We gather once again for our Spring Ecumenical Study Group, focusing on the book Historical Afterlives of Jesus by Gregory C. Jenks.  Material in this book includes the following: Introduction to the Historical Afterlives of Jesus Chapter 1: The Once and Future Jesus Chapter 2: The Parables of Jesus Chapter 3: Discovering Jesus in the Psalms Chapter 4: The Apocryphal Jesus Chapter 5: Jesus in Tertullian Chapter 6: Jesus as the Logos Chapter 7: Becoming Flesh Chapter 8: Jesus Christ on Byzantine Coins Chapter 9: The Aryan Jesus Chapter 10: Apocalypse Now and Then Chapter 11: Jesus, Individualism, and Mental Health.

We begin with a discussion about the introduction and the first chapter. Sessions are an hour and a half. Whether you’ve read the material for a particular day does not matter; come join the conversation. 

To join us online, CLICK HERE. 

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Join with others from member congregations of the Greendale Ecumenical Group for our Fall 2025 Study using Gregory Jenks’ book The Cultural Afterlives of Jesus: Jesus in Global Perspective.  The Group will meet on online, Tuesday evenings from 7 – 8:30 PM, beginning on October 7 (for six sessions).  To join the discussion online CLICK HERE.

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Join members of the Greendale Ecumenical Group as we explore the life and legacy of World War II era German Theologian and Martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The sessions will be weekly on Tuesdays beginning on Feb 4 @ 7 pm. Click the link to join!

https://bit.ly/4gI27TH

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GREENDALE ECUMENICAL GROUP – ADULT FORUM SERIES – Tuesdays @ 7 PM ONLINE Beginning October 1, 2024.

We continue our ongoing study of Archeology and the Bible. This part of the series takes us from Persian captivity through the early ministry of Jesus of Nazareth.

CLICK HERE to join the conversation on Tuesdays @ 7 pm.

Additional series will be offered to the forum later this Spring.

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We continue our Sunday Evening Adult Faith Development Program for the 2023-2024 season online on Sunday, May 26, 2024, beginning @ 7 pm, continuing our discussion of the last session of a NEW 10-part series on Ethics and Unitarian Universalism entitled “What We Choose.” This week’s session will revisit the topic of moral autnority.

The first step in the evolution of ethics is a sense of solidarity with other human beings.

— Albert Schweitzer

As we make behavioral choices in our day-to-day lives, we hold a sense of what is right and what is wrong, even if we are not always able to articulate the framework from which that emerges. This program explored several different frameworks and approaches to ethics that undergird debates over what is right, ethical, or moral in our society, our communities, our families, even within ourselves. Participants reflected on ways our networks of community, including our faith community, shape our moral and ethical values and give them life. We do not make behavioral choices and decisions in isolation, but rather as social beings, products of personal and communal experiences, stories, and structures that influence our understanding of right and wrong.
This workshop revisits the question posed in Workshop 1: What is the locus of moral authority? This workshop invites participants to name the ethical frameworks and approaches that guide their moral and ethical decision making, asking them to consider ways in which the program itself has changed their approach or clarified ethical or moral choices they are currently facing. Finally, the workshop invites participants to create skits to express their new understandings of ethics while enjoying and appreciating one another’s company.

“Introduction” to Workshop 10: Tapestry of Faith: What We Choose: An Adult Program on Ethics for Unitarian Universalists

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Please join us for our bi-weekly theme-based discussion group called Kindred Conversations.  We meet in the lounge this Wednesday, May 15th from 10:30 to noon.  Hope to see you there!

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We continue our Sunday Evening Adult Faith Development Program for the 2023-2024 season online on Sunday, May 12, 2024, beginning @ 7 pm, continuing our discussion of the 9th session of a NEW 10-part series on Ethics and Unitarian Universalism entitled “What We Choose.” This week’s session will explore an “ethic of risk”.

It is possible for there to be a dance with life, a creative response to its intrinsic limits and challenges…

— Sharon Welch

Dancing in the road.

Unitarian Universalist ethicist and theologian Sharon Welch’s work was born of her observation that those who engage in justice struggles always do so from a position of incomplete understanding and limited perspective. In the feminist movement, she learned it is impossible to control or guarantee the outcome or success of a particular action. She observed that oppressed communities have found a way to sustain resistance generation after generation in the face of repeated failure and defeat. She contrasts this with what she names as middle-class cynicism and despair which comes from an inability to control the outcome of action or to solve complex social problems.
This workshop will introduce and consider Welch’s ethic of risk, which includes a redefinition of responsible action, grounding in community, and strategic risk-taking. An ethic of risk leads us to a different kind of response to the moral issues of our time—issues of oppression and violence against people, groups, and the environment. Welch challenges us to form communities of accountability with people of different perspectives, values, and mores. Participants consider Welch’s stance that because an individual perspective on moral issues is always partial, “a single actor cannot be moral.”

“Introduction” to Workshop 9: Tapestry of Faith: What We Choose: An Adult Program on Ethics for Unitarian Universalists

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Please join us this Wednesday, May 1st for Kindred Conversations in the church lounge from 10:30-noon.  We will be discussing the month’s theme of pluralism.

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We continue our Sunday Evening Adult Faith Development Program for the 2023-2024 season online on Sunday, May 5, 2024, beginning @ 7 pm, continuing our discussion of the 8th session of a NEW 10-part series on Ethics and Unitarian Universalism entitled “What We Choose.” This week’s session will explore ethics and humanist Anthony Pinn, who graced our sanctuary for the 2023 Wolfson Lecture.

No matter how personal we wish to make ethics, it always has a collective dimension. Ignoring or minimizing this dimension is the root of all injustices.

— Miguel De La Torre, 21st-century ethicist

“Friends Together” having fun.

Ethical systems and frameworks are about behavioral choices. What action do we choose to take in a particular situation and what is the basis for that action? While religious ethics find a basis in our theological understanding of humanity and of humanity’s relationship with the divine (if we understand such a relationship to exist), the ethical precepts that guide us come also from our personal experiences and points of view. This workshop introduces an ethical framework that comes from collective, rather than individual, experiences—ethics viewed from the perspectives of those on the margins, those who, while their options and choices are narrowed by oppression, may choose to respond to situations and circumstances with actions that are vibrant, life-filled, and affirming of individual and collective agency and humanity. This ethical system draws on Christian liberation theology and the idea that all ethics are grounded in the lived experience of the poor, the marginalized, and the disenfranchised.

This workshop introduces three scholars of the late 20th and early 21st century who challenge the moral thinking of the dominant U.S. culture, a culture that ignores the collective social dimension of oppression and influences moral norms in ways that ignore (or even foment) oppression. These scholars are Latino ethicist Miguel De La Torre, African American womanist ethicist Katie Cannon, and African American humanist theologian Anthony Pinn. Each of the three begin the formulation of their ethical understanding in a recounting of history, the story of their people’s survival in the face of oppression at the hands of the dominant culture. Each lifts up stories of their people’s triumphs, strengths, and survival. They each directly challenge some of the moral “universals” and principles of character (“virtues”) espoused by the dominant culture, exposing that moral universals or principles can be as easily used in the service of oppression as in the service of liberation. For those on the margins, De La Torre tells us, “the primary source for doing ethics is their lived, everyday experience.” The ethical framework of marginalized people validates that which is life-affirming, maintains dignity and identity in the midst of overwhelming assaults on both, and supports both individual and collective resistance to systems and powers that oppress. Secondarily, this ethical system challenges those who are privileged by the dominant culture to educate themselves and others about the view from the margins, and to work to dismantle not only oppression but the system of privilege that supports oppression. Participants explore the collective dimension of ethics and the place of power, privilege, and social position in determining our behavioral choices.

“Introduction” to Workshop 8: Tapestry of Faith: What We Choose: An Adult Program on Ethics for Unitarian Universalists

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Kindred Conversations will meet this Wednesday from 10:30-noon in the lounge. Even if you’ve never been there before…it’s never too late to jump in and join the friendly discussions-  This month we are talking about interdependence.

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