Mar. 25 Newsletter: Great Expectations

   

Great Expectations

It’s “hurry up and wait” time at First Unitarian Church.

In order to protect all UU ministerial applicants and all UU churches in search, certain rules of confidentiality and due process are in place.  For that reason, your Ministerial Search Committee (MSC) is currently not at liberty to tell you where our deliberations stand. However, on Sunday, April 6, just 12 days from today, all of that will change. In church that day, the MSC hopes to announce its recommended Candidate to be our next settled Minister.

From that moment, you can expect to be inundated with information about the Candidate. The MSC’s work of discernment will be nearly done, but the congregation’s will have just begun. You will now join us, hands-on, in this remarkable project. You’ll become full and active participants in all of these final weeks. Only you the congregation can decide whether to call this Candidate to our pulpit as our next settled Minister!

Here is what will happen:

·      Sunday, April 6 until Friday, April 25: informational deluge.

·      Friday, April 25 to Sunday, May 4: Candidating “Week.” (It is really 10 days.) During the entirety of this time, our Candidate will be in Worcester, meeting the congregation and learning about all of us, and we will learn more and more about him/her. The MSC, the Prudential Committee, and the Lay Leadership Program Council will plan a bevy of events, at various times of the day, so that as many people as possible can get acquainted with the Candidate in diverse settings. A calendar of events is currently under construction.

·      On Sunday, April 27, our Candidate will conduct the service and preach in our pulpit for the first time!

·      And on Sunday, May 4, our Candidate will lead the service and preach in our pulpit for the second time!

After the service on Sunday (May 4), the Candidate will leave the building. The Congregation will then meet in order to vote on whether to call the Candidate to be our Minister—the Twelfth Minister in the history of First Unitarian Church.

Newsletter, March 18: “Home Again”

 

Newsletter, March 18, 2014: “Home Again”

As winter turns to spring, your Ministerial Search Committee (MSC) is coming in from the cold. After miles of travel to neutral pulpits with our 3 Pre-Candidates, we are “Home Again” for marathon deliberations. Under the rules, we can’t tell you until April 6 where our deliberations stand. In the meantime, our charge is clear: To recommend to you a single Candidate to be your next settled minister.

As we develop our recommendation, we are exceedingly aware of the responsibility you have placed in us. You have been our lodestar, and no MSC meeting goes by without one member or another reminding us that every part of our work is about you. We have heard that you value strong preaching, scholarly insight, spiritual breadth, and spiritual depth. We have registered that the congregation sees its history and tradition as assets from which to draw as we build something new. We have understood that the essence of our theologically diverse congregation is not mere tolerance but constructive pluralism. We have grasped that our new minister will invite us to travel together on a spiritual journey, even though everyone’s journey will be different.

We have comprehended that our spiritual guide must be approachable, articulate, facilitating, cooperative, competent, inspiring, energetic, and pastoral. 

And a beacon of personal integrity.

And gifted in integrating music.

It is a tall order.

Whatever your spiritual practice, please lend us your strength as we complete our part of this task.

And prepare yourselves, for the biggest part is still ahead.

It is your part.

Soon, it will be your turn, to discern and to decide. Only you, the congregation, can call the Twelfth Minister in the 229-year history of First Unitarian Church. Candidating Week is April 25 to May 4. It is right around the corner.

Special Meeting to Call Our Next Minister

From the Prudential Committee (Seth Popinchalk, Moderator)

Special Meeting to Call Our Next Minister

Our Ministerial Search Committee has met with all three pre-candidates and will be selecting one as our Candidate.  After the service on May 4, congregation members in good standing will vote on whether to call the Candidate as our next settled minister.

May 4, 2014 - Save the date!  This will be the day of the special meeting to call our next minister.  When it comes to choosing a minister, we all want everyone's input, and that means we all want everyone's vote.  In order to vote for the new settled minister, everyone must be a member (not a friend but a member) in good standing.

To be a member in good standing, one needs to have a signed pledge card on file. Rest assured this is not about money!  You need not enter any number in the pledge. All we need is a signed pledge card with your current contact information. Under the bylaws, a signed card is how we keep track of who is a member.

If you think now is the right time to become a member of the church, please visit the Welcome Table in the Bancroft room on Sunday after service, or contact our minister Tracey (minister@firstunitarian.com).

If you are the least bit unsure whether your membership is in order, please call (508.757.2708) or email (office@firstunitarian.com) the church to confirm your status.  As we get closer to the special meeting we will provide more details about Candidating Week (April 25 - May 4) and the the voting process.

--Seth Popinchalk, Moderator

Newsletter, March 11. Finding Our Minister: The Home Stretch

   

Newsletter, March 11, 2014

Finding Our Minister: The Home Stretch

These are momentous times at First Unitarian. Your Ministerial Search Committee (MSC) has just concluded a series of weekend-long interviews with each of our three Pre-candidates. In early April, just three weeks from now, we will introduce to you our recommended Candidate to be the next settled minister of our church. Then, from Friday April 25 to Sunday May 4, the Candidate will visit Worcester. There will be a variety of events, for you to meet the Candidate and the Candidate to meet you. The Candidate will preach on two Sundays, April 27 and May 4. After the service on May 4, congregational members in good standing will vote on whether to call the Candidate as our next settled minister. 

We are excited about each of our three Pre-Candidates. And we are certain that they are also excited about us. They are real people, with differing kinds of expertise, professional experience, life skills, and spiritual gifts. We have come to feel great confidence in all three of them. It is not going to be easy to decide!

But decide we must; and they must, too. Just as we have interviewed more than one Pre-Candidate, each Pre-Candidate may have interviewed more than one church. So the MSC’s hope has always been that more than one of these ministers would be someone we’d be exceedingly proud to recommend.

We believe that that hope has been fulfilled.