Inspiration:

 

 

How difficult can change be, when every store clerk is willing to make it for you?

Contagious Courage

Consider how contagious courage is. A friend takes a risk and shares something deeply vulnerable. In return, you are moved to share some of your own struggle, telling a story you hadn’t thought of for years. A co-worker challenges negative practices at work. Though you are silent at the time, you go to him later and think about how to change the work environment together.
At their best, our faith communities are laboratories of en-courage-ment, where our authentic selves are affirmed, strengthening our ability for self-affirmation.

It is my deepest hope that being part of the CLF community will inspire acts of courage, because our authentic selves are strengthened in this vast web of connection around the globe. Where do you feel out of connection with your authentic self? What small act of courage might you take today to address that imbalance? How might the CLF community help you with that?
Dorothy Bernard said that “Courage is fear that has said its prayers.” May we remember that we are never alone, that our small selves and actions are part of a larger web of being. And may this larger web give us strength and courage.

by Meg Riley, Senior Minister TO READ MORE

Inspiration:

Now it is time that gods came walking out
of lived-in Things…
Time that they came and knocked down every wall
inside my house. New page. Only the wind
from such a turning could be strong enough
to toss the air as a shovel tosses dirt:
a fresh-turned field of breath….

―Rainer Maria Rilke

Spiritual Courage

There are times when my heart is deeply burdened, when I think there is nothing strong in me, no ability to respond with courage to the challenges of life. Yet, like the poet, I can remember my mother, and be grateful to her for instilling in me a sense of what is good and right and true. I can reflect on those brave souls who took their lives into their own hands and did the right thing by rescuing Jews. And I can think of my religious community. When I think of you, and remember I am not alone, I discover in myself seeds of courage.

Are they growing in you? Who has planted them? Who will water them? When called upon, how will you respond? These are religious questions no one can answer for you. But I believe our faith is a strong one that will sustain us even in times of devastation. Let us commit to growing that courage in our children, and in ourselves, so that one day the world may be more just, more kind, and more loving.

by Barbara Wells Ten Hove, Co-Minister, Cedars Unitarian Universalist Church, Bainbridge Island, Washington TO READ MORE

Inspiration:

 

Only in growth, reform, and change, paradoxically enough, is true security to be found.  –Anne Morrow Lindbergh 

Where Do We Go From Here?

Let us be dissatisfied until America will no longer have a high blood pressure of creeds and an anemia of deeds.

Let us be dissatisfied until the tragic walls that separate the outer city of wealth and comfort from the inner city of poverty and despair shall be crushed by the battering rams of the forces of justice.

Let us be dissatisfied until those who live on the outskirts of hope are brought into the metropolis of daily security.

Let us be dissatisfied until slums are cast into the junk heaps of history, and every family will live in a decent, sanitary home….

Let us be dissatisfied until from every city hall, justice will roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.

Let us be dissatisfied until that day when the lion and the lamb shall lie down together, and every[one] will sit under [their] own vine and fig tree, and none shall be afraid.

Let us be dissatisfied, and [all] will recognize that out of one blood God made all [people] to dwell upon the face of the earth.

BY REV. DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., 1967 TO READ MORE

Inspiration:

 

Spirit of Life, help me to find ways to encourage ever more abundant life.

Abundant Life

San Ysidro creek starts somewhere high in the Inez mountains above Santa Barbara, California, and it falls through a boulder-strewn stream bed down to the bay and the Pacific Ocean. It is a dream of a creek, bubbling, dancing, pouring; sun-dappled and butterfly-haunted, laced with blossoms and grasses for which I have no name. In February, which is when I know it, it is in spate, swift with the melted mountain snows. The first time I saw this creek, my immediate thought was, “They must turn this off at night, when no one is looking at it.” Realizing how silly that was, I still had to wrestle a bit to wrap my mind around the idea that this pouring forth was continuous; that the stream flows all the time, splashing over the rocks and into the tiny pools constantly, whether I was watching it or not. And it struck me that the creek, in its careless fullness, in its unceasing abundance, is a kind of model for the ceaseless creative energy of the universe, which is also pouring out and over us all the time, whether we see it or not. So I go back to the creek every year to remember; to remind myself that we stand always in the flow, that the waters of life are washing over us in a springtime torrent every day we live.

by Kendyl Gibbons, Senior Minister, First Unitarian Society, Minneapolis, Minnesota TO READ MORE

Inspiration:

 

Has the way you think of yourself changed significantly in the last ten years? The last ten months?

Time and Transformation

People tend to think of transformation as this huge change that happens overnight. Like, you’re all about the caterpillar who goes into the cocoon, and then one day it breaks free and all of a sudden there’s a beautiful butterfly. But here’s what I think. Most transformation happens so slowly that you don’t much notice…

What about you? Are there ways that your life has radically changed, but maybe you haven’t noticed because the change has taken such a long time? Are there changes that you’re in the middle of, but maybe haven’t much noticed because you haven’t got all the way to where you hoped to be? Maybe it would be a good idea to give yourself a pat on the head and a “Good person!” for engaging in the slow work of transformation, however it takes shape in your life.

by Taz, a six-year-old Belgian Tervuren, the companion of Lynn Ungar, the CLF’s minister for lifespan learning.TO READ MORE