 UU Fellowship of Lafayette Greetings fellow UUs and supporters! We will begin meeting IN PERSON on November 14th as well as on Zoom until further notice. Our theme for November services is Nonviolence. Universalist and Unitarian minister Adin Ballou’s and Unitarian Henry David Thoreau’s writings influenced Leo Tolstoy’s, Mahatma Gandhi’s, and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King’s philosophy and practice of non-violence. The commitment to non-violence is essential to oppose and subvert a culture of violence that is so damaging. Non-violence is an essential tool in the work to repair the world. Sunday, November 7th Service:  If you say, ‘…[Someone] is evil. We have to prevent him from continuing to be evil,’ and if you then use the same means he has been using, you are exactly like him. Trying to overcome evil with evil is not the way. All of the world’s religions teach that humankind is, at the center, good, kind, compassionate, but that something about living causes us to lose that compassionate center and this is what causes the problems in our world—the lack of compassion in our everyday functioning. Marshall Rosenberg, offered us a practical and great insight into human suffering and the solution to a lot of it and also a way to contribute to peacemaking -- that the mass of feelings we have on an ongoing basis often have at the root of them unmet needs. We cause our own hurts by improper responses to our unmet needs. Instead, we can choose to inquire into what makes us feel hurt, find ways to communicate our feelings and the underlying unmet needs and be able to listen with empathy to the other person and not BLAME. Marshall Rosenberg has developed a way of communicating that he calls NVC (non-violent communication) which can help us to meet our needs and become better communicators. Please visit us via this Zoom link or the one at uulala.org on Sunday -- 10:30 am for fellowship and 11 am for the service. If you are unable to attend, you may wish to view the interactive service slides. If you are on Facebook the service event is here. Last Sunday's service recap: What is 'emotional intelligence'? One definition describes it as: the ability to identify and regulate one's emotions and understand the emotions of others. Melissa Bowen's presentation informed us on why emotional intelligence is key to your emotional empowerment. View the interactive service slides.----   Our online calendar is now available via this link. --- |