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Unitarian Universalists
of the Salish Sea
November 21, 2025
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Thank you to the Worship Team for a wonderful interactive ritual service last Saturday. Those who attended were able to participate during the service by visiting three different stations below:
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Station 1: RECEIVING CARE AND PROTECTION. What care and protection do you receive from your ancestors? Draw an amulet of protection that your ancestors are sending to you or write a word that represents their care or blessing for you on a smooth stone.
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Station 2: ACKNOWLEDGING THE BITTERNESS. Sometimes blessings are mixed with bitterness. It is good to acknowledge the sharp edges, the harshness, and then release it as we are able. Hold the salt, feel the coarseness in your hand, let it go into the water.
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Station 3: CONTINUING THE WORK. What work will you commit yourself to that will feed future generations?Write notes on small cards about the work you are continuing, and attach them to the tree branches.
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COMING UP IN 2 WEEKS!
Annual Craft Making Workshop
Sunday, December 7,
11:00-1:00
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Calling folks of all ages who love to make Christmas crafts! Please
sign up if you plan to attend.
WHERE?
Molly Nye House, downstairs on 940 Lynn Valley Rd, North Vancouver
Please bring a plate of sandwiches, veggies, fruit, sweets, or other finger food to share.
Contact Joy with questions:
landline 604.941.2606 cell 604.329.8073 or odetojoy@telus.net.
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HOLIDAY HAMPERS
We are once again putting together Christmas hampers. This year’s recipients are a single mother and her 12 year old boy and a senior who could use a little extra this Christmas. See the link to a sign-up form if you’d like to contribute any of the requested items. These gifts will be wrapped at the December 7th craft-making workshop and delivered to Family Services on December 15. Money for grocery gift-certificates is also welcome. The gifts can be dropped off at the homes of Robyn, Anne, Jacky or Shelley prior to December 7th or brought to the workshop.
Please sign up for what you can contribute here.
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SOCIAL JUSTICE
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"HOME" by Warsan Shire
(from Robyn)
No one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark.
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city running as well.
your neighbours running faster than you, the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind the old tin factory is
holding a gun bigger than his body, you only leave home when home won't let you stay.
no one would leave home unless home chased you, fire under feet, hot blood in your belly.
it's not something you ever thought about doing, and so when you did - you carried the anthem under your breath,
waiting until the airport toilet
to tear up the passport and swallow, each mouthful of paper making it clear that you would not be going back.
you have to understand,
no one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land.
who would choose to spend days and nights in the stomach of a truck unless the miles traveled meant something more than journey.
no one would choose to crawl under fences, be beaten until your shadow leaves you, raped, then drowned, forced to the bottom of the boat because you are darker, be sold, starved, shot at the border like a sick animal, be pitied, lose your name, lose your family, make a refugee camp a home for a year or two or ten,
stripped and searched, find prison everywhere
and if you survive and you are greeted on the other side
with “go home blacks”, “refugees dirty immigrants”, “asylum seekers sucking our country dry of milk”, dark, with their hands out smell strange, savage - look what they've done to their own countries,
what will they do to ours?
the dirty looks in the street softer than a limb torn off, the indignity of everyday life more tender than fourteen men who
look like your father, between your legs, insults easier to swallow
than rubble, than your child's body in pieces - for now, forget about pride
your survival is more important.
i want to go home, but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home tells you to leave what you could not behind,
even if it was human.
no one leaves home until home is a damp voice in your ear saying
leave, run now, i don't know what I've become.
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THIS SUNDAY!
National Worship Service
Sunday, Nov 23, 2025, 10am
Join us for a CUC National Service on Sunday, November 23, 2025 – featuring two of the newest members of the CUC staff team: Camellia Jahanshahi and Rev. Nicoline Guerrier.
What will hold us together today? As an antidote to a world built around us/them, we’ll lean into this counter-story: that difference makes strength, and that our distinctive model as UUs – based not on sameness but on cultivating relationship and shared commitments across differences of belief – carries seeds of the transformative solidarity our world needs now. Come meet this moment with us.
A coffee hour conversation will follow the service. Join at this link.
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Practicing Hope: Facing the Future with Gratitude, Imagination, Courage & Action
By Rev. Karen Fraser Gitlitz
This year’s Sharing our Faith theme was developed by over 50 UUs attending Canadian UUs Read last month. Participants included congregation members, independent UUs, and leaders from many Canadian UU organizations.
Seven ministers pitched books and responded to questions.
Rev. Anne Barker – Imaginable: How to Create a Hopeful Future—in Your Own Life, Your Community, the World by Jane McGonigal (2023)
Rev. Debra Faulk – Embers: One Ojibway’s Meditations by the late Richard Wagamese (2016)
Rev. Lynn Harrison – The Eloquence of Silence: Surprising Wisdom in Tales of Emptiness, by Thomas Moore (2023)
Rev. Pat Trudeau – Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in with Unexpected Resilience and Creative Power ( the revised edition) by Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone (2022)
Rev. Rosemary Morrison – Beyond Welcome: Building Communities of Love by Linnea Nelson (2022).
Rev. Samaya Oakley – North of Nowhere: Song of a Truth and Reconciliation Commissioner by Marie Wilson (2024)
There was laughter and sadness, anxiety and passion. We talked about the state of the world, how we want to live, what we have to share, and we agreed that all seven books have something valuable to offer and could be resources for our Sharing our Faith packet .
At the end of the event, everyone contributed their top three theme words.
Watch for 2026’s Sharing our Faith packet, available online on December 1 on the CUC website. The packet will help you bring the theme to life with options for a worship service and a congregational conversation. Early in the new year there will be an online launch with an orientation to the packet and Q&A.
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Dismantling Barriers: Your Chance to Make a Change
Camellia Jahanshahi, the CUC’s Dismantling Barriers Lead, has shared how meaningful this work has been for her. But she’s not the only one for whom it’s had a great impact. Here’s what others are saying:
“Having someone who can dedicate their time to not only finding existing resources but creating original ones contributes greatly to our ability as a movement to pay more than lip service to our 8th principle.”
“We very much value Camelia as she supports us in our efforts to learn, unlearn, and take informed action.”
“I appreciated her welcoming and open manner, which welcomed questions, rather than making people afraid they were going to ‘say the wrong thing.’”
Help create a thriving future for our faith by donating today. Even a small contribution will go a long way.
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CanUUdle 2026 in Vancouver – Staff Applications now open!
CanUUdle, the annual national conference for UU youth (aged 14 to 19) and their youth advisors (age 25+) is coming to Vancouver from May 15 to 18, 2026! CanUUdle is a youth-led con where youth and adults create an amazing community, worship together, attend workshops, play and grow as spiritual beings. It’s a beautiful weekend full of fun, laughter, games, discussion, thought, and above all, love and friendship—the special kind that can only be found in UU community!
The CanUUdle Staff is a group of about 10 youth and 2 adults who work together to plan the annual, national youth con. Youth staff are between the ages of 14 and 19. Adult staff must be over 25.
We’re currently looking for staff for CanUUdle 2026 in Vancouver!
What does the CanUUdle Staff do?
CanUUdle is a youth con by and for youth. The staff team plans the con schedule, workshops, activities, worships and runs the show during the weekend. From January to May, the staff team gathers for online meetings every two weeks and works in small teams to plan the schedule and program. During CanUUdle, the staff function as community stewards, organizers and, most importantly, role models and leaders of the youth community.
Planning is supported by the CanUUdle Coordinator, a part-time contract staff who works with the staff team and organizes logistics. If you have questions about being on CanUUdle staff, contact Raven, this year’s coordinator, by emailing canuudle@cuc.ca.
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Congregational Conversations: Finding the Energy
November 26: 10:00 am PT
Dismantling Barriers: Engaging with Queer and Trans Solidarity
November 27: 4:30 pm PT
Congregational Conversations: Finding the Energy
November 29: 10:00 am PT
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