: UUCR Examining Whiteness class participants

For the last several months, a group of fourteen UUCR members plus a few others from the Rutland community have met monthly to explore what it means to be white in deeply racist society. In this service, several of the participants will share some of what they’ve discovered about themselves, and about what it means to be white in a way that is respectful, honest, and inclusive.

We’ll explore how we might actively welcome the Sacred into our lives, through a service of poetry, reflection, and song.

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As today is April 15th we’ll take a wide-ranging look at taxes: what they do for us, why we should care, what countries with highest taxation levels exhibit. The constraints currently applicable to churches and tax-exempt organizations will be detailed. The speaker will suggest how there can be a spiritual element to paying taxes!

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Is evil a force in and of itself? Perhaps it’s the absence of good, or love? Is it innate? Who is evil, and/or what acts are evil? And how does our first principle, which states that we “respect and affirm the inherent worth and dignity of every person”, deal with evil acts or the people who do them?” This sermon topic was chosen by Kathy Harm, who purchased that choice at the 2017 UUCR Auction.

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