Moderator Musings May 2025

Hello Everyone,

Finally, April is going out like a lamb.  (But I think that’s supposed to be March!)  Well, I have to eat my words from last month’s letter because of the snow and ice storms we’ve had since then.  We even had to cancel worship on Sunday, March 30, because traveling was too dangerous.  Those of you who had your power out for an extended time were no doubt relieved when the power company restored your power.  Personally, we did not lose power, but our furnace failed and so far we have only partially cleared our property of the many big limbs and hundreds of branches that came down due to ice.  If we look for the silver lining, however, the sun shining through the icicles on the trees was very pretty.

Soon we should be seeing the bright green of spring leaves and the early flower shoots pushing up from the ground.  Pastor Dale Bishop has very generously led us through the Lenten season and Easter.  Our choirs have provided music for the services.  Missy Miller is leading our services again after Easter.  On Memorial Day Sunday, May 25, the Spiritual Life Board and Worship Planning Committee are planning a service of hymns and worship.  Our new pastors, Susie and Tim Grade, will be relocating and beginning their spiritual journey with us on June 1.

We are working on educating ourselves on how to access and use our congregation’s picture directory, which has been online for several years now.  We will be asking you to sign onto the directory with computers and/or your smartphones and see how easy it is to access.  You can update any obsolete information there and update your photo. You will always have easy access this way to the names, addresses, phone numbers and email addresses of our fellow members, but this will be available only to our membership.  We can set up picture-taking after a Sunday service if you would like, or you can submit your own favorite digital photo to the directory.  Look for further announcements on the directory.

I will again ask that we consider carefully the situation of the poor and disabled who are having difficulty accessing the support they need for housing, food and health care.  The Wisconsin Conference of the United Church of Christ has put out guidelines for congregations when considering issues like this that involve both politics and our Christian mission to care for people.  Their guidelines explain that our church has every right to advocate for issues and people in need, but should not advocate for a candidate for election. We can advocate for an issue involving our Christian beliefs, but if we state support as a congregation for a particular candidate, that would be a violation of the rule of separation of church and state.

With prayer and contemplation in our Christian life,

Sandy McKitrick, Moderator