08/08/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of August 7

“You Will Speak When Spoken To…” Anyone remember words like that? Can we imagine making them into a spiritual practice? I’d not thought of those words in many years. I remember how I felt punished and voiceless – in childhood and teen years especially. Perhaps a few of you have experienced similar words and worse. Old memories like that tend to go underground. Skillful therapy, spiritual practices and prayer, relationships and work can all help those parts of our story be more at rest. Something happens to awaken those old words and humiliations. Then we have a choice to make.

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08/02/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of August 1

“Goodness, it’s warm…” Many of you know that this summer I drove to the East Coast and back on a vacation road trip. It was somewhat eventful with a failing fuel pump and a decision to return quickly to be of assistance to Debra and the Zen community in Eugene, Oregon. The fuel pump was resolved efficiently thanks to the mechanic recommended by my grad school friends in Alexandria, Virginia. Support for Debra and the Zen sangha in Eugene was harder to do from afar but I got back just in time to be helpful with a tragedy in that

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06/28/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of June 26

Several of us from Westside UU Congregation just returned from the UUA General Assembly that happens every year in a different city. This year it was in New Orleans. A special thanks to Jill Fleming, Steve Burrows, John and Viveca Monahan, Cecelia Hayes and Cynthia Westby for attending workshops, asking lots of questions about the UUA, and being voting delegates. My role at GA this year was to be co-lead chaplain with an African American colleague. We had been concerned that General Assembly this year might be a very intense gathering given all the issues that have come up in

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06/14/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of June 12

Last Sunday I talked about volunteering and its virtues as a spiritual practice. Several people asked me to repeat my admittedly tongue-in-cheek suggestion about a 24 hour volunteering ‘day’ at Westside. This is what I said: “Just for the fun of it the other day I tried to calculate the number of volunteer hours here at Westside each week apart from paid staff. We’d include everyone in the RE program, gardeners, the Sunday social hour preparers, the covenant groups and affinity groups; we’d have committees and working groups and rehearsals. I decided to use 50 hours a week of volunteer

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06/07/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister Musings Among the Mountains – Week of June 5

“So, now what…?” Year 1 of this second phase interim ministry is nearly over. Now what? Many of us are familiar with mission and vision statements from business or educational communities. Some of them can create eye-rolling responses especially in the business world. I even have two mission statement apps on my phone as humorous asides when I talk about mission statements. All that said, however, I must say I am impressed with the mission and vision statements for Westside UU Congregation as well as commitments to make the mission and vision come to pass. Here it is Our Mission

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05/24/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of May 22

“We are a Justice Seeking People”  This last three months or so in the Unitarian Universalist Association of congregations has been intense after a strong reaction to the hiring of a colleague for a regional lead staff position in another region. That person was white, male, and a minister. Another person who was a person of color was not hired and was told they weren’t ‘a good fit.’ The responses to these events have been multi-faceted. The person who was hired later withdrew his name and the position became open again. A more important conversation has begun about the idealism

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05/17/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musing Among the Mountains – Week of May15

“Walt Whitman: ‘Be curious, not judgmental.’” Last Sunday was Mother’s Day. I tried to explore some of the threads of the women’s movement from the 19th century to today. A theme I hoped would stand out would be about male supremacy in American and most world cultures. This Sunday will be a very important one at Westside as we explore a cousin of male supremacy called white supremacy. This topic isn’t being presented as a “blame whites” conversation. Male supremacy and white supremacy are seen as the general supremacy that one dominant culture assumes it has over those it sees

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05/03/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister Musing Among the Mountains – Week of May 1

This morning (Wednesday) I was looking out over the Sound to the Olympic Mountains. Today they are partly concealed by clouds and occasional rain. When the search process was in full forward gear this winter I often got calls or video chats with potential candidates for settled minister at Westside. I would always point the webcam out the window so they could see the incredible beauty here. One time I even caught a sunset when an interested colleague contacted me. I expect we all know that beautiful scenery, the mountains, the water and so much more makes the Pacific Northwest

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04/12/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of April 10

“May you live in interesting times” Many of us have heard this wise expression over the years. It sounds astute and supposedly it comes from Asian proverb sayings. The saying has been widely shared especially in these difficult days in America and the world. Another expression that says the Chinese character for ‘crisis’ are the symbols for ‘danger’ and ‘opportunity’. We can find these two expressions in business circles, New Age websites and many other places online. Unfortunately, neither of them come from Asian traditions. The first expression “may you live in interesting times’ appears to have been conceived in

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04/05/2017 by Shannon Day

Minister’s Musings Among the Mountains – Week of April 3

http://www.blacklivesuu.com/uuwhitesupremacyteachin  Some of you may have read the information I put in the e-news last Friday about UUA President Peter Morales resigning effective April 1. His resignation was in major part an outcome of a highly controversial hiring in the Southern Region of the UUA. The compilation of the sequence of events is in this link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/10QbuEL7ADWpm5GvpRf-UdU2nbylllpK07DOgzM2dCpc/mobilebasic. You’ll read that hiring practices in the UUA continue to be overwhelmingly white and oftentimes male hires. This is clearly not in line with the aspirations of the UUA to become a fair and equitable hiring and promoting organization. A couple of days ago

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