Mother's Day 2018
Dear Friends,
Mother's Day is a time of great complexity for most people. We invite you to come bring all your diverse feelings as we give thanks for our mothers who have given us life, our children who have taught us about life, and Mother Earth who sustains us. Feelings of grief for mothers and children who have died, or betrayed us, are also welcome.
We come for healing and wisdom,and we will try to be honest about the diversity of our feelings. We will re-imagine God in order to heal ourselves and the Planet also on Mother's Day. It is a day to do deep theological thinking, and ask God/dess for help as we give her thanks. and ask for help in our prayers.
The book that has more diversity in metaphors for God/dess is the Bible and our scripture is from
the
Gospel of Matthew23:37. and we use the Inclusive Bible, the First Egalitarian Translation
God/dess said “…you murder the prophets, and you stone those sent to you! Oh, how often I yearned to gather you together, like a hen gathering her chicks under her wings! But you would have none of it. Therefore your house is being left to you abandoned.”
We will also use the beautiful song
A Mother’s Prayer
,by David Foster and Carol Bayer Sager
I pray you'll be my eyes,
And watch her (us) where she (we) go
And help her (us) to be wise, Help me to let go.
Every mother's prayer, every child knows
Lead her (us) to a place,
Guide her (us) with your grace,
To a place where she'll (we’ll) be safe.
I pray she’ll (we’ll) find your light,
And holds it in her (our) heart
As darkness falls each night,
Remind her (us) where you are.
Every mother's prayer, every child knows.
Need to find a place, guide her (us) to a place
Give her (us) faith so she'll (we’ll) be safe.
Mostly we will pray on Mother's Day both giving thanks ans asking for help. Prayer is often where the rubber hits in the road as we do the work of reimaging God/dess.
Every Sudnay our invocation is a prayer to the earth by Raffi,
Our Dear, Dear Mother
Our dear, dear Mother, daily provider, earth be your name. The time has come, to honor you, to know you and to show our love.” 1.You give us each day our daily grain, kissed by the sun and kissed by the rain. Teach us now to find a way to care for you in our work and play.
Chorus
2.Within the beauty of your silent spin, we know you’re hurting and we feel your pain. With your forgiveness we can start anew. We need a chance to make it up to you.
Chorus
Our Prayers
of Confession
are a gift from David DeBus, called
Amazing Prayers
that he sent in an email today and wrote yesterday May 12, 2018, from The Grove, in Scripps Ranch here in San Diego. Thank you David!
One:
We raise up amazing prayers when the spirit moves within our hearts, we sing proud songs when we feel we belong to the one who brought us here, after the sun goes down the night-time starts
and when the night-time starts the stars dare to appear.
Many:
We raise up amazing hopes when our despair is at its worst
we shout out our hope into the face of the dark with our lives
and when the beasts come after us—beasts who are accursed
we straighten our backs into our faith that survives.
One:
We raise up impossible dreams when our future darkens with grave doubt, our children, our beloveds, our nations and our earth we cherish with God’s light, we can hear God’s kingdom coming like paradise out loud, we find the fold inside our souls that awaits all heaven’s delight.
Many:
We have been empty, we have been vain, we have sought for what the world obtains, but now we are eager and aware, connected to the body forever and a day, we forgot all the misery that comes from when it rains, amazing prayers come among us as we connect to the one who shows the way.
Our Prayers of Thanks to All Mothers and All Who Have a Mother and to Our Common Home Mother Earth, will be in
unison.
Dear Holy One, you who are in us and amongst us, you who are sympathetic and have feelings for every creature, we give thanks.
You who are also the Earth and the interconnectedness of all life; I love your daily grace, and your silent daring, and how loved I am, how we admire this strength in each other, all that we have lost, all that we have suffered, all that we know; we are stunned by this beauty and we do not forget; what you are to us, what I am to you God/dess of Love. You are the breadth of my life and the blessing, the cells of my being sing in gratitude, reawakening. We give thanks for our own mothers who have given us life…..
We give thanks for all our children, grandchildren and everyone in the human family who comes after us………All of us who have had a mother, may we live in gratitude. All of us give thanks. Amen
(adapted from Marcia Falk, Morning Blessing Prayer and Susan Griffin’s poem
Woman and Nature
)
We will say Prayers
asking for help, guidance and healing.
Dear God/dess of Sympathy and Love,
You who are called by many names, we need your help.
We feel despair when we face our history as a human family for too often we have not honored mothers, the body, women and nature associated with the female……….…(Silence)
We honor Mary Magdalene today who was the Mother of the early church but was wrongly abused, left out, and slandered. May we reinstate her in her rightful place with Jesus as we reimage a new kind of church.……(Silence)
We ask for help to heal from our wounds from our own mothers some of whom harmed us…………..(Silence)
We ask for help for our own children who have harmed and dishonored us………..(Silence)
Heal our rage………….(Silence)
Heal our grief for our mothers and children who have died….. ..(Silence)
Heal us for the mother child relationship, the most fundamental of all human relationships which is complex and we long for wisdom and reconciliation………..(Silence)
We pray to honor and tell the truth about motherhood….(Silence)
We pray to love our enemies as Jesus and Mary Magdalene taught………(Silence)
Awaken us to how we can live well and live our fullest potential and commune with you Holy One………….(Silence)
Guide Church for Our Common Home and our work dedicated to Mother Earth. May we know that our work is never in vain no matter the outcome. Encourage us to know that any small deed might be the one to tip the tide toward planetary healing and love. We ask for your guidance in our dreams and day visions, in our worship and our community building, in our friendships and our stewardship of the Earth. We ask for healing for all earthlings. Amen
We will sing and share feelings, discuss what our dreams are for Church for Our Common Home and we will commune with God/dess in nature. We will experience the beauty and magnificence of God in the ocean, the sky, the wind, birds, sun, warm sand, rocks and one another.
Join us as we share reflections in our sermon time
Reimaging God in Order to Heal Ourselves and Save the Planet.
The Meditation for the order of worship is a quote from Carol P. Christ from her brilliant book,
She Who Changes,
“For process philosophy, the whole universe is alive and changing, continually co-creating new possibly of life…..The process view stands in sharp contrast to both classical philosophy and early modern science, which thought the world to be made up of things (substances or essences) situated in empty space….Rejecting this view, Whitehead and Hartshorne propose that the world is “co-created” at every moment by Goddess/God and all the individual beings in the cosmos with a degree of freedom. Process philosophy assumes that the divine power is present within all individuals in the universe, supporting and sustaining them but not determining their every movement Goddess/God holds the whole together so that it will not explode into sheer chaos. Goddess/God is present with and in every individual hoping to lure or persuade it to make choices that will be beneficial both to itself and to the whole of life.”
She Who Changes
, Carol P. Christ
Mother's Day is an invitation to think and feel deeply. Join us, co-create with us, give thanks to God/dess with us.
We will also have conversation about everyone's vision for church. How about Japanese rituals, building a straw bale house church, elders intentional community, planting trees, programs in UU churches and in community, dance classes, book group,
She Who Changes
, by Carol P. Christ and more. What are your visions, dreams, ideas, thoughts for our church?
Join us next week when we have our first membership ceremony as well as a Japanese ritual for closure and gratitude after our Earth Day Programs.
Love always,
Bonnie
Field Trip next Saturday My 19
th
to Salvation Mountain by Salten Sea.
NEW MEMBER Ceremony next Sunday May 20th
for James Long and special Japanese ritual for closure and blessings of Earth Day events.
Special thanks
to everyone who came last week and to James and Kaori Long for the gift of Karaoke last week. How about we do Karaoke once a month? .
Weekly Lectio Divina
and Centering Prayer
Contemplation of scriptures for following Sunday and an ancient Christian contemplative prayer practice every Wednesday, 10-11 am.
Monthly Taize first Sunday of every month.
Monthly Prayer and Healing Service third Sunday 5 pm
.
Dream Circle
every first and third Sunday before church 3-5 pm.
New Nia like intergenerational dance class
to begin this summer.
Painting the Dance Floor
, call if you are interested in working on this.
New AA and Alanon 12 step
to begin this summer.
Our Common Home Counseling Center’s services
: addiction issues, PTSD, individual and group therapy, Spiritual Direction, Pastoral Counseling, etc.
