This Week in Virtual Worship

Sunday, May 31st, 2020

Our YouTube account is First Parish in Milton UU.

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Please be on the lookout for an Order of Worship which will be emailed to you on Friday, 5/29.  We’ve added the offering to the service with a new way to give- text to giving! 

Sunday’s offering will go to the ​​United Way Neponset Neighbors Together Fund.

You can donate anytime between May 28th and May 31st. See below for text donation instructions. It will be good to worship together. Do join us on Sunday if you can.

Below in the Link:

1. Minister’s Message

2. RE Message

3.  Phased Re-Opening task group formed

4.  Sunday Donation Info

5. Volunteers Needed

6. Green Gleanings

7.  Meditation Info

Minister

Rev. Lisa Ward

minister@fpmilton.org

The worship committee is gearing up for virtual summer services, weaving the many threads of lay-led participation.  Our Phased Re-Opening Task Group (PRO) is up and running, navigating this fluid time with devotion for the heath and well-being of our community.  We’re shifting, musing, wondering, watching, trying new ideas, rejecting old assumptions.  In short, we are showing up as we can, for and with each other.  This is how we find parts of community we may not have noticed, or have taken for granted.  This is how we find resources of creativity and resilience we may not have known we had.  This is how we have the courage to say “I don’t know” or “I need help”.  This is community, upheld by intention and the belief in connection.

The phrase that is trending right now in the media is “new normal”.  I think one of the lessons that this “time of the great interruption” gives is to examine our attachment to “normal”.  It’s not time to look for a quick definition of who we are together.  It’s time to take in what we have learned and choose ways of being that speak to the interdependent wholeness that we long for: the equity and justice that we know we are capable of, the gift of connection — deep and wide and varied.

We’ve been given stark examples of a “normal” that must not re-establish: racial malice, violence and harm.   The blatant murders of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd, the young white woman calling the police to falsely accuse a black man of threatening her life and the disproportionate number of Covid 19 deaths throughout the nation.  We must see this clearly before assuming a new normal is possible.  We must discard what we have been conditioned to assume and open ourselves to another way of life together.  This will take time.  Let’s not wish for the interruption to be over until we have come to learn what has to change.

That is why we need one another: a shared wisdom to find our way forward.

In Faith, Rev. Lisa

Religious Exploration

The Passages Program will meet online on May 31 at 9:45 am. The final celebration for the children in this much-loved program will be held during the worship service on June 28.

Options for Children and Middle Schoolers: We are offering multiple short virtual programs throughout the week to help families feel connected to each other and to the heartbeat of First Parish Milton. 

Storytime: Tuesdays and Thursdays at 4:00 pm

Show & Tell: Wednesdays at 4:00 pm

Middle School Hangout: Mondays and Wednesdays at 7:00 pm

See the RE family newsletter for more information about each option and the Zoom links to join in. Each session is password protected, participants will be admitted via waiting rooms, private chat will be turned off, and screen sharing and white board use will be restricted to the co-hosts. We will ensure that two adults are present before children or youth are added from the waiting rooms. Please let Laurel know if you need the family newsletter.

We are all learning and adapting to new ways of connecting and sharing. I welcome feedback about what feels possible and helpful as we experiment with virtual RE.

~ Our bodies may not be touching, but our hearts are still connected.

Coming of Age will meet online on May 31. Youth and their mentors are invited from 1:00 to 2:30 pm on May 31 and June 7. The Coming of Age service will be held on Sunday, June 21, at the regular worship time of 10:30 am.

Virtual Youth Chat: All youth should have received Zoom links to join Youth Chat online each week. Each session will give youth an opportunity to connect and share what is on their hearts and we will play fun group online games. Please let Laurel know if you need the link info.

Weekly sessions are on Thursdays at 7:30 pm. Note, the Sunday Youth Chat session is not currently meeting.

Events, News & Announcements

A Phased Re-Opening (PRO) Task Group

has been formed!

This PRO task group will consider logistics, communication, safety protocols and implementation toward  First Parish’s phased re-opening.

In preliminary research and consultation with parish leaders and colleagues, First Parish worship will remain virtual through the summer.  There will be no in-house worship gatherings till further notice. 

This decision is both prudent, all things considered, and gives the task group more time to iron out the many details that any phase of opening will entail.

Here is the task group:Tracey Robinson – Parish Committee, (Chair of the PRO task group)Lisa White –  Parish CommitteePaul Casaz – Safety Task Force and Parish CommitteeBecky Stiles – RE and Parish CommitteeGuy Pugh, MD – medical expertTom Kemp – Worship CommitteeRev Lisa Ward – MinisterSusan DeMinico – Church AdministratorLaurel Whitehouse – Director of RE ConsultantsEric Miller – TechnologyPeter Schneider – Health and Safety

Feel free to contact Tracey Robinson: tdr02186@gmail.com with questions or comments.  

With great appreciation and admiration for such devotion to the health and well-being of this faith community.

Rev. Lisa, Minister

Lisa White, Parish Committee Chair

Tracey Robinson, Parish Committee Vice-Chair, and Chair of the PRO task group

Last Sunday’s Donations

Last Sunday, we collected donations for the International Institute of New England. Thanks to your generosity, we were able to donate $431.22 ​​

From today 5/28 through 5/31, we are accepting donations for the 

 United Way’s Neponset Neighbors Together Fund bringing the communities of

Milton, Mattapan, Hyde Park and Dorchester together to raise funds to

support the needs of people deeply impacted by this public health crisis.

Help us support some of Boston’s neighborhoods showing high incidence of

infection, serious illness and casualties with deep to impact to families

HOW TO GIVE: Simply text (617) 539-7576 with the amount that you’d like to give. Do not add words, simply put the amount. You’ll get an automatic text message back, asking you to do a 1-time set up to create an account with your credit card/debit number. After the one time set-up, you can simply text the number with an amount to give, and it’ll be automatically debited from the account of your choosing. This is contained and safe — it goes directly to a designated First Parish account. We will write one check of the compiled donations to the organization.

A few more volunteers are needed to help prepare bagged lunches for MainSpring on June 3rd and June 17th.  Friends of First Parish are welcome to join in too. 

For more information or to sign up, contact Peter Schneider at peterlschneider@gmail.com 

GREEN GLEANS

Offered by FP Social & Environmental Justice Committee (S+EJ)

This is a time-sensitive invitation to take action for MA climate change legislation before June 4.  A coalition of activist organizations is making a push to gather 10,000 signatures on an online climate petition called the “Massachusetts Strong Petition.”  This is a grassroots effort to urge legislators to vote transparently before this year’s session ends June 30.  It sends a collective message of public demand.

The petition supports FOUR legislative bills. All transition MA to a clean energy economy and uphold principles of environmental justice—ensuring that the most climate-vulnerable communities—often communities of color—are granted special protections by law.

Here are links to the digital petition and to the sponsoring coalition, MA Climate Strong.  I’s a terrific website, very clean and simple presentation, with excellent advocacy guides, tips, and information.  Please engage — it does us good.

https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/mastrong#

https://www.strongerma.world/a-strong-massachusetts

SPROUTS 

 Blood donations are greatly needed as area hospitals are resuming elective surgeries and procedures.  “It’s the blood on the shelves that saves lives,” Boston Children’s Hospital, 617-355-6677 or online at www.halfpints.childrenshospital.org  Or Red Cross MA, 800-733-2767, https://www.redcrossblood.org/give.html/find-drive   Your donation will help replenish critical inventories.  

 Tree seedling check-in.  The bare-root Tupelos many of us planted in April have proved VERY difficult to propagate.  This can be typical, sadly, of large hardwood seedlings.  So far, Mme. Brown has been successful (see her photo).  Disappointing as this is, Wakefield Estate Arboretum will host a tree seedling giveaway of sprouted trees from its nursery in September.  Let’s try again.  Thank you for your “TreeLC.  ~ Tucker Smith

Offered by First Parish The Social and Environmental Justice Committee

Meditation continues ….

All are welcome to join for 30 minutes of silent meditation/prayer on 

Thursday evenings at 6pm 

Sunday mornings at 9 am

Newcomers and friends welcome.

Here are the links — these should remain consistent every week 

but note that the link for Thursday is different from Sunday!

Please contact Tracey at tdr02186@gmail.com if you have questions or want to join us!