Weekly E-News
May 7, 2020
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Inspired by love, we transform ourselves and serve others.
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This Sunday, May 10th
Our Sunday service will be streamed via our website,
uucfm.org at 10:30 AM
and also available on video by
Zoom
gathering. There will be no physical service in our Sanctuary.
The service theme is
Mother Love
and is made possible by:
Rev. Margaret L. Beard
,
Minister
Jenn Blosser,
Director of Religious Education
Suellen Kipp,
Director of Music
Allie Carville,
Worship Associate
Peter Golbitz,
Musician
Lesley Peterson
,
Musician & Tech Team Member
Mark Brandon,
Tech Team Member
Walter Peterson,
Tech Team Member
Holley Rauen,
Tech Team Member
And YOU!
This is the Zoom meeting link for Sunday's Service:
If you join before 10:30 AM, you will be placed in an online "Waiting Room," and will manually be added when the worship team is ready to begin the service.
If you would like to make a pledge or donation to UUCFM at any time,
you may mail a check to UUCFM, 13411 Shire Lane, Fort Myers, FL 33912 or visit our PayPal at:
Type in your donation and in the notes section, please add either
for UUCFM
or
Community Sharing
or how much to split between both.
Our Community Sharing
partner this month is
Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida.
The mission of Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida, an affiliate of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc. is to provide affordable access to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health care and accurate health information through patient care, education and advocacy. This affiliate began operations in 1966 and presently provides vital sexual and reproductive health services, as well as comprehensive sexuality education to women, men and teens throughout southwest and central Florida. Due to the coronavirus outbreak, they are not allowing walk-ins at this time, please call 941-567-3800 to make an appointment.
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Upcoming Events
School of Wizardry!
Enrollment for the 2020 term of the School of Wizardry is open. The term begins on Monday, June 29th, and ends Friday July 3rd. Due to the current uncertainty brought on by the Corona virus pandemic, we are opening a light registration at this time. Space is limited to 44 participants for the term. We are monitoring the health situation closely and will not host programming at UUCFM if the CDC advises.
If we can't physically gather for camp, our team of dedicated volunteers are working to bring the School of Wizardry to their campers digitally! This virtual version of camp, scheduled for the same week, will be offered for a suggested donation of $50 per participant.
Should you have any questions or concerns, please contact:
Krista Hopper, Camp Director
Phone - (239) 464-1333
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Classes & Groups
The Book Club
May 13:
Ch. 6
May 20:
Ch. 7 and choosing our next book.
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UUCFM News
Online Photo Directory
During social distancing, it’s a great time for new members to get their photos into the UUCFM Online Photo Directory. That’s also true for other members whose photos aren’t yet in the Photo Directory. To make this happen, please email a head and shoulders digital photo of either single or couple members along with your full name(s) to Denis Jensen at
If you have never accessed the UUCFM Photo Directory, the directions for UUCFM Members are as follows:
- Go to the UUCFM website
- You can log in to the website by clicking on the light green login or register at upper right. If you’ve never logged in before, you need to email Lesley Peterson at [email protected] so she can allow you access. You will use your email as your user name and you must choose a password. Once your access is granted, you can log in.
- Once you’re logged in, click on Photo Directory from the Member Services block at left and you are in. You can also do a Membership Search or perform other activities once you have access.
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Transition Team Scheduling Member to Member Listening Groups on Zoom
We hope you will join us on Zoom. We have picked two dates - Monday, May 11 at 10:00 AM and Saturday May 16 at 10:00 AM. We will set up future dates in case you miss the May meetings, but we hope to have a small group of up to 8 people on these May Zoom video calls. We have four questions we want to ask you. It will help us plan out our future together.
All you need to do is email Karen Brown at
[email protected]
or call her at 862-432-0173. Once you make a commitment to join the call, you will be given an invitation link to get on Zoom via email. We hope many of you will email Karen or call her if you have questions. If you are not a Zoom fan, once we are together again, we will set up in-person groups. It will be a delight to gather together as we have been apart for so long.
Warmest regards from the Transition Team,
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From Our Caring Network
If you or another member of the Congregation needs some extra attention during this time, your Pastoral Care Committee is here to help as much as we can.
Our Committee members include Mary Faegre, Harvey Heckes, Joan Hickok, Marge Kolde, Mary Tracy-Sigman, Patricia Vivier-Naidl, Holley Rauen and Suzanne Ziemer. Leslie Gatto has also offered her help at this time. If any members of the Congregation are available to help during this crisis with picking up and delivering items, please contact Mary Golbitz.
As a way to keep our Community together we are offering Community Conference calls Wednesdays at 4:00 PM. These will be informal calls to check in, share and be able to offer support to one another. We may change to a Zoom format so we can see one another if all are comfortable with this.
Please call to informally connect with other members of the Congregation. The dial in number is
712-770-4898. Access Code is 634697#.
We can connect with you individually by phone if you are feeling isolated and offer other assistance such as getting groceries or other essentials for those who are unable to leave their homes while keeping us all safe and protected. Please contact Mary Golbitz for information or assistance:
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Member to Member
From Frances Pake:
I am inviting folks to join a limited number of people for a group sharing life stories. I have a few I am writing for my memorial service, whenever that might be. In the meantime I would like to get to know people while we are social distancing so we will know a few folks better when we meet next face to face. Stories will be shared with no more than 8 church members. If interested let me know and I will pass along the email addresses of those who wish to share.
[email protected]
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Social Justice
South Fort Myers Food Pantry
Yesterday I received an update from the pantry expressing the frustration they feel as they are challenged to obtain enough food for their clients. First they had to make massive adjustments to keep clients and volunteers safe. They never shut down and have been operating for the last five weeks as a drive through pantry, passing out bags of prepackaged food reminiscent of the early days before the pantry became a walk through “choice pantry”. They have worked out all the problems that this system presented and this week they will begin to register new clients. The volunteers there have been working very hard to make this happen.
You can probably imagine what has happened to their food source. They are still getting food from Harry Chapin Food Bank but of course every food pantry and mobile pantry that they send out are swamped with more and more clients every week. The churches are closed so they are not getting weekly food from the coalition churches. The markets and retail stores that were always a backup when the supply was getting low are now having problems keeping their own shelves stocked and are limiting regular shoppers to certain amounts per family. So what’s the solution?
Many of us may be feeling frustrated during Shelter in Place, wishing there were something we could do. It would be wonderful if you could fill a bag with food and bring it to the Food Pantry behind the Cypress Lake Presbyterian Church at 8260 Cypress Lake Drive in Fort Myers on any Monday between 9 & 10 AM or 3 to 3:30 PM. Remember your mask! Better still you could call friends or neighbors, tell them you are making a run to the South Fort Myers Food Pantry because they will be serving a big influx of people in the next few weeks, and would they like to donate some non perishable items? It sounds as though they could use almost anything but the items they mentioned were rice, cereal, pasta & pasta sauce, peanut butter, soup, canned vegetables and fruit.
If you do decide to do this, please, say that you are from UUCFM or just the Unitarian, Universalist Church. I think they’ll know which one. If physically you cannot do this maybe you have a friend that would be willing. Just a thought. There’s such a big need.
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May 3 Matt Hoffman
May 7 Priscilla Jeffcoat
May 8 Peg Clayton Fischer
May 9 Alison Carville
May 9 Helen Dixon
May 9 Walter Peterson
May 12 Ann Holmes
May 12 Fran Rose
May 14 Jim Stout
May 17 Elaine Swank
May 21 Mary Cline Golbitz
May 23 Cathy Snow
May 24 Janene Larson
May 29 Stephanie Moreland
May 30 Diane Buckley
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Please send all newsletter articles by
Wednesday at noon
for publication in Thursday's newsletter. Send articles to
[email protected]
.
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