Taking Care of What we Love

Stewardship is about taking care of something that you love. And we offer that care so that our church community will be here long after we are gone. -- Ellen Foley

What is Stewardship? Someone asked me this at the yard sale last Saturday, and my off the cuff answer was, “money!”. But Stewardship isn’t really about money. Stewardship is about taking care of something that you love. And we offer that care so that the thing we cherish, in this case our church community, will be here long after we are gone.

What will Stewardship look like this year? Those of you who saw the Stewardship skit during the in-gathering lunch on Sept. 11 th learned that we will be organizing stewardship visits with all church members this fall. For everyone else, here’s a brief overview:

What are Stewardship visits?
They are a chance for visiting stewards (i.e. other church members) to visit you and talk to you about your connection to the church. We want to visit everyone, and most of what we want to do is listen.

During Stewardship visits, we will share what we love about the church, and we want to learn more about what you love. What connects you? How are YOU living out our mission to honor the sacred, to connect, to serve justice?

Finally, we will invite you to think about your role as a steward, and all the ways, including generous giving, that you can help take care of this place that you love. We’ll invite you to think about how your annual Stewardship pledge reflects your sense of connection to First Unitarian.

Stewardship is about all of us and we will need your help. In the coming weeks you’ll be hearing more from us about how to get involved. But for now, thank you, each and every one of you, for being you, for being here part of this community, and for the gifts that you bring.

Comments

An Outstanding Day One for the Annual Pledge Drive

" It is rare indeed that people give. Most people guard and keep. " If this observation from James Baldwin, one of our contry's most respected philosophers and novelists, is true, then the opening Sunday of our Annual Stewardship Pledge Drive was a rare one indeed. Consider these day one statistics : Total amound pledged: $96,628 (32% of our $300,000 goal !) Number of pledges: 62 (6 of these were first time pledges !) A whopping 56% increased their pledge over last year ! Let us keep the momentum going! If you have not yet sent in your pledge, do so today. This is truly a wonderful beginning, and it was made even more special by our interim minister's homily. If you missed Tracey's message, what follows are a few of her memorable and moving insights. We come through these doors in search, in need, in hope, in prayer. We come looking for something to make our lives better; to make the lives of our family, our fr...

2017 Stewardship Interview Series

You might remember that as part of last year's campaign, the Stewardship Committee coordinated in-person visits with members of the church. The purpose of these visits was to chat about members' experiences at First Unitarian, the four goals of the Stewardship campaign* and member pledges. The core of these conversations was about participation . We discussed questions like: How are you feeling about your connection with the church? Are there any groups, volunteer activities or leadership opportunities that you'd like to be more involved in? What are your thoughts about this year's stewardship goals? Do you have any concerns? My Experience as a Visiting Steward Our family officially joined First Unitarian at the beginning of 2016. And while we had attended sporadically for years, there were lots of people we didn't know. So when Ellen announced that the Stewardship Committee was looking for volunteers to be visiting stewards, I thought it would be a fun way t...

Hearing the Call: Rudy Cepko, YRU2 Mentor and Advisor

“I believed that my day job as an RN in the Pediatric ICU at UMass would make it easy for me to handle a bunch of teenagers. However, I was surprised to encounter teens willing to gain more knowledge in their spiritual quest and to learn how to use this in their everyday lives.” Rudy Cepko For many years I had not stepped into a church except for weddings and funerals. In the mid-1990s, my wife, Alesia, started attending church to sing with UU choir. She was impressed by the message that she heard from Barbara Merritt and suggested that I try the church. I felt I was in a place that spoke to me, and our son Stefan was enrolled in the Sunday school programs. I had some involvement with church stewardship as a volunteer in the Garden committee. Mowing the lawn, pulling weeds, planting and laying yards of mulch were part of my contribution to the church. Then when my son, Stefan, was in YRU2, he asked if I would be interested in be...

First Unitarian Stewardship

Search This Blog