Happy New Year! As the days grew darker last month, we paused to appreciate the quiet as we allowed its restful embrace to seep into our being. Now daylight grows and we look ahead to the new year with hope and some apprehension and renewed energy. Our political landscape is already changing rapidly and it is imperative that each one of us begin to articulate our personal and collective mission statement. January is officially “Mission Month” and even our children and teens will participate in this exercise.
I tried an online mission writing exercise that I found helpful and somewhat surprising. I was forced to think about what matters to me and how I can achieve my goals by living my mission. Some goals I had never articulated emerged for the first time. You can give it a try if you like at http://msb.franklincovey.com.
What drives you? What’s the “bottom line” of your life? What values or commitments distinguish your life from others? What guides your decisions and priorities? Why are you here? At your funeral, what do you want people to say your life was about? What drains your spirit? What invigorates you? These are the types of questions that this exercise asks of you.
I discovered my bottom line recently when I heard someone on the news lift up internment camps as a solution to the immigration problem. Can you imagine?! I was reminded of the time I had the privilege of meeting an elderly woman, an American citizen who had been removed from her home and business in Los Angeles during WWII and moved to an internment camp in Owens Valley, CA. She was pregnant with her second child at the time of her internment and her new home for the next three years was a military barrack with a pile of straw in the middle. She was handed pillow cases to stuff with straw for her family to sleep on. There were armed guards on towers with machine guns and searchlights, and barbed wire, and row upon row of barracks. I asked her what made our country so afraid of their own citizens and her response was, “No dear, it wasn’t fear, it was greed.” The internment camps are an ugly stain on our nation’s history and I am committed to fight against it ever happening again. UU minister and social justice activist, Richard Gilbert spoke at Starr King once when I was in seminary and he asked us to think not about what we want to live for, but what we are willing to die for. I think that means, what is your bottom line?
January has five Sundays, so we will have plenty of time to delve into this process.
On New Year’s Day, Nicky Ozbeck will lead us in a process to uncover our values and begin the process of identifying what matters, what needs to change, what needs to stay, and how we will make the changes that will not only guide us on our journey but invigorate and challenge us along the way.
Following the service on January 22, you are invited to stay for lunch and creative conversations. These conversations are intended to provide the framework for shaping the future of UUCC, so you can see how important it is for your voice to be heard.
See you in church!
Cathy