Join us on Monday January 4th, @ 7:00pm when gather together to imagine. . . . Contact Jane Rohrbach (windowsjmr@comcast.net) or Nadine Smet-Weiss (njw1258@hotmail.com or 484-333-4015) for further information; contact Nadine to receive the zoom link for this gathering.

Did you catch the presentation at the December 2020 Congregational meeting on our new private Member Info website:  member-info.uuberks.org ?  Do you still have questions or need some help accessing it? Use the link below to register for either a 1-on-1 help session and/or an introduction to the website via Zoom.  You can also use the form to just post a question about the  private Member Info website.
https://uuberks.org/member-info-signup

Here are a few common questions and answers:

1. Why do I have to login to access this site?  This site is private and the information on it is for members only. By having a login, we can restrict access to those individuals that are FUUBC members.
2. I attend services all the time but I am not a member. How do I become a member?  We have a page on our public website with all of the details.  See https://uuberks.org/connect/become-a-member/ 
3. I have a Google account, but I don’t remember my password.  (1) Go to the Google login page at accounts.google.com, (2) enter your email address, (3) click on the “next” button and (4) click on the “Forgot password” link.

Mark your calendars now: Our FUUBC 2021 Service Auction is on Saturday, February 6th @ 6 PM.  This auction is not the same as other years, our primary motivation in this isolating time: Come together as a community, hence our theme “UU Heart to UU Heart”.

Following social distancing recommendations during COVID-19, our auction will be conducted fully online.  We will be using an online auction website to host the silent auction for the week before and Zoom to conduct the live auction on Saturday night.

We need your help. Service auctions only work if there are items to bid on and people volunteer to help make it happen. To make an item donation, use the donation form on our auction website at uuberks.org/service-auction. We have a “donation ideas” page on the site to get your creative juices running.  Here is a last-minute idea: if you receive a gift that is not to your liking or a duplicate gift, consider donating it to the Service Auction. We are sure someone else would like it.

We will be using an online catalog this year that can be viewed on our website or a PDF version can be downloaded to your computer, so we can accept donations up to the start of the silent auction on Monday, Feb 1.

Finally, if you would like to volunteer to help or have a question/suggestion, send us an email at g.service.auction@uuberks.org.

Many thanks from the Service Auction Committee.

We are pleased to announce that last week, through the organization of our Social Justice team and a grant from The Pennsylvania Universalist Convention, FUUBC was able to present the Helping Harvest Food Bank with a check for $2000.00.

Board President Lynn O’Brien:
“I was so happy to give this donation to HH on behalf of FUUBC and TPUC. I am sure the donation can help many hungry families in Berks county during the holiday season”.

Closed captioning is now available for Sunday service. Please note that not all Zoom virtual meeting rooms/meeting IDs have closed captioning. You will need to be using a current version of the Zoom Client App (the latest version is 5.4.1).

Each participant will be able to toggle closed captioning on/off if the Zoom meeting room has it enabled.

To turn on closed captions, click on the “Closed Caption” button in the Zoom menu bar and then select “Show Subtitles.”  Once it is turned on, you can adjust the font size by clicking on the “Closed Caption” button again and selecting “subtitle settings”.  Note: if the button doesn’t show up on your Zoom menu bar, most likely closed captioning is not available in your current Zoom virtual meeting room.

We have created a short YouTube video to demonstrate how to use Zoom closed captioning. Here is the link to the video:    https://uuberks.org/zoom-cc

Contact g.it.services@uuberks.org if you have any questions.

We have established a Zoom service tech line if you are having trouble logging into our Sunday service. If you do not get an immediate answer, leave a message and your call will be returned momentarily.Dial 484-925-1684.

This Fall, Rev. Dr. Sandra Fees begins her 17th year as our minister. Part of our commitment to her is to provide one month of sabbatical time for every five years of service. The time has come again to afford Rev. Sandra a sabbatical to renew and expand her spiritual, emotional, and intellectual gifts.

The Board has approved a sabbatical for January 1-May 31, 2021. We are pleased to provide this support to sustain and grow Rev. Sandra’s ministry with us and our broader UU movement, and we are confident that her sabbatical will be a time of renewal and growth for us all. We also know that this is a challenging and uncertain time in our world with so many disruptions.

In consultation with Rev. Sandra and the finance team, the Board has approved Rev. Sage Olnick, our Affiliated Community Minister, to serve as Part-time Sabbatical Minister during this time. We believe that this will provide the confidence and support our congregation needs to continue our important ministries.

Rev. Sage will provide a trusted ministerial presence during this time. Her time will be devoted to governance, social justice, and pastoral care. She is not meant to be a replacement for our settled minister, Rev. Sandra, but to provide ministerial support during this time. Rev. Sage’s contract with the congregation includes:

• providing three worship services each month
• attending monthly Board meetings
• facilitating monthly pastoral care team meetings
• providing pastoral care for crisis situations
• attending a limited number of committee meetings (to be agreed upon in advance of sabbatical)
• monthly check ins with the staff (the Board will have supervisory responsibility during the sabbatical)

During the sabbatical, Rev. Sandra will be free of all ministerial responsibilities. However, in the event of a member death, a member testing positive for Covid-19, or a church crisis, Rev. Sage Olnick and/or our Board President, Lynn O’Brien will be in contact with Rev. Sandra.

While this may seem a difficult time for a sabbatical due to Covid-19 and the many disruptions in our world, we anticipate that this timing will ultimately serve us all best. In particular, we hope that sometimes around Rev. Sandra’s return from sabbatical we might be able to once again worship, gather, learn, and be together in person in our beautiful building.

If you have any questions or concerns about the sabbatical, please contact Lynn O’Brien, Board President, or Rev. Dr. Sandra Fees.

If you are in need of a church directory, would like to update your pledge, sign up for Egiving or just have general questions? Please contact our office administrator at office@uuberks.org

• You can now give online on our website UUberks.org by clicking on the online giving tab or clicking
  here
• You can also give by downloading the GivePlus app on google play and the App store below. You can easily locate our church by zip code 19602

From Rev. Sandra’s Study – December 2020

We all know this has been a hard year in so many ways. Our spirits are a bit frayed. So as we enter this season of light, I wish for each of you the renewal of hope. This is what the winter holy days promise. I offer you these words of meditation and prayer to help you to manifest that hope more fully in yourself and others.

Yours in peace, light, and love,

Rev. Sandra Fees

Breathed into the World by Rev. Sandra Fees

Whoever you are, wherever you go,
May you know the stillness of winter
and the call to love.
May you see the moon
silvering the night sky
and let the dark of midnight
plunge you into your truest self
and fling you back out again
to a world in need of who you are.
May there be the familiar carols
you know by heart
and new melodies to set you free.
May there be feasting and frolicking,
kindness and wonderment.
And may there be wise people
to follow a star in the East
and a child to teach us to love
and enough magic
to let the imagination go wild,
to let Christmas arrive with its enchantments,
with its glitter, glow, and gold,
to let what wants to be born break through.
May the presence of the holy
crowd out fear, hate, and worry
and proclaim in this moment
that peace and goodwill might yet
be breathed into the world,
and avow that we too can give birth to love,
wherever we go, whoever we are.

When making music, there comes a time to be silent. This can often be confused for stillness. While our voices or instruments may not be ringing – we are listening for the next entrance, we are counting the measures, we are watching the conductor. There is a lot of activity underneath all of that stillness.

That stillness can be a time of paying more attention to the players around us and our surroundings in general. What have you noticed in this great stillness of the past many months? What will sound sweeter when it starts playing again?

nadine j. smet-weiss

spiritual director

stillness

just to hear

the word

takes me

there

which is

here

fully

if even

for a moment

for a breath

present to

life energy

exploding

into being