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Our
Society
Contract
Minister Recommendation and Parish Meeting
The
ministerial search committee has proposed Rev. Jane Esbensen as our
new contract minister and the Prairie Board has agreed to pass this
recommendation to the congregation. On August 15th, Rev.
Esbensen will present the program, which will be followed by a
potluck and a parish meeting to vote on this recommendation.
Rev.
Esbensen is in her second year as a half time consulting minister at
Lake Country UU Church in Hartland, Wisconsin. She would take the
position at Prairie as an additional half-time position.
Rev.
Esbensen comes highly recommended on several fronts. She is viewed as
an excellent speaker, both thoughtful and insightful. I think we will
find her presenting ideas which challenge us. She will bring a
humanist perspective but appreciates the need for spiritual
reflection and ritual. She also loves “talk backs” after
sermons, which fits our style well, and not all ministers are
comfortable with this.
Rev.
Esbensen is regarded as gifted in the area of pastoral care and tends
to gravitate to that as a priority over other areas of ministry
according to a number of references.
Rev.
Esbensen is open to the idea of shared ministry and will do joint
planning with our program committee, especially looking at overall
themes and identifying any gaps in our programs. She has a definite
interest in social justice and perhaps could help us strengthen our
approach to these issues.
She
is currently visiting in Sweden. When she returns, I plan to arrange
several opportunities for her to meet with small groups prior to the
August 15th service and parish meeting. This will include
the Prairie Board, the staff, and the program committee. In addition,
I will be arranging a time for folks who are not currently serving on
the board or program committee to meet with her in an informal, small
group setting. If you are particularly interested in this or if you
have issues you would like to discuss with Rev. Esbensen, please
contact me.
Barbara
Park, Prairie UU President
273-8775
or barpark (at) gmail.com
WOW
News
Prairie
women have all been invited to Pat Watkins' porch for our August
meeting on August 7th
at 9 am. Please bring a dish to pass. Pat Watkins lives at 230 N
Meadow Lane, right off of Regent, near Midvale.
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In September we will
meet at the Prairie Retreat, Saturday, September 18th,
and the October meeting is October 2nd, back at Prairie, at 9
am.
Any questions or emails to add to the
group call 276 8397 or email marysomers44@charter.net
Mary
Somers, WOW coordinator
Prairie
Book Club Update
 The
Prairie Book Club meets monthly, after the Sunday Service at Prairie,
about 11:45 a.m..except for September when it meets at the Prairie
Retreat at Pine Lake Camp (near Westfield, WI). Bring potluck food
to share at the Sunday club meetings. This is an open book club. You
may come whether or not you have read the book. For more
information, contact Mary Mullen, 608.298.0843 or mmullen@chorus.net.
Sunday,
July 18
-
Roads to Quoz, An American Mosey
by William Least Heat-Moon is about a series of short trips –
total of 16,000 miles - rather than one long trip as Heat-Moon’s
other books were. In this book he covers the Oauchita River in AR
and LA, the Florida Panhandle, portions of the Southwest, a swath
from Missouri to Maine, portions of the Great Plains, and the East
Coast. “Wherever he is, Heat-Moon’s thought is often
tethered to questions of sustainability and equitability…deep
ecology.” 608 pages. Feel free to select whatever trips appeal
to you. Of the parts read by Mary Mullen, she especially suggests
the chapters starting on pp. 15, 71 with 78, 86, 188 with 194, and
particularly 306 with 317. Recommended by Al Nettleton.
Sunday,
August 15 – Book club members can choose from 2 books on
Postville, Iowa: Postville:
A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America
by Stephen G. Bloom or Postville
U.S.A.
by Mark A Grey, Michele Devlin, and Aaron Goldsmith. Both books
concern the clash between the residents of a small, intensely
Christian town and the group of Lubavitcher Jews who open a highly
successful kosher slaughterhouse there. The book club will meet after
the brief parish meeting.
Saturday,
September 18 - Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa,
by Peter Godwin, is a memoir of a man who grew up in Rhodesia, now
Zimbabwe. His family was white, professional and middle class, but
also liberal. As a result, he had black friends and learned the
local language and got to know the bush. Yet he was caught up in the
war for independence and required to serve in the Rhodesian armed
forces. After the war he became a journalist, eventually fleeing the
country when his investigative reporting led to threats to his
safety. For reviews, see
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/philip-spires-reviews-mukiwa-by-peter-godwin.html
and
http://www.amazon.com/Mukiwa-White-Africa-Peter-Godwin/dp/product-description/0802141927
Published
in 1996. 418 pages. Recommended by Rose Smith.
Sunday,
October 17 – Now and at the Hour, a novel
by our own former Prairie member Marty Drapkin, is the story of three
isolated people in Ward B: a young aide, a 12-year-old boy with a
brain injury suffered in a football game, and a 54-year-old man with
cerebral palsy. The three “”struggle to connect with
others and to find some meaning, and maybe even salvation, in their
lives.” One reviewer remarks that “the novel is more
than just a memorable character study of compromised individuals; it
deals with such difficult issues as the nature of identity, the
responsibility of state and society, the existence of God, and, above
all, the Jobean question of why the good person suffers in what
appears to be an untenably indifferent or incomprehensibly hostile
world.” 224 pages.
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Recommended
by Erin Bosch. Contact her to get a $6 copy from the author: 238-6285
or hillfarms2002@yahoo.com We hope Marty will be able to attend our
discussion!
Mary
Mullen
Book
Club Coordinator
Menu
for the Future Follow Up
On
July 11, 2010 10 Prairie members and friends, who were participants
in a Northwest Earth Institute course Menu for the Future, gave a
presentation to summarize what they had learned. This course and
presentation were completed as one of the required Green Sanctuary
projects. During the presentation, a list of things you can do as an
individual to support a healthy food system were mentioned and a
promise made to provide them to all. They are as follows:
THIRTEEN
THINGS YOU CAN DO TO SUPPORT A SUSTAINABLE FOOD SYSTEM by Lena
Rotenberg
Discussion
course on Menu for the Future, Northwest Earth Institute, page 92
1 -
Eat foods grown and processed locally. Consider growing, processing,
and preserving some foods yourself.
2 -
Give preference to foods that were grown organically.
3 -
Become part of your foodshed’s community. Buy food through
farmers’ markets, food co-ops or community supported
agriculture programs (CSAs).
4 -
When you buy from chain supermarkets, ask where the vegetables, meats
and fish came from. Encourage the store managers to carry local,
organic, sustainably harvested and fairly traded products.
5 -
If eating commercial foods, eat foods that have been processed as
little as possible (they are likely to be fresher, more local to you,
and healthier for you).
6
- Buy food in bulk, or with the least packaging. Bring your own
reusable or recyclable packaging to the store.
7 -
Compost food scraps and waste. Reuse or recycle whatever packaging
you can (Be creative!).
8 -
Eat lower on the food chain.
9 -
If you’re buying imports, give preference to products that are
fairly traded to guarantee farmers and food industry workers a living
wage.
10
- Cook at home as much as possible. When you eat out, try to
patronize restaurants that follow the directives above.
11
- Understand that by paying a little bit more for sustainable foods
you’re supporting practices that reduce negative environmental
and social impacts.
12
- Teach your family, friends, and community about how their food
choices impact the environment, their health, and society. Contact
governmental officials to encourage their support of a sustainable
food system.
13
- Most importantly, give yourself credit for trying to do your best.
Take pride in the fact that you’re making every decision count,
as best you can.
For
more information, please contact Kathy Converse, chair of the Green
Committee.
Kathy
Converse, conversekrtm (at) msn.com
Prairie
Elders meetings
Prairie
Elders is a group of over-65 Prairie members who meet once a month
(generally on the 4th Tuesday) at Oakwood, in the Nakoma room, for
conversation and mutual support. New members are always welcome.
Topics alternate between general interest and more personal items.
For July 27th the topic is "Implications of the Texas Social
Studies Curriculum ." The Texas School Board’s removal of
Martin Luther King’s quote “Injustice anywhere is a
threat to injustice everywhere” typifies the
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Board’s
revisions. For complete texts, still awaiting technical editing, go
here: http://www.tea.state.tx.us/index2.aspx?id=3643
All
meetings begin with informal conversation at 1:30 pm, followed by
discussion beginning at 2:00 pm. If possible, please bring some
snacks to share and your own beverage cup. For more information about
the group or to arrange a ride, please call one of the following:
Donna Murdoch 238-3802, Gordon Cunningham 230-3367,
Rosemary Dorney 238-4382 or Rose Smith 233-3363.
Prairie
Fall Family Retreat!
 Our
annual fall family retreat will be held at Pine Lake Camp in
Westfield, Wisconsin, on the weekend of September 17-19, 2010. The
next Prairie Fire Newsletter will contain full program descriptions
and a registration form, but here are some “teasers” to
get you thinking!
We
have the program just about finished and it contains some of the
favorite elements we do every year as well as some new things. There
will be folk dancing and Bollywood dancing, a talent show, recorder
and Spanish lessons, yoga, crafts (paper bags and seeds,) a
presentation of the Ware lecture from GA, nature walks and story
time, a workshop on coping with stress, and more. The women's group
and the book club will also have their regular monthly meetings at
the retreat. We will be cooking spaghetti dinner together on Saturday
night and having our traditional Key Log ceremony on Sunday morning.
Lodging
options have expanded from last year. In addition to the cabins,
camping, and hotel-like accommodations, there will also be a
“bunkhouse” style option. You can look at all the lodging
options online at
http://www.pinelakecamp.org/lodging.html
If
you have any questions about the retreat, please contact one of us,
and we hope to see you there!
Phyllis
Long, Retreat Program Coordinator plong373 (at) gmail.com
Kate
Liu, Prairie Administrator admin (at) uuprairie.org
Supporting
Our Young Families
As
you know if you have been coming to Prairie in the last year or so,
we have a lot of infants and young children who've been coming on
Sunday mornings. It's terrific to see these fresh faces, and we want
our young families to be able to take advantage of everything Prairie
has to offer, including our annual retreat. If we are successful in
drawing some of these families to the retreat at Pine Lake this year,
we will need LOTS of help with infant care and with activities for
preschoolers and young elementary school-age children. That is why
we
need YOU. Our regular childcare provider Xena Anderson has
agreed to help us on Saturday from 9 to 4. In addition, we are asking
every adult who is able to volunteer at least an hour to care for and
play with our young children. If we all pitch in, we can assure our
young families that they and their kids will have a great time, and
the children will get attention they need and deserve, so the parents
can be free to get to know the rest of us and enjoy all the
activities.
There will be a place on your retreat registration
form to indicate how many hours you can devote to infant care or
activities with young children, whether you have an age preference,
and times you will
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be
available. Thanks so much for your help in welcoming and supporting
the youngest folks in our society and their parents!
Phyllis
Long, Retreat Coordinator
Humanist
Union to hear and see report from TAM 8
The
Humanist Union will meet on August 1 to see a slide show and hear a
presentation on Documenting The Amaz!ng Meeting 2010: A
photographic report by Ingrid Laas. She took photos at "The
Amazing Meeting 8", held in Las Vegas July 8-11, 2010, with
James Randi, Richard Dawkins, Paul Kurtz, Michael Shermer, D.J.
Grothe, Sean Faircloth, and many others. These meetings are "a
celebration of critical thinking and skepticism" sponsored by
the James Randi Educational Foundation for thinking people who gather
annually "to share learning, laughs and life with fellow
skeptics and distinguished guest speakers."
We
will start as usual with a potluck lunch at 11:45 am, with the
photographic report and discussion from 12:30 to 1:30 pm. All who are
interested in critical thinking and skepticism are encouraged to
attend.
Bob
Park
 Wedding
Announcement
Kathy
and Randy Converse announce the marriage of Tara Converse and Chris
Rollins on June 5, 2010, at the Allen Centennial Gardens on the UW
Campus here in Madison. Tara and Chris met in 2004 while students at
Knox College in Galesburg, IL. Following graduation, Tara spent a
year teaching English at a high school in Aizuwakamatsu, Japan, where
Chris learned why she loves Japan so much. Following Japan, they
moved to Philadelphia while Tara completed a Masters degree at Drexel
University in Dance Movement Therapy. Tara and Chris currently live
in Bloomington, IL. Chris is a jazz musician and works for US
Cellular. Tara is a dance movement therapist for children with
mental health needs that are in professional foster care at The
Baby Fold.
Social
Action Notes
Death
and Human Rights Violations at the Arizona-Mexico Border Presentation
The
Women's International League for Peace and Freedom presents Death and
Human Rights Violations at the Arizona-Mexico Border by Leila Pine and
Craig McComb. Leila Pine is a member of First Society and has spoken at
Prairie on this issue. The speakers will discuss their work with the No
More Deaths humanitarian organization, and cover updates to Arizona's
SB1070 / racial profiling, the Arizona boycott, and Arizona Freedom
Summer. The presentation will be held Tuesday, August 17th
at St. Luke's Lutheran Church, 605 Spruce St. There is no admission
fee, but the organizers ask that you bring an item for the St. Luke's
food pantry.
Mary
Somers
Social
Action
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Interfaith
Hospitality Network Week is August 1 to August
7
Please consider helping homeless families. You can call Erin Bosch for
more information about IHN (238-6285)... or... you can go to this
website for an explanation of the volunteer jobs:
Page 7
http://midvalelutheran.org/ihnjobs.htm... and
you can sign up online at this address: http://nordengs.com/ihn/group.asp?eg=15&u=true.
Because of construction at Midvale Lutheran Church, we
have not had a week of volunteering to do in awhile. But now the church
is finished, so the families will again be housed at Midvale Lutheran
and our help is needed there.
Erin Bosch
IHN Coordinator
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UU
& Wider Community News
Ethical
Eating study group at FUS
The
2008-2012 Congregational Study/Action Issue (CSAI) for the UUA is
Ethical Eating. First Society invites you to join members of their
Environmental Action Committee and others at First Unitarian Society
this fall to delve into Ethical Eating as it relates to the
environment. Kicking things off, at our August 5 meeting, we will
discuss the book The
Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter
by
Peter Singer and Jim Mason. This book is available through the
Madison Public Library system in print, audio, and electronic
versions or can be purchased from your favorite bookseller. Future
meetings will be devoted to specific aspects of the topic such as:
soil fertility, water and air quality, energy use, technology/GMO
issues, and effects on other species. Meetings of the Environmental
Action Committee are the first Thursday of the month at 6:30 p.m.
starting Thursday August 5th.
Join us for one or all of the discussions! Look at the First
Unitarian Society Calendar and newsletter for notices of meetings
(http://www.fusmadison.org/calendar/calendar.shtml).
Meeting rooms are posted on the door of the First Unitarian Society,
900 University Bay Drive. For more information - Liz Wessel,
238-9934.
Prairie
UU Society
2010
Whenona Dr.
Madison,
WI 53711
608-271-8218
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