From the Associate Minister of RE • Rev. Dan Harper • July 2020

artwork by UUCPA children, teens, and adults - June 2020

It’s summer, and the pace of congregational life has slowed down.

Except it hasn’t slowed down for the Curriculum Subcommittee and me. We are in the middle of developing all kinds of programs that don’t require us to meet in person. We don’t expect to be able to have in-person programs for children and teens for some time, so we’re developing alternatives.

We will continue to have online Sunday school programs meet via Zoom. For some families, Zoom Sunday school has worked very well, and it’s a way for children and teens to maintain their friendships with other UUCPA kids.

Some families suffer Zoom fatigue by the time Sunday rolls around, and we’re working on ways to reach out to those families as well. Most importantly, we’re going to send age-appropriate books to every UUCPA kid from preschool to grade 8, all paid for by the Sherwood Sullivan Book Fund. The Curriculum Subcommittee and I are currently reviewing the books that we will send out.

We’re also planning to send monthly packets to every child vis U.S. mail. We’re still working on what will go in those packets, but we already have UUCPA artists creating coloring pages (and if you’d like to contribute a coloring page, contact me).

We’re also exploring other possibilities. We’re looking at possible service projects that can be done from home. The weekly “Stories for All Ages” videos that appear in the worship service also go on the UUCPA Youtube channel, so your kids can watch them any time.

For teens, we’ll be moving our popular Coming of Age program (for grades 8-10) online. The Senior High Youth Group continues to meet online for fun, serious discussion, and social time. We are exploring how we might offer OWL sexuality education programs for teens.

It’s going to be an exciting school year at UUCPA. True, it won’t be the same as meeting in person, but you’ll also see some interesting and kid-friendly innovation.

Help us with our planning! Please fill out the online Children and Youth Religious Education (CYRE) participation form.

See you online soon,
Dan