Showing Up

11/27/2019

Last Sunday, I participated in our community's interfaith Thanksgiving service, held at Temple Sharaay Tefila. The theme of the service was coming together to oppose hatred in all of its forms--racism, anti-immigrant bias, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, misogyny, and more. I showed up because it was important that our Fellowship's voice be added to those who side with love.

In the strategic plan that the Board is developing to implement our congregation's vision, one of the things we're looking at is how we become the congregation that shows up in our community. Shows up for justice. Shows up to help. Shows up for action. Shows up when marginalized communities call on us--without question or comment or complaint. And that starts with me, as your minister, showing up.

But I can't be everywhere, nor can I know of everything, nor am I enough, by myself, to represent our Fellowship. So I need to know: Where do you show up in our community? When you hear of opportunities that are important, will you let the rest of us know? And will you show up, too?

Perhaps if you're going to show up somewhere, you'll wear a UUFNW t-shirt (available in my office) when you do so. It's not necessary, but it says to the community that you're representing an organization and not just there as an individual.

At Temple Sharaay Tefila on Sunday, the interfaith youth of the Westchester Youth Alliance were making and packing 3,000 Thanksgiving meals for people in our community who would otherwise be hungry this week. Their director invited us to participate in this next year so that the number can go higher. I will be passing along that invitation to our youth and adults when the time is right.

I hope that we can be the people who show up. I promise to show up more. I hope to do that alongside you.

3 Comments

Patricia

11/27/2019 03:38:52 pm

I'm not at the UUFNW many Sundays right now. The upside to that is I can share the perspective of someone who is not present on Sunday but still is an active part of our community. This interfaith community event was published in last weeks newsletter. What I did not see was something that said, "I am going to this event and would love to have people from our congregation join me." Thinking you may not know another person at an event can present an obstacle for some people. But if they knew you were going and you invited them, that might help. If you knew other people in the congregation who said they were going and you said, "Would you join Steffani and I at this event? We can drive together." it might help. Again, perhaps you said this last Sunday but everyone is not present on Sunday every week. I can say from my own life, personal asks make a huge difference in allowing me to overcome whatever barriers I may feel in participating in an event, both at the UUFNW and in the larger community. Thanks for representing us.

Michael Tino

11/27/2019 06:23:42 pm

Thanks for this concrete suggestion!

11/27/2019 06:24:15 pm

(Also, we miss you on Sundays.)

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.

Showing Up

Leave a Reply.

Postal ADDRESS

Telephone

Email