Congratulations, Pastor Derrick! Congratulations, Sun Lakes UCC! And thank you, Desert Heritage Church (UCC/DOC)! This is what happens when two small congregations risk doing something new, and gracefully collaborate to share a pastor. One congregation worships on Saturday evening. One congregation worships on Sunday morning. Both congregations share their unique programs with each other in person and online. Thanks be to God!
Imagination and creative thinking are at work at First Church Phoenix. The Campus Redevelopment Committee continues to explore a future vision for the church campus. One focus of the committee is to pursue a multi-campus approach. In pursuing this potential direction, serving the First Church congregation would remain the number one priority. A second opportunity would be to meet a community need while also generating sustainable revenue. This model would ensure First Church has the necessary operating funds to continue its outreach to members and the community.
First Congregational in Albuquerque is assembling volunteers to tutor elementary school students after school (3:30-5:30pm) at the community library at the Pueblo of Jemez. Tutors are currently covering two days a week and hoping to expand to the full week.
Look at these smiles! The WISE Team (Welcoming, Inclusive, Supportive, Engaging) from Shadow Rock invites you to support NAMI through their team, WISE Walkers. The event, NAMI Walks Your Way, is October 15 in Tempe. Check out the fantastic WISE Walkers team page!
Oro Valley UCC collected 1011 diapers in its October diaper drive for ICS! Lots of dry bottoms thank you!
A new book study group at Scottsdale UCC will tackle “Fierce Love: A Bold Path to Ferocious Courage and Rule-Breaking Kindness That Can Heal the World”. A healing antidote to our divisive culture, full of evocative storytelling, spiritual wisdom, and nine essential daily practices—by the first female, Black senior minister at the historic Collegiate Churches of New York. Inspired by the tenets of ubuntu—the Zulu philosophy that we are each impacted by the circumstances that impact those around us, and that the world won’t get better until we all get better—Fierce Love lays out the nine daily practices for breaking through tribalism and engineering the change we seek.
A Health Fair sponsored by the Pima County Health Department will be held at the Sahuarita Food Bank & Community Resource Center, as well as The Good Shepherd patio and classrooms. Save the date for October 20 from 9 am-1 pm. Many health services are available including flu shots, the newest Covid vaccine, blood tests, and even liver scans. Click here for a flyer. This event is open to the entire community at no cost.
The Tucson area UCC churches were well represented at the Pride weekend last week. Thank you to Church of the Painted Hills for this picture!
The Creation Care team at Rincon UCC has spun off a sub-group working on ways to raise awareness of our Indigenous neighbors whose land we’re on. Every Sunday they acknowledge that the church is on lands that belonged to Tohono O’odham, Pascua Yaqui, and Apache peoples, as well as their ancestors. The hope is to back up those words with actions of repentance and repair and relationship. To that end, they are organizing a field trip to Mission Garden this week. It will be an opportunity to learn about O’odham agriculture and their traditions associated with Native American crops like corn, beans and squash, and how crops brought by Europeans were integrated into O'odham agriculture. Mission Garden is a living agricultural museum of Sonoran Desert-adapted heritage fruit trees, traditional local heirloom crops and edible native plants. It’s located at the foot of Sentinel Peak, at the site of the Native American village of S-cuk Son (pronounced Chuk Shon), a place sacred to the Tohono O’odham. You can learn more about this treasure at
Thank you Randy Mayer of The Good Shepherd UCC for hosting National staff, Rich Doerrer-Peacock from Desert Palm, Pastor Susan from First Phoenix, Conference Minister Bill Lyons, and Holly Herman from the East Valley Network. Randy gave us all a tour of the border wall and surrounding area, of the town of Nogales, and then to the Casa, a refugee shelter supported by the UCC, Lutherans, and Episcopalians. We met the director, Sister Lika, and were able to see all the services at the Casa. She is a woman of calm spirit, artistic ability, and she radiates love. Here is her picture along with one of her paintings depicting refugees from around the world in the Last Supper. We then toured Casa Alitas before heading back.