Capital Unitarian Universalist Congregation

Learn how cancer-related research and clinical practice have advanced in recent years. Everyone of us has been touched by cancer. The ways that cancer is detected and treated is radically different than how it was done even 20 years ago.

Dr. Walter spent 23 years as staff scientist at Benioff Children's Hospital, Oakland, Calif., before
returning to Canada. Today he is an Adjunct Associate Professor of Biology and the Zen Buddhist
spiritual care provider at UVic Multifaith.

People in all cultures sing, for many reasons: to connect in community, to revive memories, to tell their stories, to express emotion, to celebrate life events… and some people don’t sing — also for many reasons. Let’s explore this a little, with a lot of singing, and a welcome to join in.

Dick and Cathy are co-directors of Victoria’s Gettin’ Higher Choir, Outside Voices and the Wednesday
Evening Sing-In. Together with Denis Donnelly, they lead the Community Choir Leadership Training
program.

Please join us at 10am on Sunday January 26th for Reilly Yeo – Prophets of Love: Active Engagement in a Time of Polycrisis

We’re called in this time of climate crisis not just to change our world, but to transform it. In the process, we will need to transform ourselves. Climate change is a wake-up call that heralds the urgency of our third principle as Unitarian Universalists – spiritual growth. Join Reilly Yeo, Candidate for Ministry with the Unitarian Universalist Association and Co-Founder of Climate Plan, for this exploration of the spiritual dimensions of the climate crisis.

This pre-recorded sermon is part of the Meaning Making series.

Bio: Reilly is an organizer and facilitator with extensive experience in digital campaigns. Prior to entering seminary, she was the Director of Communications and Public Engagement at the David Suzuki Foundation, and she currently serves as Co-Founder of Climate Plan, a membership-based organization that helps people and their communities respond to climate change. She received her MDiv from the University of Toronto and completed her chaplaincy training (CPE Basic) at Victoria General Hospital. Her work focuses on the twin challenges of spiritual resilience and systems change in the face of the polycrisis, the interlocking crisis of crises that defines our time. She lives in James Bay on the unceded territories of the Swenghung, a Lekwungen-speaking people, with her partner Jamie and their children Avery and Elyse.

The Truth Mandala. Re-created for Capital this was created by Joanna Macy and is a whole group structure for owning and honoring our pain for the world. The practice emerged in 1990 amid a large, tension-filled workshop near Frankfurt, on the day of the reunification of East and West Germany. 

What is love?  How could it have evolved from an apparently meaningless universe?  How, if implemented and practiced, could love be the answer to the problems that afflict each of us and our whole species?  How can love give us meaning, purpose and hope for the future?

Our American Unitarian-Universalist cousins have adopted a “Statement of Shared Values” that will help “promote liberation, radical inclusion, and communal care…”  In a report, the UUA calls on members to apply the spiritual discipline of love to the work of living our shared values.  How do they define love?  Discipline?  And Spiritual?

With the light of the chalice guiding the way, we explore our aspiration to be theologically alive: seeking to be ever-evolving in our understanding, open to new knowledge. How does our theology respond to the present moment and where might it go in the future?

Rev. Fiona Heath spent nine years as the settled minister at the Unitarian Congregation in Mississauga, as well as two years as the part time minister of the UU Congregation of Durham. Now retired, she lives in the countryside north of Kingston, focusing on fiction and poetry writing, local climate crisis response, and how to be a UU at home.

UU communities have a unique role to play in this time – unique amongst spiritual communities, we offer belonging regardless of belief. Belonging to a UU community isn’t predicated on sharing a theology, or an allegiance to one sacred text, to a dogma, to a creed. It does, however, require commitment to our UU principles, including the 3rd principle: Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations.

Acceptance, but also encouragement to growth, are in some tension with each other, but ideally they represent the two poles of belonging in a spiritual community. In this service, we’ll explore the question of how we get the balance right, and how we come back into relationship when we get it wrong.

Today’s service will include a New Members’ ceremony!

Though that feels like a very grand title, Yvonne will share poems and experiences of re-reading and re-telling the Persephone myth in poems. She will also share some of her current work on women, their unseen genius, clothing, climate and change. Yvonne is a writer and poet and is the past poet laureate of Victoria, BC, having served from 2015-2018. Her most recent book is Death of Persephone: A Murder and she is currently editing an anthology of poems on ice, her third anthology of water-based poems.

Join Heather Stefanek and Joy Huebert as they explore the challenges and necessities of leadership in a Unitarian Congregation.  Heather will share her experiences as Chairperson for the past three years, a time of many changes, and Joy will touch on what she is learning of Unitarianism and how we can continue to provide a joyful and meaningful religious experience

The moment I am asked about belonging, immediately a whole bunch of stories come to mind about times when I felt I didn’t belong. I am sure I’m not alone in this, it’s one of the challenges of trying to talk about belonging, how it creates complicated connections between our inner landscape, the world we find ourselves in, and the worlds we are attempting to bring about.

Speaker bio: Karen Fraser Gitlitz (she/her) is a white, cis-gendered woman of northern European ancestry. Karen has served as a Unitarian Universalist minister since 2008 and a professional Art Therapist since 2023. Karen and her partner, musician and composer Paul Gitlitz, now make their home on the Saanich peninsula on southern Vancouver Island, BC, the traditional territory of the W̱SÁNEĆ people. Karen keeps connected to congregational life through her work as Coordinator of the Meaning Making Project, this year offering 8 monthly theme packets and worship services to 15 Canadian UU congregations. Karen is also developing her private art therapy practice under the banner of Creative upWelling Art Therapy and a Community Ministry focussed on the interconnections between the arts, spirituality and social justice.

Today’s collection will be going to the CUC’s initiative Sharing our Faith.  Congregations are invited to send the money collected during the Sharing our Faith Sunday to the CUC. This money goes into the Sharing our Faith fund and in the future Capital can apply for financial support of projects. Capital has made applications in the past and may wish to do so in the future.

AGM follows the service instead of a Forum

In a constantly shifting world, what are the spiritual practices that allow us to be present to ourselves and be committed to our spiritual community? What resources and wisdom can we draw from to achieve equanimity in our lives and become more resilient?

This pre-recorded sermon is part of the Meaning Making series.

RevJ (he/they) is the Lead Minister of First Unitarian Congregation of Toronto. Dr. Kwong obtained his master of divinity and doctor of ministry degrees from Claremont School of Theology in California, and graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in film studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Born and raised in the Philippines (of Chinese descent), most of RevJ’s adult life was spent in California and Hawai’i. He served several congregations during his more than decade-long ministry including First Unitarian Church of Honolulu (where former U.S. President Barack Obama attended Sunday school), Sepulveda UU Society, Temecula Valley UU Community, Ohana Metropolitan Community Church (MCC) in Honolulu and Resurrection Beach MCC in Orange County, CA. Their non-profit leadership included serving as Executive Director of the Counselling & Spiritual Care Center of Hawai‘i and API Equality-LA.

RevJ values his pluralistic and ecumenical upbringing, from Evangelical to United Methodist, from Episcopalian to Calvary Chapel. They were christened at a gospel church and baptized as a Chinese Mennonite. In Hawai‘i, RevJ was a member of the Honolulu Mindfulness Community, a sangha influenced by Zen Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hahn.