President's
Message
Right
Relationship? Or a Right to Relationship?
(second in a series)
So,
what is this Right Relationship of which we speak?
What is to be our posture here? This text is intended
to explore this question and suggest some answers.
Being in Right Relation with another involves fully
accepting the identity of that individual, and
especially going out of one's way to acknowledge,
respect and appreciate the ways in which that person's
core identity differs from one's own. It is defined as
coming from Center in our interactions with the Other.
It entails acting always from a position of Love, of
Consciousness, of Intentionality, of Respect. It is
recognition in every word and action that the Other is
indeed a valued and precious member of the Beloved
Community.
Whatever
differences exist among Pagans, they are exponentially
increased in number and complexity when dealing with
members of our host churches who are not Pagan. It is
OUR responsibility to ease the ouchiness
of such situations for all concerned. WE are the
guests at the welcome table. As you would wish a guest
in your own home to behave, so should be your behavior
as a CUUPS member in your home congregation. In fact,
the Board of Trustees of CUUPS-Continental
re-emphasizes here that, should you desire to be in
full fellowship with, and a member in good standing
of, CUUPS-Continental, so MUST be your behavior. Our
interaction with chapters and members is also a
covenant relationship.
Here are some
basics. These are the minimum requirements for
ascertaining that your chapter, and its way of
conducting itself furthers (rather than hinders)
understanding and acceptance of Paganism within the
UUA. Let us, pay attention to behaviors which serve
to illustrate our Ethics here. Each of these ideas
corresponds with one of the UU Seven Principles.
Click
here to read the rest of the article on the CUUPS
website
(Next
month we'll continue to look at these basics.)
|
Our
Sponsors
If you have a CUUPS related event or
product that you'd like thousands of people to know
about - please email bulletin@cuups.org
!
|
|
Finance Report
Period:10/1
- 12/10, 2007
(rounded to nearest dollar)
Balance
10/1 : 1267
Revenue:
Member Dues 967
Chapter Dues 145
Donations: 25
Bank Fee Refund: 22
Expense:
Bulletin Expense 252
Paypal Charges 12
Bank Fee 11
Balance
12/10 : 2144
We
will need to have $5000 on hand by the end of March if
we are to fund our General Assembly presence without
resorting to borrowing from boardmembers.
|
|
CUUPS
Bulletin is a publication of the
Covenant of Unitarian Universalist Pagans, Inc.
The CUUPS Bulletin
is available for free to anyone interested in UU-Paganism.
To subscribe visit the CUUPS
website and fill in the form at the top of the
webpage.
Corporate Officers: Pres. -
Maureen Duffy-Boose, Vice Pres - David Pollard,
Secretary - Rev. Bonnie Dlott, Treasurer - Dick
Merritt
At large Boardmembers: Rev. Adam Robersmith,
Steve, Storm, Niko Tarini and Michael Walker.
Readership:
Dec. 2007 - 1,408
Jan. 2008 - 1,707
|
|
Greetings!
January is named for Janus
(Ianuarius),
the god of the doorway; the name has its
beginnings in Roman
mythology, where the Latin
word for door (ianua) comes from -
January is the door to the year.
Historical names for January include its
original Roman designation, Ianuarius, the Saxon
term Wulf-monath (meaning wolf month) and Charlemagne's
designation Wintarmanoth (winter / cold
month). In Finnish,
the month is called tammikuu, meaning month
of the oak, but the original meaning was the
month of the heart of winter, as tammi
has initially meant axis or core.
This month is in Czech
called leden, meaning ice month.
Welcome to the second issue of CUUPS
Bulletin where we feature the new flavor of Cakes
for the Queen of Heaven as well as a
round up of online UU resources for Imbolc.
Aisling talks about how we relate to our
Congregations and chapters. Also, we
kick-off our Bylaw Review with a posting of
the CUUPS Statement of Purpose.
|
|
|
"In
Ancient Times"
Volume One of the long-awaited update of
the popular feminist theology curriculum, Cakes
for the Queen of Heaven, is ready to
order. IN ANCIENT TIMES introduces
participants to ancient Goddesses, weaving
their stories together with major concerns
of women today.
The five-session adult religious education
curriculum includes an introductory section
featuring author Shirley's Ranck's
"Statement of Feminist Thealogy,"
Elinor Artman's "Brief Herstory of
Cakes," and Nancy Vedder-Shults,
"Baking Cakes for the Queen of
Heaven." The themes of the Session
Plans are: The Sacred Female, In the Name of
the Mother and the Daughter, Womanpower, The
First Turning-From Goddess to God, and
Reclaiming Women's Heritage of Peace."
The resource section includes supplementary
essays by a number of important authors, a
listing of highly recommended materials, and
the sheet music of songs by Carole
Eagleheart and Ann Forfreedom for use with
the curriculum. The curriculum also includes
a CD-ROM with five Visual Programs to
accompany the sessions, plus resource
material for easy distribution to
participants.
UU Women & Religion, Publisher
Funded in part by the Fund for Unitarian
Universalism and the UU Women's
Federation
ORDER FORM: Send to UU W&R Treasurer,
3224 Timmons Lane, #165,
Houston, TX 77027.
Thank you for your order!
Name_______________________________
Address_____________________________
___________________________________
Phone_______________________________
Email____________________________
Number of copies ordered ________
X $40 + $5 shipping = Total _________
____ Check enclosed,
payable to UU Women & Religion.
PRINTABLE
ORDER FORM
|
Imbolc
Resources
CUUPS
members Celebrate Imbolc
It seems that we're still cleaning up from Yule
rituals, but Imbolc is only a few weeks away.
While it can be fun to write your own stuff from
scratch, one of the advantages of being part of an
interdependent web is that someone out
there has probably already done what you've got
in mind, and
posted to a website!
Mountain CUUPS in Boone, NC have posted a detailed
pictoral of their 2006 Imbolc ritual. While
I don't see a script there, there are
several pictures of altars and setup procedures.
Another chapter which has a photo gallery of an
Imbolc service is Greater New Bedford CUUPS
which show the beautiful
candlelit altar they used at their 2001
Imbolc service.
For a sample of a really nice online ritual
announcement check Twin Cities CUUPS Imbolc
2008 webpage - complete with an RSVP link.
It's not just your basic when & where type
statement, but gives an indication of how
child-friendly the service is and even gives
clothing suggestions.
For those of you looking for ritual scripts. A
short 2004
Imbolc script can be found courtesy of
Lexington CUUPS.
And lastly, while they aren't CUUPS members as
they live in the UK, Earth-centered Unitarians
in England had a national gathering at Imbolc
2005. The Unitarian Earth Spirit Network has a
webpage describing the event.
|
|
Bylaw Review:
CUUPS Statement of Purpose
Early in CUUPS history a Statement of Purpose
was developed which has served our
organization very well. The only change to the
Statement (that I'm aware of) was that in the
mid-90's, when we changed
"Judeo-Christian dialogue" to its
present "interfaith dialogue".
Now, as part of our review process - we need
to take a fresh look at the Purposes and see
if there are any listed purposes which no
longer are appropriate for us, or if there are
new unforeseen items to be added.
If you would like to comment on these, please
send an email to: cuups-bylaws@yahoogroups.com
Bright Blessings,
David Pollard
CUUPS VP
The Covenant
of Unitarian Universalist Pagans, Inc. exists
for the purposes of:
- promoting the practice and understanding
of Pagan and Earth-centered spirituality
within the Unitarian Universalist
Association,
- enabling networking among
Pagan-identified Unitarian Universalists,
- providing for the outreach of Unitarian
Universalism to the broader Pagan
community,
- providing educational materials on
Paganism and Earth-centered spirituality
for Unitarian Universalist congregations
and for the general public,
- promoting interfaith dialogue,
- encouraging the development of
theological and liturgical materials based
on Pagan and Earth-centered religious and
spiritual perspectives,
- encouraging greater use of music, dance,
visual arts, poetry, story and creative
ritual in Unitarian Universalist worship
and celebration,
- providing a place or places for
gathering and for worship,
- and fostering healing relationships with
the Earth and all of the Earth's
children."
- The purposes of CUUPS include providing
support for Pagan-identified UU religious
professionals and ministerial students.
|
|
|
Volunteers
Needed
CUUPS has no paid staff. Everything that
happens is the result of people who have
volunteered their time, effort and money to
make things happen. Currently these
are our most pressing needs:
* PHP Programmer - We need
someone who knows the PHP Programming
Language to assist Aisling update and
upgrade our website.
Update: We
found one PHP Programmer, but we could
always use another!
* GA Display Staff - The
2008 General Assembly will be in Fort
Lauderdale, FL. We need people who will be
there to help staff our display booth.
* Media Project - We would
like to digitize all of the old CUUPS printed
material as well as our audio and video tapes.
Some of this would go up on our website as
archives, others could be used for material
like podcasts and YouTube presentations,
etc. If you have a trove of old CUUPS
material we need to hear from you - because
in many cases we no longer have access to
the originals.
Update: It
looks like the Connections Journal files
will soon be part of the CUUPS website
thanks to Robin Woodsong.
If you are interested in help on any of
these projects, or have other ways you could
help CUUPS in mind, send an email to bulletin@cuups.org
|
|
|
