Dear Beloved Community at CCSM,
I hope you had some relaxing time with family and friends over Labor Day weekend. I look forward to seeing many of this Homecoming Sunday. This week I will begin our new series and we will be talking about rebuilding community. We will still be masked and socially distanced, the children’s programs will remain outside, and we will not be having our traditional homecoming BBQ—however, the best gift we have is being able to see each other and be together, whether in the sanctuary or online. Those who are able to come in person, please plan on lingering outside on the loggia or the lawn after the service and enjoy the company of others who you may not have seen in 18 months!
I know that many of you are still feeling hesitant to return in person—please know that we understand that and we feel your presence and know you are there online. I have heard from several of you who do not live locally and you have expressed how you feel connected seeing people back in church again as you are watching the service. We are one congregation, one in spirit, untied in our longing to be a more loving presence in the world.
I leave you with this meditation – in these unreliable times, I was reminded again this morning that I can choose to live in love, no matter the circumstance, and that the strength to love is always available to me if I open.
“It is only when attachments disappear that one enters the boundless realm of spiritual freedom called love. One is now released to see and to respond.
The orchestra is within you, and you carry it with you wherever you go. The things and people outside you merely determine what particular melody the orchestra will play. You now carry in your heart a happiness that nothing outside of you can put there, and nothing can take away.”
~The Way to Love: The Last Meditations of Anthony de Mello~
Please keep scrolling down as there are many ways to be involved and to volunteer.
And we wish all our Jewish brothers and sisters La shana tovah! as they celebrate Rosh Hashanah.
Love,
Penny
P.S. I dropped off my ballot today—have you voted yet?
