• Home
  • rainbow flagA Welcoming Congregation
  • Safe Congregation SealKeeping Safe
  • Capital Campaign
    • Contact: Capital Campaign
  • DONATE/REALM
  • TUCWomen
    • About TUCWomen
    • Join Us
    • Events
    • Contact
  • Contact
  • Instagram

The Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Westport

10 Lyons Plains Rd., Westport, CT 06880 - Ph: (203)227-7205 Sunday Services: 10:00 AM

Unitarian Universalist Association
  • Calendar
    • Calendar
    • SOUNDINGS
    • Communications Guidelines
    • ZOOM Instructions
    • Tips For Making Videos
    • Event & Space Reservations
    • TUUCWSocial Email List Ground Rules
  • Welcome Visitors
    • UU Orientation
    • Directions & Services
    • Special Ceremonies & Dedications
    • Our Congregational History
    • Our Faith
    • What is a Unitarian Universalist?
    • We are Unitarian Universalists
    • How did you become a Unitarian Universalist?
    • History of the Flaming Chalice
    • UU History in 8 Minutes
  • About Us
    • Our Mission Statement
    • Our Vision Statement
    • About Our Ministers
    • Our Staff
    • Getting Involved
    • Board of Trustees
    • Governance
    • Healing and Resilience Task Force
    • Congregant Celebration
    • Pastoral Care Chaplains
    • Our Welcoming Congregation
    • Photo & Video Galleries
    • Links – Beyond Our Walls
    • SOUNDINGS
    • Communications Guidelines
    • Events & Space Reservations
    • Pledging
  • FAITH FORMATION
    • Faith Formation for Children and Youth 2022-23
    • Welcome to Family Faith Formation
    • This Week in Family Faith Formation
    • Faith Formation Age Groupings 2022-23
    • What to Expect on Sunday Mornings
    • OWL Information at a Glance
    • Youth Ministry
    • Adult Faith Formation
    • Soul Matters
    • Keeping Safe
    • Faith Formation Registration
  • Social Justice
    • Welcome to Social Justice
    • Advocates for Prevention of Gun Violence
    • Beardsley School Committee
    • Immigration and Refugee Committee
    • KIVA Microfinance Committee
    • Racial Justice Committee
    • Westbridge Coalition
  • Music Program
    • Music Choir Schedules
    • Evensong
    • Our Minister of Music
    • The Music Committee
    • The Bell Choir
    • The Choir (Women and Men)
    • Special Projects Choir
    • Once & Again Singers
    • Children’s Choir
    • Teen Choir
    • The Chamber Choir
    • Sight-singing Classes
    • Cabaret
    • Voice Classes
    • Love Is the Spirit
    • Tune My Heart To Sing
    • Support Our Music Program
  • Sermons & Poetry
    • Minister’s Messages
    • Sermons – Audio
    • Sermons – Video
    • Rev. John T. Morehouse’s sermons
    • From Your Senior Minister: Facing Grace
    • Facing Grace – Rev. John’s blog
    • Rev. Frank Hall, Minister Emeritus – sermons
    • Rev. Frank Hall, Minister Emeritus – Dear Friends
    • Intern Minister’s sermons
    • Guest Minister’s sermons
    • Poetry & Readings
    • Communications from Your Ministers
  • Live Stream

Dear Friends – June 11, 2004

April 20, 2011 by Rev. Frank Hall - Minister Emeritus

Dear Friends;

“And on the seventh day God rested from all his work which he had done.”

The summer is a Sabbath of sorts. We don’t do Sabbath the way it was done in earlier times. I don’t know if that’s good or bad. Both, I guess. Sundays were sacred. There were no shopping malls and no Cumberland Farms convenience stores. Gas stations were closed.

“The Sabbath,” Dr. Beck said, “is simply a time to stop trying to alter the universe.”

Lory, Carlyn and I are going to start the summer by stopping the hectic pace. We’re getting on a plane bound for London. After four days we’ll take the chunnel to Paris, where we’ll stay for four more days, then we’ll take a train to Frankfurt where we’ll visit Lory’s uncle. It will be a two-week Sabbath. We’re billing it as a birthday extravaganza. Lory had a big birthday in April, and rather than trying to arrange an ambivalent party she opted for the clear choice: Europe.

Travel restores the spirit, but it’s demanding and it can be exhausting, so we’ll recuperate at home for a couple of weeks. There’s a stack of books with promises of sermon-stimulating stuff that have been waiting patiently. Then we’ll be off to Chautauqua for a week. I’ll conduct the Unitarian Fellowship Sunday service on July 25, and two days later I’ll offer up a lecture for the ethics series. My topic is, “Humor As a Moral Imperative.” We have a responsibility to nurture mind, body and spirit-we need to learn how to lighten up.

Carlyn will be spending the last two weeks of August at Kinhaven music camp in Vermont. She went there last summer and loved it. She’s becoming an accomplished cellist and the Kinhaven experience challenges her to further growth.

During one of Carlyn’s weeks at Kinhaven Lory and I will say hello to the little cabin at Old Orchard Beach, Maine. By then the pressure is on: sermons have to move from ideas in the mind to an outline on paper. I like to be able to start the new church year with a leg up.

Barbara, Ed and I share the responsibility to be on call during the summer Sabbath. Sue will be in the office every weekday; one of us will be accessible by phone in case of emergencies.

I hope you have some summer Sabbath plans, taking time to stop trying to alter the universe and simply be in it. At some special moment you’re sure to say with E. E. Cummings: ‘i thank You God for most this amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees and a blue true dream of sky, and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is Yes.’

This has been a good year for our gathered community at the Unitarian Church in Westport. It has been a difficult year to be a responsible citizen of this powerful and rich nation, and a caring citizen of our war-weary world. Our covenant reminds us: ‘to dwell together in peace, to seek the truth in love, and to help one another.’

Take care,
Frank

Filed Under: Dear Friends

  • Minister’s Messages
  • Sermons – Audio
  • Sermons – Video
  • Rev. John T. Morehouse’s sermons
  • From Your Senior Minister: Facing Grace
  • Facing Grace – Rev. John’s blog
  • Rev. Frank Hall, Minister Emeritus – sermons
  • Rev. Frank Hall, Minister Emeritus – Dear Friends
  • Intern Minister’s sermons
  • Guest Minister’s sermons
  • Readings & Poetry
  • Communications from Your Ministers

     The Unitarian Universalist
     Congregation in Westport
     is a member congregation of the
     Unitarian Universalist Association

      CLICK HERE if you have any questions      about The Unitarian Universalist
    Congregation in Westport

Congregational Hours: Tuesday - Friday
9:30 AM to 4:00 PM

Summer Hours:
July & August until after Labor Day:
Tuesday - Friday 9:30 AM to 4:00 PM

CLICK HERE to contact the web master

CLICK HERE to opt in to receive
the Weekly Congregational Email Blast

Copyright © 2023 · Visit us at The Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Westport - 10 Lyons Plains Rd., Westport, CT 06880 - All rights reserved.