RE Voices - January 2026

January 2026

Another calendar year has come and gone--and so far this program year we’ve had five Spirited services; Backpack Blessing, Water Communion, Samhain, Thanks-giving, and Winter Solstice, each of them different, unique, and a whole lot of fun (and work).  By the way, we still have about a dozen backpack blessing tags, if anyone has lost one and wants another or if you missed that service and would like one.  And if any parents happened to take photos of the Winter Solstice Pageant--please share!  I forgot to ask someone specifically to take photos for me, so I only have a couple that I managed to take afterward, which only capture two-thirds of the participants.

In RE, the children have learned about the greeters and welcomers in our congregation during our EPIC classes and about our Values and Promises in Spirit Play.  We also shared the Spirit Play Hanukkah story and made ornaments for the residents of Crescent Manor during a Sunday Funday service.

Our theme for the month of January is justice.  Justice can have two, somewhat competing definitions--it can mean “the administration of the law”, but it can also mean “the quality of being fair and reasonable”.  I’m sure that we can all think of a situation we’ve encountered where the administration of the law did not feel just (fair and reasonable) to us.  This dichotomy is coming up in our day to day lives more and more these days.  There are also multiple types of justice.  Procedural justice concerns whether the rules are the same for everyone and whether they are followed; this is what the criminal justice system should be.  However, more people are interested in retributive justice, which is focused on punishment--did the wrong-doer ‘get what they deserved’?  Distributive justice is all about determining who gets what, and can sometimes be in conflict with restorative justice, which is concerned with righting the wrongs of the past in order to establish a level playing field in the present for the children of the future, this can feel unfair to some, who have enjoyed a more privileged position.  Although we don’t have a lot of Sundays to fit them all into, I hope we’ll get to explore some of these themes in Time for All Ages this month.

Holly vs. Oak Credits

I’d like to thank everyone who participated in and helped out with our Winter Solstice Pageant.  Our cast was:

Queen Mother  -- Zoe

Holly King -- Sean

Oak King --  Ezra

Day -- Gretchen

Day’s Assistant -- Ryan

Night -- Greysen

Mother Earth -- Savannah

Thanks also go to Jason Harthan, who narrated, MB DeKara, who was an immense help with stage direction (otherwise known as cast wrangling), and David VanZandt, who assisted in the cutting out of very large cardboard circles.

Coming Up in RE

Remember, there is NO service or RE on December 28th.  Our service on January 4th will be our annual Kwanzaa Family Service, with all participants in the sanctuary.  Our next day of regular RE classes will be on January 11th, which will be a Spirit Play lesson.

Come One, Come All!

Our next Family Game night will be on January 18th starting at 4:30 p.m.  Dinner this month will be pizza!  We are inviting the families of Beth Tikvah to join us for this event.  RSVP by January 16th to re@uusgu.org. 

Featured Books of the Week

Featured on the library shelf on January 4th (when we all return from our holiday adventures) will be books about Kwanzaa.  We own a picture book version of the story. Rev. Daniel will be telling us at our Kwanzaa Family Service, “Carry Go Bring Come”, that I hope to find before January 4th. 

If you have a particular book about Kwanzaa (or any other topic) you’d like us to obtain for the UUSGU library, drop me an email about it!