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So as we begin December we, we welcome everybody to the, the month of Blessings.
Our monthly theme is Blessings and we are wrestling with the question of:
What does it mean to to live a life of Blessing?
And I think no month gets at our
Unitarian faith
and the uniqueness of our Unitarian faith quite like, like this one, especially during
the holiday season.
As we offer blessings to others, it's it's not just charity and us giving gifts.
I think there's a a recognition in the midst of that, that we are all in
this together.
And in that sense
we we recognize that as we give blessings to each other and recognize we've
received blessings
we notice that were all part of one wider,
wider family
that's leaning on each other and helping prop each other up. That we are deeply,
deeply interconnected.
And this month, as we dig deeper into that I think nothing really gets at
that interconnection
better than our Greater Good project.
Well, tonight is all about serving needs greater than our own.
Your families have made decisions to
give up some of what they have to give to people who don't have the basics.
And that's what you are going to vote on.
Kids like you probably won't be getting just as much
because your family is gonna to make a little sacrifice to give that money away to somebody who needs it more.
A major blessing of the Greater Good project
is the way we asked the kids to lead us. We pick up on the
the traditional Christian
and Christmas message of a child shall lead us. So it's actually the the kids, the
kids that vote on the projects that receive
our Greater Good project donations and we think that only makes sense because
the way that we raise the money for our Greater Good project is we ask all the
families in the church
to think about how much they spend on Christmas.
And then, cut that in half.
We challenge
all of our families to cut that in half. You get to keep half for yourself, but then we ask
all the families to give the other half to the church and we
we pool that together and we offer that to organizations, local and international
that are working for the Greater Good.
And since it is children
who are making the sacrifice, literally chopping their christmas budget in half
we think it's right for them to lead us in picking what the projects are.
And so maybe this month is not just about blessings, but but also having all of
us think about the common blessings that are in our lives;
the blessings that we all share 'n that many ways are already
surrounding us everyday.
The Greater Good certainly helps us think about the
the gift or the blessing of being able to share a little bit of what we have to
make life better for another.
We certainly know that we're encouraged through our sermons this month to, to slow
down and
and pay attention to the relationships around you invest yourself in the common
blessings of family and friends.
And on Christmas Eve we certainly are going to be inviting everyone to
celebrate the the wonderful blessing of music and worshipping together.
We are excited to have three Christmas Eve services this month; one, a children's
service, then another, a rock-and-roll service, and then
of course our our late,
traditional candlelight Christmas Eve service.
We hope everybody takes advantage of those opportunities,
but more so
we hope everyone this month can can take some time to widen their view and
notice all the gifts and blessings that you already have received.