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 When is the last time you have played? Not "play" a sport or a competitive game but just play for the sake of playing? No intentions for an outcome, no gains to be achieved - just simply and delightfully playing. These last fifteen months have been hard, isolating, and at times frightening. Play may not have been at the top of our priorities this year, with the pandemic, elections, inequities, and the suffering of our Siblings of Color. Play can sometimes feel like a luxury when the people and world around us need so much attention. And sometimes it is absolutely discouraged with words like, "Stop playing around!" or "You play too much!"
Yet play, my beloveds, is essential. -
O. Fred Donaldson, psychologist and author of Original Play, reminds us that "children learn as they play and more importantly, in play, children learn how to learn." He continues, "Children play for the same reason that water flows and birds fly."
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Ralph Waldo Emerson sees play as a trait, "It is a happy talent to know how to play."
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Carl Jung declares, "The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct."
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Abraham Maslow connects it to creativity, "Almost all creativity involves intentional play."
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Mr. Fred Rogers reminds us that "When children play, they're using their imaginations to move beyond the bounds of reality."
The incredible thing about play is that it is not only for children, even though adults may forget the joy of play as our lives become more complicated and full of responsibilities. But our Unitarian Universalist faith supports and encourages us to embrace play by connecting with the direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life. Or, in simpler terms, we teach our children that in play, we can connect to "the sense of wonder we all share."
This month Jefferson Unitarian Church's children and adult faith formation are encouraging play as a way for us to discover our sense of wonder and direct experience with play that renews our spirit and opens us all up to life.
As you go about the next month, how can you: -
Nurture your mind and body with play?
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Connect to people in play?
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Renew and re-energize your spirit with play?
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Create new ways to connect with the natural world through play?
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Heal aches in your soul through play?
We would love to hear about the ways you are playing this month. Feel free to post how you are playing on our Virtual Commons or Families Facebook pages or write us an email, or a note. We look forward to hearing all the ways you are playing in June.
Blessings and love to you and your families as you discover more ways to play in your lives.
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Board of Trustees Report
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The Safety Team provided an update to the Board. The Safety team continues to monitor CDC, state, and county guidance, which will allow the Board and Staff to make an informed decision regarding the eventual resumption of in-person services at the Church building. Detailed safety guidelines will be established before any final decisions are made.
Thank you to those who completed the Spirit Map survey. The compiled results will be instrumental in how the Board and Staff plan over the coming years.
In preparation for the new Church fiscal year beginning July 1, the Board is finalizing an onboarding process for new Board members, including a new Board member manual.
The process for the Spring Congregational Vote is finalized. Voting will be conducted for new members of the Board of Trustees, Leadership Nominating Committee, and the Endowment and Memorial Gift Trust, as well as the 2021-22 budget.
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Story and Planned Giving
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We all have stories from our past that we cherish. Understandably, we can have past stories that are not helpful or even are barriers to our living productive, healthy and joyful lives. The future can be different from the past based on what we do with the present moment. We always have the power to create the story for the rest of our lives. We are not in this alone. We have the beloved community of JUC to support us in being brave and going forward to create newer stories that reflect the wonderful humans we are.
Your support for JUC through your gifts in your estate plan can create a wonderful legacy story for you and support the present and future generations of our beloved community in creating their stories. Contact JUC's planned giving coordinators: Bud & B.J. Meadows, Mike Kramer or Carol Wilsey
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Spring Congregational Vote
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Voting is in process. Complete voting information can be found on the JUC website's 2021 Spring Congregational page. The deadline for voting is Sunday, June 13.
Eligible members may access a ballot in one of the following three ways:
- Vote electronically using this form;
- Print your ballot and mail it in;
- Request that a ballot be mailed to you by calling (303-279-5282) or emailing the JUC office. Please include your mailing address.
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14 Months of Zoom Choir Rehearsals; or "Silver Linings"
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At a recent Wednesday in May, the JUC Choir celebrated the completion of an era: weekly choir rehearsals since the beginning of the pandemic. Starting in March 2020, Wednesday Choir Gatherings moved to Zoom, and with the exception of a Wednesday before Thanksgiving and a couple after Christmas, the choir met continuously, even - for the first time ever - during the summer of 2020.
Last May, a year ago, I posted a photo of the choir's gathering to social media.
Some choral conductor colleagues whose choirs had stopped meeting altogether wondered what the purpose was, if the choir couldn't actually hear each other due to Zoom lag time. My answer a year ago:
The purposes are much different now. Wednesday night gatherings are no longer to prepare music for Sunday mornings. Instead a lot of time is spent keeping voices flexible and resilient by doing chair yoga and vocal maintenance. Also keeping the sense of choral community and the idea that the group is going through this time together. Each evening includes check in times in smaller breakout with guided questions. I'll often share a video like the great ones being produced daily by Vocalessence which combine vocal development with inspiration. And we sing Happy birthday and last night concluded with our typical first Wednesday wine and cheese.
One year later, the Choir's May 2021 celebration event on Zoom, concluded this particular era featuring funny hats, a round of "Name that Hymn," some reflection time in breakout rooms, and an invitation to share takeaways from this year. Here's what some of our choir members said about the importance of this time:
"This experience has been a lifeline." "When we created our first video, Blue Boat Home, I started to see that we could create music in a new way." "I appreciated that we met during all last summer, which is not what we normally do. It held me together - I'm not sure I missed one session." "I loved when we would stop rehearsal for a moment at 8 p.m., go outside, and howl for first responders." "The people have been so important to me. Just being able to meet together in breakout rooms." "I feel like I have gotten to know people that I never really saw before." "I have enjoyed the warmups, making siren sounds, throwing frisbees." "It was hard to keep singing during last summer's fires." "Being able to watch the virtual choir creations was so rewarding." "Folks were able to participate from afar - we had singers living on both the East Coast and West Coast." "It was a connection to other people. We'll evolve from this and be stronger even when we get back in person."
The JUC Choir's experience echoes that of many other choirs and musical ensembles around the country, who had to learn completely new ways of being together. In order to participate, one had to become familiar with new technologies and create a mini-home recording studio. There was personal and spiritual work needed to participate as well, as choir members had to become comfortable hearing their own voice in recordings, over and over. And there was the sense that the group was doing something together, going through this tough time not alone, but with one another, and the sense of camaraderie and companionship was strengthened during this time.
The Choir is now taking a break for awhile, as the world begins to reimagine what is now possible. In the future, there will be more opportunities to sing - whether online or in person. And the door will be open for you, you who think you might like to sing but haven't done so in a group before. Or maybe you were once in a choir but it has been awhile, and you are wondering when and if you would be welcome in the JUC Choir. The answer is a resounding YES. This last year has taught us that the choir is both a learning community and an open one (folks joined the choir during the pandemic).
Underscoring all of the experience of singing in the JUC Choir is the music that upholds the values and principles that we as a people say are important. It is said that "talking about music" is like "dancing about architecture," so let's let the music communicate the priorities of Unitarian Universalism in its own way: here are the virtual choir videos produced during this extraordinary time.
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Just Play
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 Case Collard, Trustee
I asked my youngest, Ramona, what I should write about play. She's seven. She said that I should write that I have three kids that like to play outside, play video games, play dolls, play house, play basketball. It's true - I have three excellent play-ers living in my very own house. Sometimes I wish I was as good at playing as they are. But they remind me what it was like to play and feel the freedom of childhood. And that is nice.
Play as an adult feels different to me. It comes less naturally. Sometimes I ask myself a judgmental question about play: what do I do for fun? I don't have a simple answer anymore and I can't rattle off as many things as Ramona. I gave up motorcycling. Does playing with the kids count? Does watching a show or a movie in the evening to unwind really count as "fun" or "play"? I tell myself I should set aside more time for fun. And sometimes that happens! During the pandemic I've started a weekly movie night with friends.
For me, play means trying not to take things too seriously. Do I bring a light heart to my work and interactions with my colleagues? Do I have some fun while cleaning up the kitchen after a meal? Am I generally ready to have a laugh at our board meetings? I think so. And when the chance to be playful arises, luckily I have three experts in my house that remind me to jump right in.
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JUC uses a fairly unusual pledge process we call Year Round Pledging (YRP). Most churches have an annual campaign during which they make a big push for pledges over a limited (but intense) period of time. We switched from that traditional method to YRP in 2012, nearly a decade ago!!! YRP can be a bit confusing until you get used to it, so here are the basics:
- Your pledge tells us how much you plan to give over a twelve month period based on your pledge month.
- Pledging is not the same as paying. You will pledge ahead of time and pay over the course of the following twelve months.
- You can pay in one lump sum, monthly, or in any way you like over that twelve month period.
- Our accounting is easier if you do complete your pledge payments during the pledge period.
- We have twelve pledge months corresponding to the calendar months.
- Here is an example:
- Your pledge month is June.
- We ask you in May to let us know what you plan to pay for the period June 1 through the following May 31.
- If you pledge $150 per month the total amount paid over that time would be $1,800.
- You might pay that by automatic transfer every month or one time using a Required Minimum Distribution from an IRA or another source, or periodically by check.
- You can also pay your pledge using appreciated stock for added tax benefits (let me know if you want more information on that method).
- Disadvantages of YRP (these are outweighed by the advantages listed below)
- As I mentioned, it can be confusing for those who are used to a different method.
- There is no big cheerleading time to campaign for pledge increases. AKA, no sermon about the pledge campaign.
- The accounting is more complex than for a traditional campaign.
- Advantages of YRP
- There is no special pledge time. It is part of the normal work of the church.
- It is routine and much less labor intensive and expensive than an annual campaign.
- We can spend more time following up with those who do not remember to return their pledge form because it is a smaller number of households.
- We have a much better handle on our members and pledge income than with the traditional pledge campaign.
I really think the biggest advantage is that first one: this is just part of the work of the church. We don't have to have a giant gala consuming the energy of volunteers and staff to know that we need to support the ministries of the church. If you have questions about YRP, or about your pledge specifically, please let me know. I am happy to talk it through with you.
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Stories of Hope 4: Guest at Your Table 2020-2021 Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC)
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 Stephanie Wells
"People cross the border in search of new opportunities for their families," Adela RamÃrez explains. "That is why we always say that migrating is an act of love." A human rights advocate in Guatemala, Adela has a deep understanding of the conditions in the country that make it impossible for many to remain in their home communities. Violence against women, extreme poverty, discrimination against Indigenous peoples, and lack of opportunities for young people are some of the key factors leading record numbers of people - the majority of them Indigenous - to migrate from Guatemala.
 For many Maya People and Guatemalans who migrate, the painful process of leaving home is only the beginning of new challenges. "When we are forced to leave our communities, we leave behind everything that is known to face an unknown world," Adela explains. "In a way, the family is broken. We face many risks and many even lose their lives along the way." These challenges are compounded by anti-immigrant sentiment and increasingly harsh immigration policies in the United States and Mexico - which are narrowing the legal paths to asylum, rejecting valid asylum claims, and targeting undocumented people who have lived in the country for years. (Additionally, fleeing food insecurity is not considered valid grounds for asylum, an exclusion especially relevant for Guatemalans migrating.) "Migrating people are treated like criminals," Adela explains. "When they are captured and returned to their communities, children are left in shelters and other places where their rights are violated."
This is where Adela and others working with Pop No'j come in. (Adela is pictured left, above.) A UUSC partner since 2017, Pop No'j is a civil society organization that advocates for the rights of people migrating and supports people after they have been deported from the United States or Mexico to Guatemala. With UUSC's support, Pop No'j staff members like Adela accompany families throughout the process of return and reintegration, providing mental health services, educational support, and vocational training. "This accompaniment work is very important since it includes psychosocial care," Adela shares. "Separation deeply impacts their emotional and mental health."
Pop No'j continued work during COVID-19, including distributing food and money to support families facing food insecurity during the crisis.
In this 8-minute video, Adela explains the challenges facing her people and the hope Asociación Pop No'j and UUSC have given them.
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Doing the Work
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 Alex Wilder
A good friend of ours called me the other day. She was upset and near tears. She told me that she and her teenage daughter were going home and that the police had blocked off half the street with their vehicles, but that she saw no other signs of an emergency or crisis going on. She slowly brought her plug-in hybrid SUV up and was getting ready to drive around them once she was certain that there was no traffic coming the other way.
An officer then waved them to a stop, approached her and asked them to take another route through the neighborhood. Our friends live in a subdivision with a road layout akin to a dropped mass of spaghetti. She told the officer that they were almost home, that it would take them an extra ten minutes for them to get home taking an alternate route, that they could see that there was no oncoming traffic, and could they please just be let through. The officer was adamant that they would not be let through.
Once they were turned around and taking the long way home our friend's daughter asked her mother why she argued with the police? Our friend was mortified that she was unconsciously modeling privileged white suburbanite behavior to her teenage daughter; a person of color.
After they got home safely, our good family friend called me to check in and talk it out.
We talked about how racism permeates every person in, and therefore every aspect of, our society. We talked about how even though we do the work of anti-racism we can still be taken by surprise when it leaks out of us yet again in the most subtle ways. We talked about the frustration that our implicit biases remain even as we intellectually check our actions and communications. We talked about how racism insinuates itself into our relationships and can obscure the lived experiences of those closest to us, up to and including our own flesh and blood.
It was cathartic, but we weren't done yet. She also had a favor to ask of me.
She was hesitant to ask this favor. We had talked before about, how to some friends of ours, I'm the only adult person of color they know and how it was hurtful to me when they would ask me tell them stories of being pulled over while walking down the street, about the first time it was thrust in my face that I was a brown kid, about being approached by police with their guns drawn, about how I like wearing glasses as sometimes people find me less threatening, about being cut in front of in all manner of lines by white people, about being horrified the one time I slipped and talked back to a police officer during a traffic stop. How these friends of ours gathered to play board games one night, decided in their own unexamined ignorance to ask me "When was the last time something racist happened to you?"
So she was hesitant, but concern for her daughter's well-being pushed her to ask me to please have "the person of color talk" with her teenage daughter.
I know her daughter was the product of a previous union and that her biological father was no longer in the picture. I know that our friend has since remarried to a wonderful friend of ours whose ancestry is Jewish American. I told her that I understood her hesitance that she did not want to be like our other friends in their callousness. That she did not want to add yet another wound to my soul. That she was still doing the work, and that I still regard her as an ally, even after asking this. I know that this family of good friends and allies has no one else to turn to that can bring their lived experience to their daughter to maximize her chances of getting home alive.
I accepted and told her that I am honored to do so.
We should be getting together in a couple weeks as the weather is getting nicer and vaccines are received and are becoming more widespread. It will be a difficult talk, and most likely just the beginning of an ongoing conversation. It will also be more practice for me as Lauren and I continue to raise our own daughter of color.
Anti-racism work is difficult work. It is often soul rending, heart breaking and tearful. It is intense and uncomfortable. It is messy and there is no easy way to do it, but we must do it for we are the ones here, now. We do it to build a better society that we may only see glimpses of, a future that we will not live in but that we will have helped build for those we love and those we will never meet.
Be fierce when you must.
Be kind when you can.
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Showup Identification Procedures (Racial Justice)
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 Jill Armstrong and Steve Gebhard
This month, we want to tell you about the recent success of Together Colorado's bill: HB21-1142 "Eyewitness Identification Showup Regulations," that successfully passed both houses of the Colorado legislature and is on its way to the Governor to be signed into law.
JUC is a member congregation of Together Colorado. You probably read about the incident that the son of one of Together Colorado's members had in Rev. Eric's excellent article in the January 2021 issue of Ignite Rev. Eric's article. Our work with Denver Police Chief Pazen after the meeting at Shorter Community AME Church  resulted in Denver implementing many practices that would become an important part of the bill's framework.
Together Colorado reached out to stakeholders on both sides of the issue, including the ACLU, the Colorado Defense Bar, the Colorado Association of Chiefs of Police, the Colorado District Attorney's Council, the Colorado Criminal Defense Bar, Chiefs of individual departments, state legislators, academic researchers, other expert witnesses, over 180 congregations and Faith Leaders statewide, and many others.
The bill passed the House Judiciary Committee, the House Floor, the Senate Judiciary Committee, and then the House floor again with a bipartisan vote of 42-20. The next step is for Governor Polis to sign it into law.
The bill has been called an outstanding model of community organizing and how to do a bill correctly. All too often, bills tend to be one-sided and forced on one's opponents. The fact that Together Colorado reached out to stakeholders on both sides of the issue is historic.
When the bill becomes law, the showup procedure will be standardized statewide across all law enforcement agencies. The bill:
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Requires an update of the current model policies and training for showup eyewitness identification procedures to reflect current recognized best practices.
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Requires the Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) board to certify that law enforcement agencies have adopted the required policies.
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Limits the admissibility of showup eyewitness identifications in court if not conducted properly.
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Requires that data collection on the use of showups be added to currently required data collection by law enforcement.
Some useful links for further information:
If you would like to be added to the JUC CAN Action Alert list to receive timely updates about this and other Colorado legislation, please send an email to [email protected].
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UU the Vote: Ranked Choice Voting
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 Pam Moser
When I first heard of Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) last summer it seemed like a good thing. The more I learn about it, the more convinced I am that it would help solve some of the issues we have in our country today. RCV is a voting system that allows voters to rank their candidates in order of preference. In an "instant runoff" a candidate is elected only after receiving 50% +1 of the vote. It is used statewide in Maine, and in many U.S. cities.
There is currently a bill in the Colorado Senate, HB21-1071, that will allow localities to run ranked-choice elections through their counties.
Among the benefits of using RCV:
- Voters can honestly rank candidates in order of choice, no more voting "for the lesser of two evils."
- Candidates must compete for second choice votes from their opponents' supporters which lessens the incentive to run a negative campaign.
- A jurisdiction can enjoy the benefits of two (or more) rounds of voting in a single, more representative, higher-turnout election, saving time and money.
- Promotes the representation of historically under-represented groups.
- Protects the right to vote for people serving overseas in the armed forces or living abroad with the elimination of a runoff election.
Now is the time to contact your State Senators and ask them to vote for HB21-1071. Your UU the Vote group here at JUC is currently focusing on three areas: voter suppression, local elections, and RCV. We meet on the 3rd Thursday of the month, your participation in living our 5th principle would be welcomed. If you have questions, please email [email protected].
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