'Plarn' mats are being made by Desert Garden folks at a great clip. Each one provides a comfortable, colorful, insulated, lightweight resting place for a homeless person ... AND keeps hundreds of plastic bags out of the trash/oceans. Ten more mats were delivered to Justa Center last week. Desert Garden plarn makers have recycled well over 10,000 bags.

Next time people ask how many members Church of the Good Shepherd in Albuquerque has, they will include the 50K online participants! Plus, Pastor Sarah did a live broadcast over her lunch break one day and a US soldier logged in to talk to her from the Syrian desert!!!

United Church of Santa Fe's Immigration Task Force invites everyone to watch “Immigration Nation," a new 6-part Netflix documentary series. Difficult to watch, it captures the violence perpetrated by ICE and the current administration against immigrant communities. The filmmakers were given exclusive access to ICE—interviewing officers, filming inside detention camps and even riding along on raids. What they recorded shows an accurate and disturbing truth about ICE. United’s Immigration Task Force encourages you to watch the series and then engage in a zoom discussion on Wed., Sept. 23 at 5:30. Register at unitedchurchsf@gmail.com.

First Church Phoenix and “Thankful Sundays” the official name of the Sunday afternoon program that feeds people experiencing homelessness was gifted with 5 pallets of water (nearly 10,000 bottles). Thanks to the quick organizing of the Office Coordinator, Charity, the Sacred Space Moderator and her brother (Grace and Eric) and Thankful Sunday’s Director, Diane, they were able to muster up a U-Haul and enough volunteers to pick up the 5 pallets of water at Costco and unload the nearly 2000 bottles of water for people experiencing homelessness. The water will be distributed with their daily lunches 4 days a week and at the 2 weekly evening meals for our homeless guests. (Yes, First Church serves 40-50 homeless daily lunches.) It was a glorious morning and afternoon and a change of the daily pattern of life during COVID.

Do you miss congregational singing? We can’t sing in groups right now, but inventive folks are coming up with good substitutes. First Congregational UCC in Albuquerque invites you to Radiant Music, a community sing on Zoom, 7:15 to 8:15 PM, (NM time) every third Wednesday of the month - 9/16 is next. Pauleta Hendrickson, music director at St. Luke’s Lutheran, and Ruth Striegel from FCUCC will lead the group in singing a variety of songs including hymns and rounds. Last month they learned that Shall We Gather at the River was written in response to an epidemic in 1865! Don’t let your singing voice get rusty. Join us! The Zoom link is https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86013932672

Casas Adobes UCC in Tucson collected funds instead of supplies this year for the Helen Keeling Elementary School. Donations were wonderful and greatly appreciated! Altogether they donated $4,490 from the church (some other folks contributed directly to the school).

Taos UCC is beginning the third year of its Medical Debt Relief program. The first year three churches joined together, and were able to purchase and forgive over eighty thousand dollars of uncollectible medical debt owed by over eighty Taos neighbors. Year two they grew into an Interfaith collaboration that included nine spiritual communities, and were able to purchase and forgive almost a quarter of a million dollars of uncollectible medical debt for their Taos neighbors. This year they are aiming for half a million dollars. Is it possible that a little new church start, who created this program with only five hundred dollars, can continue to expand their ability to help their neighbors with medical debt they cannot pay? (OF COURSE IT IS!). If you would like to donate to this program, please send your donation to Taos UCC, PO Box 1084, Taos, NM 87571, or donate online at their website, taosucc.org. Mark your donation: Taos Medical Debt. With the medical debt purchased at three cents on the dollar, a little bit of money buys a lot of human freedom.

Oro Valley UCC is holding an ICS DRIVE-BY FOOD DRIVE - September 6th, 11:30-12:30, where they hope to create a PYRAMID OF PEANUT BUTTER!

The most needed item at ICS right now is the ever-popular jar of peanut butter. The goal is to collect 175 jars of peanut butter. Why 175 jars? September 6th will mark the 175th day since Oro Valley UCC last gathered in their sanctuary for a worship service. (With smaller sized jars, ICS can help more people.)

Congregational Church of the Valley co-pastors are starting a new sermon series this fall. There are some really bad ideas that are NOT found in the Bible, yet some swear they are. Here is an example that comes from Dr. R. Glen Miles and from a book by Rev. Adam Hamilton: Adam Hamilton got in an argument with his wife's aunt. She quoted the Bible as saying, "God helps those who help themselves." Adam said, "That's not in the Bible. That's actually opposed to the whole idea of the Bible, which says God helps us; we can't always help ourselves." She said, "Not only is it in the Bible, it's my favorite Bible verse." Adam said, "I've been to seminary. I'll bet you twenty dollars it's not in the Bible." She stayed up all night looking for that verse. She couldn't find it, because it was Benjamin Franklin who said it, or at least it is attributed to him. This was the only time that Adam Hamilton won a bet because he went to seminary.