Christmas Eve Service
Dec. 24, 7:00 PM

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Join us for a special service of candlelight, carols, music and story.

 

The theme in worship and religious education this month is AWE.

A Holiday Letter from NUUC

At NUUC, we will be celebrating the holiday in multiple ways: our community Solstice service, our Christian Eve worship, and, our Holiday Family program. For the Holiday Family program, we have adopted the participants in the Horizon Prison Initiative at the Ohio Reformatory for Women again this year. We will be providing them with journals, food and drink for a holiday party, ongoing support for their programming, and personalized holiday cards. It matters so much to the women to know that people remember them and their situation. This time of year is often an especially challenging one for them. Supporting the Horizon program-with both volunteer and monetary resources---is just one of the things we do here at North Unitarian Universalist Congregation to support our mission of "Welcome - Connect -Inspire-Act."  

Speaking of realizing our mission, the holiday season seems like the perfect time to catch you up on the doings of this past year.  

We have had a very busy year this year with our efforts to build our capacity to further advance our mission by expanding our building in a way that will more fully allow us to realize our goals. Here's a quick look of where we are and where we are going (should you like more detail, you can find it on our website, from the front page just click the menu button for "building expansion").

 

Building Design and Construction

We have a full set of schematic design for the building expansion from our architect, Kay Onwukwe, based on the original design scheme we approved last December. You can see his designs in 3-D and artistic renderings on our website, just head to www.nuuc.org and use the "Building Expansion" menu tab. We are excited by Onwukwe's plans, which give us considerably more space for worship, religious education, and fellowship. What's next? We are currently in the process of completing the purchase (for legal and transactional costs only) of two acres of property from DelCo Water company. This brings our total property holdings to five acres, which will allow us to have the considerable size of our expansion approved by the Orange township Zoning board without special consideration. As soon as that transaction is complete, Mr. Onwukwe will complete the site plan. The Grounds Design Committee will work with him on planning locations for a memorial garden, natural playscapes, protected play areas for the children, an outbuilding, and other features. Once the site plan is complete, we can return to Orange Township for final approval of our plans. At that point the Building Committee will spring into action, asking construction companies to bid on our project. We anticipate breaking ground this Spring.

 

Capital Campaign

The first phase of our Capital Campaign launched this past Spring was enormously successful, with a little under $800K raised or pledged. What's next? Once we have the final drawings of both the building and the site, we can refine our current cost estimates to a more precise figure. Once we have that figure, we will launch the final, "matching gift" "close the gap" phase of the capital campaign. We have one matching gift of $45K promised and three additional donors who have already indicated a willingness to contribute for the match.

 

Our Annual Operating Budget  

This summer, we switched our fiscal year from Jan. 1 - Dec. 31 to the more standard July 1-June 30. This also allowed us to do a combined ask for the capital campaign and the operating budget in the Spring. It also left us with a rather confusing six-month fiscal period that lasted from Dec. 31, 2019-June 31, 2020. As we did an ask for pledges in the spring, we did not do an additional campaign for the annual budget with the start of the July 1 new fiscal year. For these reasons, we find that our current pledges total a little under $10K the amount needed to sustain our current operating budget. Because of this, we are making a special holiday appeal for gifts to the annual operating budget. Your gift of any size is most welcome to help us sustain our programs until we develop a new canvass and a new budget in the late Spring of 2020. You can give by enclosing a check made out to NUUC with "holiday appeal" in the greeting card you return to us, by mailing us a check at any time or placing one in the offering basket (again, noting "holiday appeal" in the memo line), or online by going to the www.nuuc.org website and clicking on the red "donate" button. We realize that all the changes to the way we do the annual canvass and budget have been confusing for many, so in early December all pledging members will receive an accounting of what we have received from you during the July 1-June 30 period, and what you have contributed since July 1, 2019, as well as what we have as your current record pledge amount. This letter is in addition to the usual tax deduction later we will send out in January.

 

Thank you so much for all you do to support our programs and mission. If you have any questions, please contact [email protected].