Upcoming Events
Sun. 9/8
Social Justice Meeting
Adult RE Room
9:30 - 10:30 a.m.
Worship Committee Meeting
Fellowship Hall
9:30 - 10:30 a.m.
Worship Service
In-Gathering / Water Communion
10:45 a.m.
Picture Directory Sign-Up
Fellowship Hall
12:00 p.m.
Music Committee Meeting
Music Room
1:00 - 2:00 p.m.
Wed. 9/11
Small Matters Small Groups (Group C)
1:00 - 2:30 p.m.
UUkulele Fun Group
5:45 - 6:45 p.m.
Adult RE Film Showing: Selma
7:00 - 9:00 p.m.
Choir Practice
7:00 - 8:45 p.m.
Sat. 9/14
Property Work Day
Details TBA
Sun. 9/15
Small Matters Small Groups (Group D)
9:00 - 10:30 a.m.
Worship Service
Rev. Ed Brock
10:45 a.m.
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The UUkulele Fun Group is open to everyone, regardless of skill level.
The group meets every 2nd and 4th Wednesday at 5:45 p.m.
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Huntsville Assistance Program
The Social Justice Committee has a goal to collect at least
100 items each month for the food pantry; you donated 150 food items and tons of toiletries in the month of July.
Please put your nonperishable food items or personal care products donations in the basket in the church foyer for the Huntsville Assistance Program.
Please, no canned corn, beans, or peas! They are currently overloaded with those items.
Sponsored by the Social Justice Committee
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UUCH's Free Food Pantry is installed in the parking lot and is now stocked. The Social Justice Committee will restock the pantry with non-perishables, as needed, and you can, too.
See the Social Justice Committee for more information on what items are in need.
Sponsored by the Social Justice Committee
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During August and September, we will share the Sunday offering with the Huntsville nonprofit
Knight's Village.
Sponsored by the Social Justice Committee
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UUCH 2019-20
Board Members
President:
John Schulz
Vice President:
Denise Runnels
Secretary:
Nick Wilbourn
Treasurer:
David Bollinger
Trustees:
Ed Bernstein
Jack Long
Bryan Walls
Interim Minister:
The Rev. Edward L. Brock
Do you have an agenda item for the Board?
The Board respectfully requests that all agenda items for the meeting be submitted to
Board President John Schulz
via email no later than one week prior to the meeting (i.e. the Tuesday before).
The next board meeting will be Tuesday, September 24
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The Overlook is a publication of The Unitarian Universalist Church, 3921 Broadmor Rd., Huntsville, AL 35810
Interim Minister:
The Rev. Edward L. Brock
Board President:
John Schulz
Editor:
Nick Wilbourn
Newsletter deadlines are each Monday at midnight.
Any committee with newsletter announcements should send submissions to news collator Amanda Schuber at [email protected].
Office Hours:
8 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Monday, Wednesday, & Friday
Office Phone:
Minister's Email: [email protected]
Website: www.uuch.org
Sunday Services are held 10:45 a.m. to
12:00 p.m. Children's Religious Education held concurrently. Nursery available for ages 3 years and under.
For more info on any event, contact the church office.
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Upcoming Service
In-gathering / Water Communion
September 8, 2019
The start of the school year marks the end of summer and the return to our routines and schedules. It's also a signal for the beginning of a new church year.
Each year, UU congregations around the country celebrate the end of the summer season and the return to "regular" church life by hosting an In-gathering / Water Communion service.
We invite you to bring a bit of water gathered from your summer travels (be it faraway lands, your local swimming hole, or the garden hose out back) to blend with the waters from communions past and share a bit about your adventures. If you forgot to bring back any water, or TSA wouldn't let you bring it back, don't worry... we will have "symbolic" water available for you.
This is a moving ceremony designed to welcome us back into community after our summer travels. We hope you will join us this Sunday for a joyful, inter-generational service.
September 15: Rev. Ed Brock
September 22: Rev. Ed Brock
September 29: Rev. Ed Brock
September Theme: Expectation
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Welcome back to the fall program of Children and Youth Religious Education (CYRE) at UUCH! The first day of fall curricula will be September 15.
As always, children and youth will begin the service in the sanctuary with our full, multi-generational congregation and will go to their RE rooms after the Story for Sharing. The worship service will include a ceremony of dedication for our CYRE teachers and volunteers. After the service, we will have an ice cream social for all ages in the Fellowship Hall and playground areas.
If you have not done so already, please register children and youth for this year's program. Paper registration is available at the church, or you can register online.
Our usual CYRE age-based groups are listed below, and we will update you on any changes to this year's room configurations.
- Nursery (ages infant to 3, staffed by experienced childcare providers)
- Peace (ages 4 / pre-K to grade 1)
- Justice (grades 2-3)
- Searchers (grades 4-5)
- Transformers (grades 6-8)
- YOUUTH (grades 9-12)
This year's theme is Side with Love: exploring our justice-making identity as Unitarian Universalists, and how justice is rooted in love. We have terrific curricula from UUA's Tapestry of Faith, which explore our principles and values and incorporate justice and outreach actions every month. Lessons are highly interactive and story-based, with games, crafts, music, projects, and more!
We will continue to integrate our monthly Soul Matters worship themes with our stories, RE worship time, singing, and discussions. We begin the month of September with the theme of EXPECTATION.
Welcome back, or welcome for the first time! We are so pleased for your presence in the UUCH Children and Youth RE Program. As always, children and youth are invited to pick up their name tags in the foyer and wear them while at church, just like all ages. This is one way we welcome each other!
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Worship Committee Meeting
The Worship Committee is having its first meeting of the church year this Sunday in the Fellowship Hall from 9:30 - 10:30 a.m. If you have ever wanted to have input on elements of the service, be a pulpit host, assist with aesthetics, or be involved with any other part of worship, please come to our meeting this Sunday! You do not have to join the Worship Committee, but we would love to hear what you have to say.
If you cannot make the meeting but would still like to be part of worship, please email the Worship Team, and let us know how you would like to be included.
Light refreshments will be provided at the meeting.
Submitted by the Worship Committee
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Your Two Minutes of Fame!
As part of the ministerial search process, we will be providing videos for prospective ministerial candidates to familiarize them with our church, our members, and what we hope to find in our settled minister. Barbara Hitt will be taking short videos of members responding briefly to two questions:
- What do you like about UUCH?
- What attributes do you hope to find in our settled minister?
The videos will be
scheduled immediately after church on two Sundays:
September 8 (THIS SUNDAY) and September 15. Each individual video clip will be short -- just two minutes or so -- and the clips will be combined into a video with many members expressing their thoughts. Do not worry about sounding professional or polished; just speak naturally, and if you hiccup/snort/sneeze, it's no problem to take a do-over!
We are a diverse congregation, and we want our video to reflect that, so we want youth and children to participate, as well as parents, singles, retirees, and all other members of our church community.
The videos will be taken in the Board Room, which is the last room in the RE Wing, across from the Adult RE Room. Since the entire RE Wing has to be vacated and quiet in order to take the videos, participants should wait in the Fellowship Hall until their turn. Someone from the Ministerial Search Committee will send participants to be videoed, one at a time.
It will also be important for parents to collect their children from the RE classrooms and the nursery immediately after church on the days we will be videoing.
To sign up, you can either email
Barbara Hitt, or click the
SignUpGenius link. Thanks so much for helping to make our search process a success!
Submitted by the Ministerial Search Committee
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Smile and Say "Cheese" -- It's Picture Directory Time
It's time to update our church picture directory. Schedule your LifeTouch appointment now. Every participating family receives a free professional portrait. Plus, just in time for holiday cards and gifts, if you purchase photographs, LifeTouch will include a 30% off coupon to Shutterfly.
Our scheduled dates are October 22 and 23, with additional dates possible, if needed. Sign up now to claim your preferred time and day. We also will have sign-up forms available before and after church on Sunday.
Submitted by the Membership Committee
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Ministerial Search Timeline
The Ministerial Search Committee is busy working through the phases necessary for a successful search for a settled minister. We have familiarized ourselves with the procedures for the search, worked on establishing roles for the upcoming work of the Committee, completed an informative "Beyond Categorical Thinking" workshop for our congregation, and designed a survey to gather opinions from the congregation. A video of our church with interviews of the congregation is currently in progress.
Things now will be moving quickly as we work toward our goal of
having a settled minister in place by August 2020.
Here is a brief timeline of some of the important upcoming events:
- Distribute survey to the congregation (late August)
- Produce video about UUCH (September- October)
- Hold cottage meetings and interviews with the congregation (October)
- Complete our congregational record and documents to be made visible to searching ministers (November - December)
- These materials are the way we present our church to the potential candidates. The packet will include demographic data, church bylaws, policies, newsletters, survey information, our Covenant, annual reports, minutes from board meetings, information about our area, and other information to help the candidates see who we are.
- Receive the initial list of applicants (first week of January 2020)
- Conduct video interviews, reference checks, and website reviews (January)
- Ministerial Search Committee will have per-candidate visits to determine the one candidate we will bring to the congregation for a full interview (February 1 - March 29)
- Conduct background checks (late March - early April)
- Announce the candidate who will be presented to congregation (early April)
- Candidating Week (late April - early May)
- This is the opportunity for the congregation to meet the ministerial candidate the Committee has chosen to present. Candidating Week usually runs for nine days, from Saturday through Sunday.
- The candidate will lead services on both Sundays, as well as hold question-and-answer sessions with the congregation.
- The week culminates on the final Sunday with a congregational vote whether or not to call this candidate as our minister.
- Preparation for the new ministry (May - July)
- Arrival of new minister (August 1, 2020)
Your Ministerial Search Committee wants to keep you informed at all stages of the search. Please contact us if you have any questions at
[email protected], or speak to any of the committee members.
Committee members are Betsy Applegate, Laurel Bollinger, Suzey Delacey, Nancy Finley, Vickie Goodman, Barbara Hitt, Brad Korb (Chair), and Tim Miller.
Submitted by the Ministerial Search Committee
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UUCH Board Report
August 27, 2019
The UUCH Board conducted its regularly scheduled meeting on August 27, 2019.
The Communications Task Force recently prioritized the launching of our new church website, as improving our website has been identified as important for the ministerial search process. It is anticipated that our new website will launch in the near future.
Rev. Ed Brock and Bob Locklear presented updates on chancel renovation plans. We are currently receiving bids from general contractors for the renovation work. A formal proposal for renovation plans will soon be presented to the Board, after which a proposal will be presented for congregational vote.
A Negotiating Team is being formed for the purpose of negotiating the new minister's salary and benefits package. This team will not be involved in the ministerial search process but will work closely with the Ministerial Search Committee (MSC) and the Board. The team will include one MSC member, one Board member, and one member of the congregation appointed by the Board.
We are currently working to complete the process to designate UUCH as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
The next Board meeting will be Tuesday, September 24.
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Care List
This Sunday, September 1, 2019,
at our Circle of Candles:
Ariel DeBardelaben lit a candle of joy: Thank you to everyone who brought us food after the birth of Odin. We are incredibly thankful. Between my fellow Feminist Choir members and UUs bringing us food, we haven't had to cook! We are incredibly thankful. Blessed be.
Thelia (Bridgit) DeMoor lit a candle of joy: I'm alive! I made it through my operation! Thanks so much to the Feminist Chorus for so much love, support and kindness. What a wonderful retreat filled with so much love, music and positive vibes. Thanks to this spiritual community, including Rev. Brock, who counseled and advised me when I badly need it. I send you all my sincere thanks.
Jefflyn Weed lit a candle of joy: Cheri Smith would like to say thank you for all the meals and visits during her continuing recovery from the accident, in which she fractured her humerus. The food was really appreciated. Also, it has been difficult for her to pay her bills. If you would like to help, please see Jefflyn.
Rachael Scheib lit candle of joy: New employment has started at Josie's Burritt on the Mountain, where I'm a manager. Thank you for all the positive referrals.
Caroline Strickland lit a candle of both joy and sorrow: My grandmother form New York has come to visit us! She is leaving on Thursday, but we will do all we can with her while she is here! My other grandmother, who lives here, was recently moved to a nursing home. She is not happy, but I hope she feels more at home soon.
Nora Schuber lit a candle of joy: Today is my birthday party, and I'm very, very, happy that my friends and my parents are coming!
Amanda Schuber lit a candle of concern and joy: As the school year starts for me, I ask for prayers and good energy. This second year of Divinity School promises to be stressful, amazing and transformative. Hugs, wine, coffee and funny memes are all welcome!
Kathy Fisher lit a candle of sorrow: I am sad to tell you of the recent death of my friend and colleague, Hope Duve. Hope was an excellent piano teacher for over 50 years!
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