Divine companion,

we should recognize you by now.

We’ve followed you down countless roads,

watching you with keen attention.

How can you be a stranger to us?

Open our eyes to you again.

Burn your truth into our hearts.

Be friendship’s host and guest.

Stay with us until your resurrected presence

is blessed, broken like bread,

and placed in our hands….

Envelop whatever

blessing, mending,

caring, healing,

welcoming, weaving,

reconciling

acts of love we can offer

our earthly companions

within the loving legacy

of your divine friendship.

~ Holy Week Services ~

Maundy Thursday, March 29, 6:00 pm, Gathering Place A Shared Seder and Supper led by Rabbi Darah Lerner

Reservations needed!

Please call and tell us what you will bring. Church Office 866-3655 or Shelley Gilman 827-7980

Good Friday, March 30, 7:00 pm

Tenebrae Service A service of shadows with the gradual extinguishing of candles.

Easter Sunday, April 1: Sunrise Service 6:30 am Penobscot Valley Country Club

Together with The Orono United Methodist Church and the Alton United Methodist Church!

Easter Breakfast 7:00 am at The Orono United Methodist Church

Easter Morning Worship Service 10:15 am at The Church of Universal Fellowship

Prayer ; Sharlande Sledge, Prayers and Litanies for the Christian Seasons

Drawing: Hermano Leon

The

Church of Universal Fellowship March 2018

82 Main Street Orono, Maine 04473

207-866-3655

email: cufoffice@icloud.com

web address:

churchofuniversalfellowship.org

Minister’s Message 1

Around CUF 2

Send Good Thoughts 2

Lenten Journey 3

YAWP 4

Upcoming Events 4

UCC New England Women's

Celebration 4

2

Around CUF . . . Thank you to Fred Otto for spending many hours fixing

the lights on our Christmas tree which is finally safely

up in the attic until next December!... Our church family appreciates the love and care shown to the

families of Faye McDermott, Sherman Hasbrouck and

Phyllis Borns in serving as hospitality hosts, ushers, and bell ringers for these memorial services… Thank you

to Wayne Hamilton, extraordinary Kiwanis book

person, for recognizing the 1941 Western Reserve Academy yearbook as belonging to Sherman

Hasbrouck and sending it along to Hudson, Ohio, with

Sherm’s obituary and a copy of the memorial service for their archives!... Thank you to Raechelle Edmiston-

Cyr for her leadership and to all who served as Mystery

Friends this year, and a special thank you to Eli McGill who came as the wizard Gandalf to announce who

belonged with whom at the Reveal Luncheon!...

Thank you to Judy Whitney for her wonderful presentation of her trip to Machu Picchu for Alliance

this month!... Congratulations to our dancers at

UMaine’s Dance Festival: Ruby and Owen Beane, Sonja Birthisel and Alyssa Urquhart!... Thank you to

Sandy Feher and to Kendra and Kevin Ritchie for four

new dedicated hymnals for our Sanctuary!... Thanks to Dot Turner for polishing our silver candlesticks!...

Sam Kunz and Louise Jolliffe were really superb in the

play Love Letters!... There was a good crowd for Music With a Mission to hear the Acadian fiddle music!... All

of us here wish Hannah Barry a safe and healing journey as she and Leslie Beliveau travel to Germany

for a special treatment for Hannah’s Lyme disease.

You can keep track of Hannah’s progress on Face Book or on Instagram!

Congratulations to

Jessie Walker Maine State Speech and Debate Tournament:

1st place in Story Telling

1st place in Oral Interpretation

National Qualifying Meet:

The 2017 Maine State Student of the Year

The Maine Forensic Association:

College Scholarship

Jessie is a National Speech and Debate Association

Academic All-American currently holding the number one

point position in the State of Maine. In June, she will

travel to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, for her fourth year of

competing in a national tournament!

Gospel Lessons

March 4: John 2:13-22 March 11: John 3:14-21 March 18: John 12:20-33 March 25: Mark 14:1-15:47 Palm Sunday April 1: Mark 16:1-8 Easter

Cards of condolence on the death of

Sherman Hasbrouck to his children:

Lisa Summers and Joel Hasbrouck 183 Katherine Road

Ridgewood, NJ 07450

Brian Hasbrouck 46 Sherborn Street

Arlington, MA 02474

Dewey and Emily Hasbrouck 91 Bennoch Road

Orono, Maine 04473

Cards of condolence on the death of

Faye McDermott to her children

Tamara and Murali Ranganathan Terry and Teresa Raymond

Peter McDermott and Courtney Painter Margaret and Andy Hurd

send to: c/o Tamara Ranganathan 4 Fernwood Drive, Merrimac, NH 03054

Cards of condolence on the death of

Phyllis Borns to Donna and Kenneth Moore and Family

29 Annette Drive, Limerick, PA 19468

Thanks to the work of Dr. Kathy Bourgoin

The Church of Universal Fellowship

at its Annual Meeting has affirmed the statement of

Physicians for Social Responsibility:

Back from the Brink: A Call to Prevent Nuclear War:

“We call on the United States to lead a global effort to prevent nuclear war by: *renouncing the option of

using nuclear weapons first;*ending the president’s

sole, unchecked authority to launch a nuclear attack; *taking US nuclear weapons off hair-trigger

alert; *cancelling the plan to replace its entire

arsenal with enhanced weapons;*actively pursuing

a verifiable agreement among nuclear armed states to eliminate their nuclear arsenals.”

Cards of love

and encouragement to:

Jim Artesani

14 Spencer St., Orono ,ME 04473

Hannah Barry

622 Bennoch Rd, Old Town, ME 04468

Barry Hammer

15 Downeast Terr, Apt 2, Orono, ME 04473

Lorraine Lick

44 Kelley Rd., Orono, ME 04473

Dennis Mann

P.O. Box 61, Passadumkeag, ME 04475

Deanna Westfall

326 Main Road, Passadumkeag, ME 04475

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Into the Woods: The 2018 Lenten Journey at CUF presented by the Deacons’ Adult Spiritual Growth Team

All are cordially invited to participate!

Join in whenever you can!

The Worship Team has chosen to assist our Lenten journey by posting around the church some of the most famous quotes of long-time peace activist and American clergyman William Sloane Coffin (1924-2006). Known for books such as Credo, Letters to a Young Doubter, The Heart Is a Little to the Left and The Courage to Love, Coffin had an influence on many of us growing up. He was ordained in the Presbyterian tradition and later in the United Church of Christ. In his younger days, Coffin was an athlete, a talented pianist, a CIA agent, and later Chaplain of Yale University where the influence of

Reinhold Niebuhr’s social philosophy led him to become a strong leader in the Civil Rights Movement and peace movements of the 1960s and 1970s. Coffin served as Senior Minister of NYC’s Riverside Church and President of SANE/Freeze (now Peace Action), the nation’s largest peace and justice group. He prominently opposed US military intervention in conflicts from the Viet Nam War to the Iraq War. He ardently supported gay rights.

The posters are by artist Nan March of Brunswick, Maine. The Into the Woods branches are by our own artist Nancy Leavitt.

Into the Woods: EXPLORING RACE & RACISM: Thursdays, 3/8, 3/15, 3/22 at 2:00, Library Race, racism, white privilege, discrimination, and other often misunderstood concepts regarding how we treat others, will be explored throughout this six-week series. We will explore the ways “white privilege” and other related concepts are still rampant in our public and private lives even though we think we have long ago moved beyond them. Peggy McIntosh writes, “As a white person, I realized I had been taught about racism as something that puts others at a disadvantage, but had been taught not to see one of its corollary aspects, white privilege, which puts me at an advantage.” Join us, that together we might gain insights that could be life changing for ourselves and for those around us.

Into the Woods: OPENING NEW SPIRITUAL PATHWAYS: Sundays, 12:10, March 4, 11, 18, and 25

#12:10, March 4: Throughout Barbara Brown Taylor’s book An Altar in the World: a Geography of Faith are meaningful ways to the sacred in small and seemingly everyday things. When regarded properly, anything can become a sacrament, an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual connection. Brown calls us to live with a purpose, pay attention, slow down, and revere the world we live in. Leader: Rev. Emily Taylor

#12:10, March 11: This will be a discussion on Spiritual Practices using the four elements: Earth, Water, Fire, and Air. This is part of Heart Rhythm Meditation. Leader: Judy Kuhns-Hastings

#12:10, March 18: The discussion will center on Brian McLaren's We Make the Road by Walking, a Year-Long Quest for Spiritual Formation, Reorientation and Activation. This is a brilliant retelling of the biblical story and a thrilling reintroduction to Christian faith in "helping translate your faith into action" so that you can "become pregnant with holy aliveness". Leader: Barbara Turner

#12:10, March 25: Amos Smith's book Healing the Divide offers a direction for Postmodern Christianity that "preserves the integrity of Christian Mysticism's epicenter from contamination from both the Christian Hard Right and the sometimes rudderless new age." Described as "an essential book for the evolution of Christian consciousness and the healing of our world," this book will be the focus of our discussion. Leader: Will Hunter

Updated Directory! A new directory is coming out soon! Please check your own listing and confirm that you are listed correctly. If you notice an error please send any changes, updates or corrections to Erin in the office at cufoffice@icloud.com or at 866-3655

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YAWP celebrated the promotion of

Emily Feher, Sarah King, Jasper McGill and Henry Smith to YAWP on Sunday, February 11th. These "fresh YAWPers", as they've been named, join the ranks of some older and sometimes wiser YAWPers who welcomed them with tee-shirts and personalized copies of the book Wonder. No doubt this awesome group will continue to make us all proud as they rushed right off to create and sell homemade Valentine's Day cards to raise money for Water for South Sudan. As their tee-shirts say "YAWP---leaving things better than they were...most of the time."

March Benevolence Giving OUR MISSION WITHIN AND FOR OUR COMMUNITY (CUF Open Doors)

Our church is committed to keeping its doors open to promote community-building activities and encourage positive relationships. Many local, non-profit groups use our beautiful facility. Relationships are formed, plans are made, lessons are learned, and community is built and nourished with love and laughter. CUF considers the cost of our open doors (heat, lights, cleaning) a benevolence gift to the greater Orono/Old Town community. Won’t you help?

Monday Night Book Group

March 5th – The Bastard of Istanbul by Elif Shafak tells the story of two families--and a secret connection linking them to a violent event in the history of their homeland. Filed with humor and understanding, this exuberant, dramatic novel is about memory and forgetting, about the need to examine the past and the desire to erase it, and about Turkey itself.

Host: Judy Kuhns-Hastings Monday at 7:00pm in the Gathering Place! Join us for any or all of these discussions.

Easter Lilies If you wish to purchase a lily this Easter in memory, honor, or celebration of someone, please call the church office at 866-3655 by March 23rd. The lilies are $15 and will be placed around the altar on Easter Sunday. Please also indicate if you would like to take your lily home after the Easter Worship or if you wish your lily to be given to one of our homebound church members. Thank you.

This is the fortieth anniversary of UCC New

England Women's Celebration.

Come! Celebrate with us!

There is “a seat at the table” for you!

http://www.uccwomenscelebration.org/

If you are interested in carpooling to the

Saturday, April 7th events, please call the

church office: 866:3655.