Author: Rev. Gretchen Haley (Page 3 of 7)

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]It doesn’t really feel like August, does it? August usually means back to school shopping, finding out where you sit and how your classroom will be set up.  Or if you’re not connected to school, August often means preparing for fall trips or projects. But this year…what does August mean?

One of the most disorienting parts of corona time is the loss of “the usual.” Habits and rituals and routines that ground us in our daily lives and to time in a broader sense have fallen away.

Humans need rituals. Rituals offer us a purposeful acknowledgment of transition and change. Rituals help our brains process the shifts in our own lives and in life itself.  Rituals orient us in time. And rituals connect us to each other, and to our deeper values – the bigger story our lives are a part of.

This is why we felt so strongly that we needed to set aside time for some important goodbyes this week. So that we could acknowledge more fully the big transitions we are experiencing as a community, and make space in our hearts for both the gratitude and grief of these changes.

The first was Thursday, as the family ministry team held a lunch time goodbye and thank you to Betsy Naas, our Family Ministry Assistant who is headed to Smith College for graduate school this fall. If you missed it, you can send notes to Betsy via Eleanor.

We also had a drive-by goodbye for Rev. Kristen on Friday evening.

In the midst of these goodbyes, we are also making space for some new beginnings.

Our new Assistant Minister Rev. Elaine Aron-Tenbrink began her work with us this week, and has started to meet with some of our caring network and lay leaders to set the foundation for the work ahead.

Our new Director of Finance and Operations, Katie Watkins, has officially begun full time in the last two weeks, and our new Marketing Manager Tanner Linden is the long timer as he enters his third week on the team!

To help mark these new beginnings, we are looking to hold a couple of set-aside times for you to drop in and get to know these amazing new staff members. Look for more information in the coming weeks.

One of my favorite ways to think about Sunday services, actually, is a way to mark time. The routine of returning again to community, to commitment, to a collective vision for an hour each week helps ground us in time’s passing and helps connect us to our place in it all.

This Sunday my friend and colleague the Rev. Kelly Dignan (some of you may know her from her meditation sessions) will be leading worship with me as she offers her UU Good News with a message on why bad things happen. I look forward to marking time with you this Sunday at 9 & 11 am MT.

With love,
Rev. Gretchen[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Rev. Gretchen Haley

Rev. Gretchen Haley has an audacious ambition for the liberal church, believing in its capacity to transform lives and our world by way of hyper-local relationships and partnerships that inspire the unleashing of courageous love. She oversees worship, community resourcing and outreach, and the intersectional work of our justice teams. She also serves as chief of staff, and ministry lead to the Board. In all of these, she is inspired by the commitment of the countless people who show up to do the sometimes-messy work of the church, and who are leading us to live into our mission for Northern Colorado as it is growing and changing. Her ministry is infused with her relentless curiosity about most things, especially the big stuff of theology, the beauty of creation, the magic of collaboration, and the joy of pop culture. She’s all in on adrienne maree brown’s emergent strategy, and finds solace in the trails in and around Fort Collins. She moved to Colorado from Washington state over 20 years ago for grad school in theatre, and knew immediately that she would never leave. She and her amazing partner, Carri, have 2 teenagers, Gracie and Josef, who both relish and resent being PKs, and who keep her grounded, frustrated, inspired, and humbled, everyday. She is basically obsessed with her two dogs, both large mutts, Charlie and Archer.

Responsible for: Worship, Community Resourcing and Outreach, Justice Ministries, and Congregational Leadership

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Rev. Gretchen Haley

Rev. Gretchen Haley has an audacious ambition for the liberal church, believing in its capacity to transform lives and our world by way of hyper-local relationships and partnerships that inspire the unleashing of courageous love. She oversees worship, community resourcing and outreach, and the intersectional work of our justice teams. She also serves as chief of staff, and ministry lead to the Board. In all of these, she is inspired by the commitment of the countless people who show up to do the sometimes-messy work of the church, and who are leading us to live into our mission for Northern Colorado as it is growing and changing. Her ministry is infused with her relentless curiosity about most things, especially the big stuff of theology, the beauty of creation, the magic of collaboration, and the joy of pop culture. She’s all in on adrienne maree brown’s emergent strategy, and finds solace in the trails in and around Fort Collins. She moved to Colorado from Washington state over 20 years ago for grad school in theatre, and knew immediately that she would never leave. She and her amazing partner, Carri, have 2 teenagers, Gracie and Josef, who both relish and resent being PKs, and who keep her grounded, frustrated, inspired, and humbled, everyday. She is basically obsessed with her two dogs, both large mutts, Charlie and Archer.

Responsible for: Worship, Community Resourcing and Outreach, Justice Ministries, and Congregational Leadership

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]It hit me today that in just a few days, my family and I will have been sheltering-in-place for a full month. A month ago tomorrow the Governor declared a state of emergency.  This Sunday – Easter Sunday! – will be our fifth Sunday online! It feels both longer and shorter. Time is a really strange thing in a pandemic.

So, how are you holding up?  However you’re doing today.  However you’re doing this moment.  You are loved. And it’s enough.

A few weeks ago – when I was in a “bargaining” mood of grief – I was wondering if we could just postpone Easter until after things got “back to normal.”  What does Easter even mean in the middle of a pandemic? In the middle of all this news of death, how do we talk about rebirth, and resurrection? I actually have a colleague who decided that that’s what she should do.  They are waiting, and they’ll do a big Easter celebration – with all the Alleluias! – once we can say we got to the other side.

But what I’ve realized is that Easter is exactly what we need right now.  Because we can’t wait for joy.  We can’t wait to live.  Living must always be now.  And joy is a survival strategy.  And besides, we can have MORE Alleluias when we’re back together (and we WILL!).

So I hope you’ll join us this Sunday! And invite your family and friends from all over. Links are below, or always at foothillsuu.org/livestream.

We’re going to be blessing babies – at least 7 of them! Because life continues! And you don’t have to miss out on wearing your Easter garb – we’d love to have everyone wear a hat to worship – at 9:00 we’ll turn on gallery view and can see each other’s Easter “bonnets.” Be creative, or formal, or silly – whatever helps bring out the joy.

With love,
Rev. Gretchen[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

Rev. Gretchen Haley

Rev. Gretchen Haley has an audacious ambition for the liberal church, believing in its capacity to transform lives and our world by way of hyper-local relationships and partnerships that inspire the unleashing of courageous love. She oversees worship, community resourcing and outreach, and the intersectional work of our justice teams. She also serves as chief of staff, and ministry lead to the Board. In all of these, she is inspired by the commitment of the countless people who show up to do the sometimes-messy work of the church, and who are leading us to live into our mission for Northern Colorado as it is growing and changing. Her ministry is infused with her relentless curiosity about most things, especially the big stuff of theology, the beauty of creation, the magic of collaboration, and the joy of pop culture. She’s all in on adrienne maree brown’s emergent strategy, and finds solace in the trails in and around Fort Collins. She moved to Colorado from Washington state over 20 years ago for grad school in theatre, and knew immediately that she would never leave. She and her amazing partner, Carri, have 2 teenagers, Gracie and Josef, who both relish and resent being PKs, and who keep her grounded, frustrated, inspired, and humbled, everyday. She is basically obsessed with her two dogs, both large mutts, Charlie and Archer.

Responsible for: Worship, Community Resourcing and Outreach, Justice Ministries, and Congregational Leadership

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]I’ve loved labyrinths for a long time, especially since a walk I took through the labyrinth at Sunrise Ranch in Loveland about 10 years ago. It was a time of major transition in my life, and turning through its tangles as the sun was setting one evening felt like unraveling my heart. I felt connected and alive and open to all that life would bring next.

That first–and the many transformative times I’ve had with labyrinths since–are why I was so excited that we could bring the labyrinth practice to Foothills during the Future Tense series.

It has been really beautiful to witness people traveling the labyrinth this month. And…at the same time, I’m so relieved that we won’t have the labyrinth as a part of the 11:30 service anymore! Not only was it pretty labor intensive to set up (thank you so much to the volunteers who made it happen!!) in a very short turn-around after the 10:00 service, it necessarily took up a disproportionate amount of time for a Sunday service. And even still, I felt like it wasn’t enough time to have the sort of transformative experience the labyrinth process.

Labyrinths are a perfect example of my message from Sunday. They are NOT efficient! Labyrinths are meant to be deliberative, slow journeys where you really feel the movement in your body and soul.

Which is why I’m so glad and grateful that Pat Slentz, spiritual director and labyrinth guide, is offering a 2-hour workshop this Saturday from 9-11 to fully explore the labyrinth. She’ll provide some history and context, and then she’ll guide us through a walk in the labyrinth as a meditative experience.

Sign up here – and invite a friend!

This workshop seems to me the perfect bridge between the Future Tense series and our next series, The Feels, which we’re kicking off this Sunday–as the movement in a labyrinth often helps us process and move emotions through our bodies and minds so that we can be open to what life brings next. Rev. Kristen is kicking off the series this Sunday with a service looking at liberal religion’s historical resistance to emotional wisdom and ways to engage emotions productively today

Join us at 8:30, 10, or 11:30–looking forward to seeing you there!

In partnership,
Rev. Gretchen[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Notes from Future Tense: Week 4 – Inefficiently Yours    
Listen to the sermon
Read the sermon

Text
Wendell Berry’s Manifesto: Mad Farmer Liberation Army

Mentioned in the Service
Automating Humans: The Costs of Amazon’s Extreme Efficiency
Courtney Martin’s article about an ambivalent relationship to efficiency
Malcom Harris’ book on millennials and efficiency

Music
We sang our series theme song People Get Ready
The Band played Panic! At the Disco’s High Hopes
We sang Bill Withers’ classic Lean on Me

Further Resources
Time Article on Amazon’s Treatment of Workers
Hurry Slowly – A podcast on being more productive, creative and resilient by slowing down
On the Clock: What Low-Wage Work Did to Me and How It Drives America Insane.

Remember
We have created an economy, and increasingly a culture,
that conflates efficiency with ultimacy.
But humanness is inherently inefficient.
Which means we’ve created an economy, and increasingly a culture
that requires we suppress our humanity.
Our faith reminds us that we hold both the agency, and the responsibility
to create a world that amplifies and celebrates –
rather than suppresses,
our humanness –
our true existential purpose
of being utterly and inefficiently interdependent.
Notice when you are getting caught thinking efficiency is the same as best.
What other values can you choose to privilege to create a future where humanness can freely flourish?

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Rev. Gretchen Haley

Rev. Gretchen Haley has an audacious ambition for the liberal church, believing in its capacity to transform lives and our world by way of hyper-local relationships and partnerships that inspire the unleashing of courageous love. She oversees worship, community resourcing and outreach, and the intersectional work of our justice teams. She also serves as chief of staff, and ministry lead to the Board. In all of these, she is inspired by the commitment of the countless people who show up to do the sometimes-messy work of the church, and who are leading us to live into our mission for Northern Colorado as it is growing and changing. Her ministry is infused with her relentless curiosity about most things, especially the big stuff of theology, the beauty of creation, the magic of collaboration, and the joy of pop culture. She’s all in on adrienne maree brown’s emergent strategy, and finds solace in the trails in and around Fort Collins. She moved to Colorado from Washington state over 20 years ago for grad school in theatre, and knew immediately that she would never leave. She and her amazing partner, Carri, have 2 teenagers, Gracie and Josef, who both relish and resent being PKs, and who keep her grounded, frustrated, inspired, and humbled, everyday. She is basically obsessed with her two dogs, both large mutts, Charlie and Archer.

Responsible for: Worship, Community Resourcing and Outreach, Justice Ministries, and Congregational Leadership