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PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE “This work of generosity outlasts the yearly fund drive and calls us into a deeper communion with each other and with the world. It calls us to be larger, stronger, and braver than we ever imagined we could be. Do not fear though, for we are called together. We have one another. These are the ancient tasks of religious people: to trust the wonder of the universe, to use our lives to serve the good, and to be a blessed comfort to one another on the journey.” May 2008 We're barreling along to the end of another church year, which follows close on the heels of our fiscal year. Regardless of nomenclature, this soon-to-be-past year seems to have gone by at warp speed, packed as it was with so many events! Did time accelerate or did we just not have time to catch our collective breath? I can't sufficiently underscore the significance of this church year, surely one of the most noteworthy in our nearly 100-year-old history. We approved, welcomed, and installed a settled minister. And just a few weeks from now, we may well have voted on our next church home! During the lifecycle of a church year, the winter half is usually busier than the fall, for it is then that our stewardship efforts take center stage. The Budget Committee also gears up by collecting information, including requests from the paid staff and lay groups. It’s that committee’s job to create a fiscal year budget in time for the congregation’s vote. The latter half of the program year also tends to contain more town hall gatherings and congregational meetings. These efforts require additional participation on top of ongoing committee work, program planning, worship services, social justice activities, membership orientations, shared ministry groups, classes, concerts, movies, etc. What did I leave out?! Over the last four years, there have been from two to five congregational meetings called by the Board between January and June, for an average of about one a month. When I first started attending UUCE, we averaged just two or three congregational meetings over the course of an entire year. The difference is that we’ve had momentous decisions to make, requiring multiple church-wide gatherings and numerous congregational meetings. And that’s in addition to the obligatory standard meetings we have to elect our leaders and vote on our annual budget. I strongly encourage all of you to stay involved and engaged for the remainder of the program year. By the time this newsletter goes to print, we will have already had one congregational meeting on April 20th to vote on the slate of candidates for the Board, the Building Project Oversight Committee (BPOC), and the Nominating Committee. The Town Halls, one on May 4th and the other on May 11th (NOTE: these dates have been postponed into June), will be facilitated by the BPOC. These gatherings will be your chance to ask questions about the proposed property. If all goes as expected, the congregational meeting scheduled for May 18th (also postponed) will be to vote on that property. The last church-wide meeting of the program year requiring a vote is the congregational budget meeting, which will be held on June 8th. There is one agenda item only—to adopt the budget for the 2008-2009 fiscal year. It is scheduled as the last one of the year because it follows the annual canvass but is before the beginning of the new fiscal or program year. As you know, the annual budget is dependent upon pledges. If you haven’t made yours for the next fiscal year, I encourage you to do so by the end of this month. Similarly, if you haven’t sent in your pledge for the current fiscal year, I ask that you do so before the congregational meeting on June 8th. The Board is well aware of congregational fatigue. We’ve had so many meetings only because we are an extremely busy community and are committed to exercising responsible congregational polity. Yet the reason we have come so far this year is due to the enthusiastic involvement of all of you! It’s worth it, don’t you think? See you in church, April 2008 Our annual canvass is underway, causing me once again to think about stewardship generally and our pledge drive specifically. As we must create a new budget every year, so, too, must we have an annual pledge drive to raise the money for that budget. In some years we have had an all-member face-to-face canvass. In other years, like this one, we host several canvass events, culminating in the all-church member and friend Celebration Sunday on April 6th. The money raised allows us to pay our seven staff members who head or support the programs that are the meat and muscle of this church. It also allows us to maintain and repair our building, pays for our UU national and district dues, and sustain the many facets of our church life. The operating budget represents, in fact, the nuts and bolts of our church finances. Put simply, the greater the pledges, the bigger the budget, the more expansive our programs and mission. Stewardship, on the other hand, is a much larger concept than a canvass. It happens during worship services and over coffee, when teaching an RE class, or participating in a shared ministry group. Stewardship happens at every church committee meeting and at every meeting at which we as a congregation elect church leaders, vote on decisions that drive our mission and vision, or “call” a minister. Some stewardship moments are small and some are huge. Voting on our next church site, for instance, will be as big a stewardship moment as any we’ve ever had, because we’ll be choosing our future church home. And that choice will both reflect and drive our future mission in the larger community and help determine who our future stewards will be—those who will need us and find us and become part of us. Stewardship, including pledging, is about nurturing, sustaining and advancing this church and this denomination. Stewardship is spiritual and ethereal, pragmatic and monetary. It is educational, emotional and soulful. It involves time and money. And our church needs both from each of us, according to our means. Furthermore, stewardship and sustainability are integrally linked. Both can be advanced only with attention, intention, commitment, and “intelligent design.” Sustainable Prosperity As you know, we will be pledging our financial support to the church on Celebration Sunday. Not merely as individual congregants, but as a community of stewards who have committed many hours to doing the good work of this church and of this "uncommon denomination." We have guided this church as we've shaped its vision and mission, through the sometimes mundane, sometimes creative (detailed) work that movement building requires. This is our annual opportunity to make our financial commitment to the church as one, all together in one place at one time. Our work for the church can sometimes be a real sacrifice. It can be complicated and difficult, even painful. Yet the camaraderie has also been joyful and humorous and the work meaningful and useful. So we keep coming to worship services and attending meetings and writing e-mails and making phone calls and hospital visits and sharing meals and participating in work parties and auctions. Together, we've done work that matters. We have done it for the church we were, and we continue to do it for the church we are becoming and for the church we hope to be. So as you think about the pledge you will make to the church this year, and discuss that pledge with your spouse or partner, please reflect on what brought you to this church in the first place, whether two years or two decades or more ago. Think, too, about what keeps you coming back as you consider making a percentage increase in your pledge. I ask that we all meditate on these things and on our pledges before we come together on April 6th. For only by standing together as “one great body” of Unitarian Universalist stewards will we make our future bright. Olga Turner |
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