New Socks & Underwear Needed

Dear Grace United Church of Christ!

As you may have heard from Mr. Bill Taylor, Grace is a solid supporter of the Family Promise network in Hunterdon County. We now have a unique opportunity to continue that support.

Family Promise is participating in a CARE event which involves various community service organizations distributing information to members of our community who might need support. Individuals in the community who attend the event are provided lunch, box dinners, some medical screening and other useful items. THIS IS WHERE YOUR SUPPORT IS NEEDED!

I am coordinating a drive for NEW underwear and socks to be distributed to those in need who attend the event. All sizes are needed and must be new in the packaging (nothing gently used, please). Underwear and socks can be purchased in bulk packages; Family Promise will separate into sizes -- we only need you to bring them in. Items are needed no later than October 27 to ensure they are packaged and prepared for the event on the first.

So - as you are out and about in the coming weeks and find yourself in a store wondering what you might buy, please consider picking up some packages in different sizes. Children's sizes and adult sizes are needed.

Thank you so much for your continued generosity!!!!

With much love in Grace,

-Chris Syltevik

Faith in Action

Hello Grace UCC,

We have the opportunity to do some mission work with other faith communities on Sunday, October 20.

There will be any number of projects to do- see the link at the end of this e-mail to sign up....

Many of you may know our involvement in the past with the "Church has Left the Building". Well, this is a continuation of this to now include all houses of worship.

Please sign up for one of the projects- Grace UCC has agreed to lead a garbage clean up detail!

-Dan

Please note that activity slots may be added or deleted based on the number of people signing up for these slots. Thanks for your understanding.

We will meet at the Flemington Jewish Community Center (FJCC) at 1:30pm for a group opening, prayers, and sendoff.

We'll depart for our projects at about 1:45pm. We'll return to the FJCC at 4pm for a wrapup and recap of our projects.

UPDATE: Grace UCC ran the garbage pick-up group. It rained all day, but the group picked up multiple bags of trash (To see more photos at the Presbyterian Church’s facebook page click on the image below).

Laity Sunday: Finding our Inner Super Hero

My church is a sanctuary. Not in the sublime definition of sanctuary where we visualize zen music and serene landscapes but that of safety and refuge. We are an open and affirming church who truly invites the lost and lonely to be folded in our Grace. Today, I led the service and built up to my superhero - my mom - providing the sermon. We are called to live in kindness and love, and I see this group of diverse and wildly awesome humans come together to do many small things in hopes of changing the world. I am so proud of my congregation. I am so proud of my mom. I am so hopeful for the world we can still recreate for my kids and yours. God calls us to be our best selves and shine our loving light wastefully. Today, I feel we answered that call.

— Michaela Healy Birdyshaw

"How to Be an Anti-Racist," by Ibram X. Kendi

Editor’s note: At this time we do not have a week three recap for you from the interfaith book group, as our usual correspondent is out of town. Instead, we have a recommendation for additional reading material.

This note is a follow up to our discussion this past Wednesday. During that discussion, I delivered a message from my wife Vassie. Her perspective was everyone in our group would agree that racism is not good. Her analogy was all of us would similarly agree that slavery is not good… none of us would ever have slaves. But in American history, while there were many people who believed slavery was not good, there were not very many people who were true abolitionist. She defined an abolitionist as someone who not only did not own slaves, but someone who was also willing to take actions to abolish slavery from the American system. So Vassie’s suggestion was that our discussion might be better served if we moved away from trying to decide whether we individually were racist and eventually moved toward a discussion of how might we abolish racism. None of us wants systematic racism. But are we willing to work to change that system… to be an Antiracist?

 Vassie said there is a good book about all of this, titled How to be an Antiracist. I’ve not read it. So I can’t recommend it. But I’ve purchased it on Audible and I am currently listening to it (It’s about 10 hours long). Under Audible, you are allowed to give any friend a free book if they’ve never accepted a free Audible book from some other friend. So each of you can download the book for free if you’ve not accepted a free book under Audible in the past.

 If you prefer to read a physical book, or like to do your reading on Kindle, you can purchase a copy through Amazon Smile.

— Bill Taylor