Tonight – FRIDAY

7:00 PM:

• Tonight’s story is a wisdom tale about a cracked pot. It is a beautiful story about how all things are connected even if they don’t realize it. 

• Listen and watch here: The Cracked Pot – author unknown 

SUNDAY

9:45 AM :Adult RE 

• In Person: in 2nd floor chalice house with Jim Beidler and Ginny Chudgar

• The Many Lifetimes of UUBerks: Universalists started meeting in our building in 1832.  Jim Beidler leads us in a time of reflection of those approximately 9,880 Sundays that people have gathered to meet and worship.  We’ll gather questions about our past and the nearly 10,000 times we’ve collectively met in this place. [soulful home packet] 

• Onsite Only 

9:45 AM: Children’s RE  

Elementary Ages:  Onsite and Online, email director.religious.education@uuberks.org by Saturday noon if you’ll be attending online

• On site: in Kidspace w/ Ms Corinne & Ms Erin (* teens may help, let us know you’ll be coming)

• RE Hangout – “Waking Up to Interconnection” – Our theme this month is Awakening. Pretty soon we’ll celebrate Earth Day, so for this lesson, we will be exploring our relationship with the Earth. Our 7th UU principle calls us to “Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.”… but that can often be taken to mean we must save our Earth. In this lesson, we will go one step further and explore our interconnection with the Earth. We will unpack how by working to save Mother Earth, we are also working to save ourselves. Our faith calls us to wake up to the idea that we are people of the earth rather than people over the Earth; we are interconnected and interdependent. 

•  link sent via Remind 1 hour before class.  If you need access please email Ebee (director.religious.education@uuberks.org)

10:30- Worship Service- All Ages

•  What does it mean to notice how we’re all connected to each other? 

• Coloring Sheet: “UUA Doodle Logo” by Jennie Freiderger

• Use a printed or hand labyrinth to find renewal as you attend worship this morning. Here’s a labyrinth you can print out and trace.  Labyrinth Printable

• Practice your Searching and Creative skills with Spark Maze
   

Monday – Thursday 
Daily posts on our new covenanted RE Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/groups/UUBerks.RE.page/?ref=share
check out our Remind classroom. 
If you need to signup link here: remind.com/join/refuucbc

April 24th Youth Group Meeting – Grades 7-12:  meets next, longer session 

CELEBRATING REV. DR. SANDRA FEES RETIREMENT

CHURCH PICNIC

Sunday, May 22, 12-3 pm

Festive party at the Farming Ridge Park in Exeter. This will be a time to gather outside together, share in a potluck lunch, and celebrate Rev Sandra as she prepares for retirement. Watch the Univoice for more information.

WORSHIP SERVICE 

CELEBRATING OUR SHARED MINISTRY

Sunday, June 12, 10:30 am

This service will include Rev. Sandra’s farewell sermon 

and a special video.

WORSHIP SERVICE

SUNDAE SUNDAY

Sunday, June 19, 10:30 am

This Sunday will be Rev. Sandra’s last service with us. Join in this fun, interactive service followed by an ice cream social.

FAREWELL MEETINGS WITH REV. SANDRA

by appointment
sign up here

Members and friends who would like to meet with Rev. Sandra in person, by phone or on zoom may sign up for one of these times (or contact Rev. Fees to find another time):

Tuesday, May 24 – 2 pm, 3 pm

Wednesday, May 25 – 2 pm, 3 pm, 7 pm

Thursday, May 26 – 11 am, 1 pm

Wednesday, June 1 – 3 pm, 4 pm, 7 pm

Thursday, June 2 – 1 pm, 2 pm, 7 pm

Tuesday, June 7 – 11 am, 1 pm, 2 pm

Friday, June 10 – 11 am, 1 pm, 2 pm

Tuesday, June 14 – 11 am, 1 pm, 7 pm

Beginning April 1, masking will be optional for small group gatherings and Sunday coffee hour. Participants in onsite church programs are still required to submit proof of vaccination and to mask during worship services. The updated UU Berks Gathering Policy can be found here.

Mark your calendar for the Celebrate Rev Sandra Church Picnic on Sunday, May 22 from 12 PM to 3pm at the Farming Ridge Park in Exeter. This festive party (previously scheduled as the Service Auction Picnic) will be a time to gather outside together, share in a potluck lunch, and celebrate Rev Sandra as she prepares for retirement.

We will spend the first hour gathering with a basket raffle. Starting at 1pm we will have a picnic lunch with time to participate in a creative art project. The picnic and raffle are open to everyone, but if you purchased a bidding number for the Silent/Live auction, you will receive a coupon that is good for 5 basket raffle tickets. Watch the Univoice for more information.

Learn about being “not racist” vs. being “antiracist.” It has been observed that saying “I’m not a racist” does not help the racism problem. Activists contend that the first step in being an antiracist is to acknowledge that there is racism in all of us and that there are many forms of racial biases and behaviors. For this week’s antiracism activity, read the VeryWell Mind article and learn what anti-racism is and why it is so important.

Save the date (AND a few before, See Below)

April 23, 2022

Where:   Reading City Park

Washington St. & N 11^th St.

Reading, PA

When:   Noon to 6 p.m. Rain or Shine!

What:   

• Environmental Groups
• Speakers on Sustainability Issues
• Presentations of Wild Animals & Some Winged Visitors
• Local Artists and Poets
• Food Vendors And More!

NOTE:  To volunteer, contact earthdayberks@gmail.com

Mark your calendars for the LGBT Center of Greater Reading’s PRIDE FEST on July 17th, 2022. Come out and show your support for our LGBTQ Community with a day full of music, vendors, food and FUN! We will be asking for volunteers to staff the FUUBC table as the date gets closer. Please consider helping out.

• Free parking is available on Sundays on the street and in the library parking lot.
• The parking garage across the street (4th and Cherry streets) has changed to a pay by app system. The app is called ParkMobile. It can be downloaded in the apple store or on the google play app. At this time we are unable  to offer discounted parking vouchers.

Registration for General Assembly 2022 (GA) in-person in Portland, Oregon is now open. GA 2022 will be a multiplatform event, with registration options for in-person and/or virtual participation. Registration for Virtual participation will open March 1. For more information, go to www.uua.org/ga. If interested in serving as a UU Berks Delegate (to vote on denominational decisions), please contact the UU Berks Board at g.board@uuberks.org or Rev. Sandra at minister@uuberks.org.

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.

Rev. Dr. Sandra Fees, April 2022

You tell me to live each day / as if it were my last. / But why the last? I ask. Why not / live each day as if it were the first— / all raw astonishment, Eve rubbing / her eyes awake that first morning, / the sun coming up / like an ingénue in the east?

~ Linda Pastan, Imaginary Conversation

What would it be like to live each day as if it were the first? This is a question I am sitting with these days. I envision retirement as a vital time to reawaken to that raw astonishment. I don’t see it as a time to live as though each day is my last.

I look forward to more unstructured time and also more time to be curious about the question “who am I now?” I will still be a minister. I will still participate in clergy groups and UU circles. Very likely I will preach from time to time and perhaps occasionally officiate at rites of passage for friends and family. But my role will be changing. I will no longer be a congregational minister. I will no longer be your settled minister. I will be awakening to something new.

And I wonder, what would it be like for you to live each day as if it were the first? What would you be awakening to? What choices might you make for yourself to bring that vision a little closer to being a reality?

With love,

Rev. Sandra

I love a good meme and this one is a classic at this point… “I was today years old when…”

Often these realizations feel like a jolt, an awakening to something new to me. They often feel like a paradigm shift – a big Eureka moment – the way I was doing something isn’t the way it has to be! Or – I never knew that!

I love the enthusiasm behind a lot of these posts. To celebrate awakening to something new can be a great way to live into experimentation and play. Another way to put this is “I was today years old when…” captures one way to draw from our first of six UU sources “the sense of wonder we all share.”

What understanding did you wake up to lately?

by nadine j. smet-weiss

spiritual director

now 

is the season

to come alive

awaken

to the power

of the light

you bear

embody 

the gifts

that are

yours

to give

open your arms

to receive

what others

live to share

now is the season

to come alive

awaken to

the love

you are