Skinner House

Help update Churchworks

Churchworks: A Well-Body Book for Congregations, published in 1999 by Skinner House and still a key resource for congregations, is being considered for updating.

Its author, the Rev. Anne Odin Heller, former district executive for the UUA’s Pacific Northwest District, is inviting congregational leaders to help her determine what changes to make. In addition to the questions below, she would welcome suggestions for activities or resources that could be included in the new edition.

Here are the questions for congregational leaders:

  • What topics, if any, do you feel are missing from the first edition of Churchworks?
  • What section(s) do you think are most in need of updating?
  • What do you find most useful about Churchworks?
  • What do you find least useful?
  • How do you and your congregation use Churchworks?
  • Is there anything else you would like to say?

Churchworks uses parts of the physical body as metaphors for various facets of congregational life. Chapters are focused on core documents, spirituality and worship, assessment tools, communications, vision, social justice and evangelism, ministry, conflict, organization, stewardship, etc.

Email responses by October 15 to Heller at aoheller@taosnet.com, or send them by ground mail to A.O. Heller, HCR 74, Box 21207, El Prado, NM 87529.

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New book offers inspiration for activists

The Rev Stephen Shick, senior minister at the Unitarian Church of Marlboro and Hudson in Marlboro, Mass., has written a book designed to, as he says, “inspire and sustain activists and others who are working for a better world.”

Be the Change: Poems, Prayers and Meditations for Peacemakers and Justice Seekers is published by the UUA’s Skinner House.

Shick is founding director of the Unitarian Universalist Peace Network and former director of U.S. programs for the UU Service Committee. He draws on his four decades of activist experience to offer motivation and encouragement to those just starting out in social justice work as well as reflections and insights for veteran justice-seekers. The book includes quotations from Jesus, Shakespeare, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Rachel Carson, Maya Angelou, and others.

He notes, “I offer this book to those people, to you, who look upon the carnage of war, the cruelty of poverty, and the destruction of our environment with open eyes and simply say, ‘We can and must do better.’ This book is for you, the ones who, despite fears and limitations, give hope and courage to all of us by the way you live. It is dedicated to you who have a pestering need to love more boldly and live more courageously so that others might live better lives.”

Be the Change is $12 from the UUA Bookstore, 800-215-9076.

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