BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.2.2.1//EN TZID:America/Los_Angeles X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/Los_Angeles BEGIN:VEVENT UID:16487@uucpa.org DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250528T120000 DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20250528T130000 DTSTAMP:20250525T013853Z URL:https://www.uucpa.org/events/resonant-reading-2025-05-28/ SUMMARY:Resonant Reading (Wednesday)-Amazon rainforest-Jabr DESCRIPTION:Resonant Reading (Wednesday)-Amazon rainforest-Jabr An explora tion of ideas\, feelings\, and our life experiences\, using a different sh ort reading as our springboard each time. The sessions are on Saturdays\, 4-5\, and on Wednesdays\, 12-1. All are wide open and you are welcome to c ome twice a week or once in a while.\n\nThe participants over the years ha ve found that the approach we take\, and the respectful\, affectionate com munity of inquirers in which we read and converse\, are as important as th e reading itself. While many small groups begin with a check-in\, with a s ession only an hour long\, Resonant Reading jumps right in to the conversa tion. Those who are frequently in the group get to know each other very we ll this way\, and those who are new will soon find they are among friends. \n\n\n\nFacilitators use a light hand\, posting the reading in the chat an d calling on whoever's Zoom hand is up. Suggestions for readings* come fro m group members\, who also take turns facilitating\, if they want to try t hat role.\n\nThe reading for this session:\n\n\n"More than 10 years ago\, I learned this astonishing fact: That the Amazon rainforest doesn't just r eceive the rain on which it depends. It generates about half of the rain t hat falls on its canopy each year. And the way this happens is so fascinat ing because it's more than just trees and plants pulling water from the so il and releasing what they don't need to the atmosphere. In addition to do ing that\, they're also continually spewing these invisible plumes of tiny biological particles that are called bioaerosols. So these would be thing s like pollen grains\, microbes\, fungal spores\, little bits and pieces o f leaves\, even little pieces of insect shells. All of these tiny biologic al particles get swept high into the atmosphere. And they give something f or all that water vapor released by the forest to condense onto. And that' s how clouds form. Clouds form when water vapor condenses onto suspended p articles in the atmosphere. And in places like the Amazon\, and indeed whe rever there is dense life\, biological particles are the most important se eds for clouds in the atmosphere\, not inert inanimate particles like dust and soot. So then some of these particles even seed ice crystals within t he clouds. So as you were mentioning\, there's a particular bacterium\, Ps eudomonas syringae\, and it has extremely effective ice nucleators on its cell surface. So these are proteins that can arrange free-flowing water mo lecules into a solid frozen crystal. So that microbe and other particles e ncourage water to freeze within clouds. That makes them heavier and larger and more likely to burst and fall as rain. And in fact\, most of the rain that falls on land\, even in tropical regions\, begins as ice crystals in clouds and then melts on the way down. So microbes and other biological e ntities and biological detritus is hugely important for the water cycle\, not just above the Amazon\, but really around the world. So life really is creating the weather all the time\, not just receiving or experiencing th e weather.\n—Ferris Jabr on his book Becoming Earth on Talks at Google"\ n\n \;\n\nHow to join:\n\n\n\n Join this class from your Web browser: https://zoom.us/j/96865808923\, passcode 227385\n Join this class using the Zoom app: Meeting ID: 968 6580 8923\n Join this class by phone: 669 9 00 6833 US (San Jose) Meeting ID: 968 6580 8923\n Join this class by one- tap on mobile phones: 6699006833\,\,96865808923#  (San Jose)\n Phoning i n\, but not in the Bay Area?  Find your local number: https://zoom.us/u/a bL8clvIYT\n\nThis is the Zoom link for Wednesdays. For the Zoom link for S aturday\, go to Calendar and click on a Saturday session.\n\n\nQuestions? Drop an e-mail to resonant-reading+owner@uucpa.org.\n\n\n \;\n\n*This activity was formerly called "Sacred Text Reading." That proved misleading --for one thing\, more often than not our sources are secular--but it's wo rth describing the qualities of a sacred text\, which we still look for in the readings we choose. It is any reading that helps us to:\n\n connect to something of supreme importance to us\n feel more connected to other b eings or to the universe\n feel more intensely alive\n align our lives w ith our values\,\n perceive or feel more deeply\n be more fully and auth entically ourselves.\n ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://www.uucpa.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09 /Resonant-Reading.png CATEGORIES:Adult,Classes,Learning,Small Groups END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/Los_Angeles X-LIC-LOCATION:America/Los_Angeles BEGIN:DAYLIGHT DTSTART:20250309T030000 TZOFFSETFROM:-0800 TZOFFSETTO:-0700 TZNAME:PDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR