The Messenger: December 2025
December’s Theme: Choosing Hope
Worship Services Sundays at 10 a.m. EST:
December 7th: The Advent of Hope with Rev. Lori
December 14th: The Hanukah Light with Rev. Lori
December 21st: Blue Christmas with Rev. Niki
December 24th: Christmas Eve with Rev. Lori & Rev. Niki
December 28th: Janus with Rev. Charlie Grindle
If you can’t join us in person, please tune in via our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@uucsb
Hello Good People,
Welcome to December! We are spiritual companions here. We are journeying together into and through darkness together. We are in the season of advent. Advent is a term for approaching something monumental. In Christian terms it has meant the approach of the birth of Jesus. The coming of the son. The time when God breaks through the heavens and enters the world to walk amongst the people. A time when light and love return to the world in tangible ways. It has always been interesting to me that Christmas happens just after the solstice when the light literally begins to return for the northern hemisphere. It comes when other traditions recognize the solstice. A returning of the sun. Interesting indeed.
This month’s theme is choosing hope. Something that can be difficult as we head into darkness and in this time and the place. Choosing hope is an act of courage, not a denial of reality. It invites us to look directly at the broken places in our lives and in the world and still whisper, “More is possible.” Hope isn’t passive optimism or wishful thinking; it is the steady, stubborn belief that our actions matter, that compassion can take root in difficult soil, and that even small steps can shift the path ahead. When we choose hope, we refuse to let fear write our story. We claim our agency, our creativity, and our capacity to heal.
Hope also connects us to one another. It reminds us that we do not walk alone, and that shared burdens become lighter when held in community. Choosing hope is choosing relationship—trusting that others will show up, that love will meet us again, and that the future is shaped not only by outcomes but by the spirit with which we meet the journey. In choosing hope, we commit ourselves to tending sparks of possibility wherever they appear, and in doing so, we become part of the light we long to see. We become the returning light for ourselves and each other.
This month we will celebrate advent by lighting an advent candle each Sunday between now and Christmas Eve. Our candles are:
Joy: November 30
Hope: December 7
Faith/Community: December 14
Peace: December 21
Love: December 24
Join us to hear members of the community share a brief reflection on these as they light the candles.
Religious Exploration Committee kickoff
We will be having a kickoff for the RE committee on December 7 at 11:15 in the parlor. Please join us. We need this committee to come together in support of our new RE coordinator and to help shape our growing RE program! Please rsvp to Rev. Lori!
Peace and Blessings
“Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul, and sings the
tune without the words and never stops at all. ”
– Emily Dickinson
This month’s theme is ‘Choosing Hope’ and the above quote is one of my favorites. A good friend set this very simple, poignant verse to a lovely round that our choir has sung every year. Every day we have the opportunity to make choices in our feelings and thoughts. For me personally I believe that ‘what we think about, we bring about’. This might seem like a trite affirmation, but I’ve found that it works for me. When choosing hope, I have seen others overcome despair in concrete and meaningful ways. Music can be a powerful source of hope. It is my hope, as we enter the holiday season and the darkest days of the year, that the hymns we sing and the special music shared by the choir and others, help to lift your spirits to ‘Choose Hope’, too.
Rehearsals: Pick Up Choir typically rehearses on the 2nd and 4th Sundays of each month followed by singing in church on that day. December Dates are a little different:
December 14 (8:45 regular rehearsal; 11:15 Christmas Eve rehearsal);
December 21 (9:00 and 11:15 Christmas Eve rehearsal)
December 24 (Wednesday, Christmas Eve, 2:30)
Participation: ‘Pick up Choir’ means that you do not need to commit to every Sunday that we sing but if I can know in advance that you’ll be there it helps me plan for appropriate music. We are actively seeking additional singers for our Christmas Pick Up Choir!
Special Music: Do you like to sing solo or play an instrument? Special music is always a welcome addition to a service.
All are welcome who love to sing or who want to be involved with our Music Ministry.
Special Music for December
12/14 and 12/24: The UUCSB Pick Up Choir – Our choir, directed by Ellie Rolnick, will offer special music and often supports the congregational singing. Make a joyful noise with us!
12/7: Anne Wilkinson - Anne’s primary instrument is Cello. She has been a member of our congregation since 1990. As a teacher she developed and headed up the strings program in Saco schools and Thornton Academy. She has directed summer youth string programs as well as honors programs. Now retired, she enjoys improving her abilities and playing in small ensembles whenever she can. She is an ephemeral ‘Church Lady’ and can be found helping in RE, the church fair and as a Special Musician, among other things. She lives in Saco with her husband Charles. She has 3 daughters and several grandchildren.
12/21 Beau Neitz - “Through music I was able to find the space and freedom to recognize my own emotions and meet them honestly. In worship, I am moved by the space we enter together through many singing voices. It’s my privilege to be part of that space. In my free time I explore voice, piano, accordion and strings”
12/28 Rev. Charles Grindle with Rev. Niki Norman: Charles is a classically trained musician with a passion for music of all kinds. He has worked as a pit musician and music director for school and community theaters in Maine and New Hampshire as well as serving as a church organist and pianist. Charles has also played in clubs and lounges from New Brunswick to California and has appeared onstage in Portland community theaters. He and Niki first met and worked together at First Parish in Portland This year they will be reminding us that ‘United We Stand, Divided We Fall’, an anthem from the 70s written by Hiller and Goodison. “It is time to take these words to heart as we move toward better days for all of us”. This is about their 7th time offering a musical uplift for the coming year!
December Outreach
Share the Plate: December
We will share the plate in December with Hope Squad. Their mission is to see those that are invisible; to hear those that have no voice, and to reinforce the infinite value and worth of each person we meet by providing a loving, compassionate and consistent presence, needed resources and hope to those living in the shelters and on the streets of Maine through our mobile peer outreach. We made over 400 sandwiches for their outreach in November while we shared the plate with the saco food pantry that was hard at work to support people iduring the SNAP crisis and the holiday. We are sharing the December plate with the HOPE Squad.
Winter is Coming!: Collection Drive.
We need warm coats, warm hats, waterproof boots & Gloves, snow pants, warm socks for adults and kids. Gently used or new welcome. A drop box will be available at the church.
Ways to Support Our Vibrant UUCSB Community
School Street Coffeehouse Membership Mugs Are In!
Just in time for the holidays!
Our brand-new membership mugs are now available- perfect as a gift or to treat yourself.
$25 each
Pick one up at our next event:
December 14 • 6:30pm
Open Mic • Christmas SingAlong
(Wear your best or worst holiday attire!
Or grab one at Coffee Hour every Sunday!
Thank you for supporting the Coffeehouse and helping keep music, community, and UU values flowing.
Coffee Hour Help!
1. Set-up: make coffee, arrange tables, put out creamers, etc
2. Provide simple snacks
3. Clean up: dishes, sweep, put tables away
4. Schedule volunteers
Can you do any of these tasks at any time?
Many Hands: Some things that need doing:
Hang drapes in Parish Hall
See if the Green Room TV can project from a computer
Bake for Coffeehouse
Review By-laws and church Policies
Declutter the upstairs “Teen Room”
Represent UUCSB at MUUSAN
Research reusable food packaging options
Help folks use Google Docs
Help with Children’s Worship
Please complete this interest survey so we can match your talents with our needs
DONT GET CAUGHT BY THE SCAMMERS!
BEWARE OF TEXTS AND EMAILS FROM REV LORI ASKING FOR FAVORS OR FOR YOU TO PURCHASE ANYTHING ON HER BEHALF. SCAMMERS HAVE BEEN CREATING FALSE BUT BELIEVABLE EMAIL ADDRESSES FOR HER AND HAVE BEEN TEXTING AND REACHING OUT ASKING FOR FOLKS TO BUY APPLE CARDS AND FORWARD THE NUMBERS OF THE PURCHASES. ONCE THIS HAPPENS, THERE IS NO GETTING THE MONEY BACK!!! SHE WILL NEVER REACH OUT IN THAT CAPACITY TO ASK FOR MONEY OR FAVORS OF A FINANCIAL NATURE. AND IF YOU RESPOND THEY MAY TRY TO INVOLVE YOU IN FUTURE OUTREACH SCAMS UNRELATED TO THE CHURCH.
IF YOU RECEIVE A REQUEST OF THIS NATURE, DONT GET CAUGHT. PLEASE REACH OUT TO REV LORI THROUGH THE PRESCRIBED CHANNELS TO REPORT IT. REPORT IT THROUGH EMAIL AND PHONE PROVIDER AS A SCAM. NEVER SEND MONEY OR VALUABLES IN RESPONSE TO AN EMAIL OR TEXT WITHOUT VERIFYING WITH THE PERSON WHO ASKS!!!!!
Wanted: Welcoming Congregation Coordinator
No experience necessary. Training and support provided.
Requirements: Passion for justice for all.
Duties:
Learn about the Welcoming Congregations Five Practices of Welcome Renewal Program
Communicate with congregation about required practices
Complete a tracking form
Celebrate.
Repeat annually.
To apply: Contact Rev. Lori
December Calendar Highlights
Sunday, December 14th at 6:30!
Other Upcoming Dates To Take Notice Of
Ministry of Faith in Action (MoFA)
MoFA is the social justice team at UUCSB.
As UU’s we are really all on the social justice team. We have causes we support as individuals or families. MoFA attempts to gather us all together to use our collective strength and vision for meaningful action.
Help some little old ladies get their mojo back!
Join MoFA!
Watch the online calendar and Friday Flyer for meeting times.
At the November 15 MUUSAN Fall Network meeting, guest speaker Rev. Dr. Jodi Cohen Hayashida (she/her), developer and organizer of Multifaith Justice Maine under the auspices of the Maine People’s Alliance, explained that legislators are inundated with narratives from white Christian Nationalists of one set of religious beliefs. She led attendees in practice activities to counter with narratives from our faith tradition. MUUSAN and MoFA will soon give us all some chances to learn how to do this.
Church Work- Church Life Balance
Many of our paid church personnel are also members of our church. Separating work life and church life is often a tricky balancing act. We aim to understand and respect each other’s boundaries.
Spotlight on Our Staff: Brian D., Church Administrator
Our Beloved Church Member
Brian D. lives in Biddeford and has four children and two grandchildren. Although he’s a local boy, he holds a business degree from American University in Washington, DC. He enjoys photography and assembling Lego sets, many of which share space in his home with his collection of vintage cameras. Also, he’s a movie fan. When you see him, ask him about some of his favorites. But beware! Brian is (in)famous for his dad jokes and awful puns!
Our Church Administrator
Brian is our bookkeeper and can answer questions about all things related to our finances, including writing checks and making reports.
Requests for event or meeting space in the building go through Brian. Among many other things, he puts together the Orders of Service, makes name tags, updates the Directory, and sends reminders to volunteers for Sunday jobs and tracks attendance in RE and Sunday services. He answers the phone during office hours and responds to voicemails.
Brian has started to share some responsibilities with our web chaplain, Morgan Rowe. Together they populate the interactive online calendar and put together the Friday Flyer. He sends out the weekly reminder to check out the Flyer and prints a PDF version of the Flyer and Messenger for members who don’t do email.
Note: On Sundays, Brian is Our Beloved Church Member! Office Hours: MWF: 8-10
The Last Class
A documentary Featuring Robert Reich
American political economist, professor, author
and social media sensation
Join Robert Reich for a free live watchalong of The Last Class: December 8 @ 8:30pm.
(runtime: 1 hour, 11 minutes)
Robert Reich
teaches his final "Wealth and Poverty" class to 1,000 students at UC Berkeley, ending a
40 year career that reached 40,000 students. One thousand fill the biggest lecture hall
on the UC Berkeley campus, the last class to recieve Reich's wisdom and exhortations
not to accept that the world has to stay the way it is. His belief in the next generation's ability to take on the fight is inspiring.
You can read more about the Board of Trustees @
Happy Holidays!
On November 22, interested vendors and volunteers gathered for a centering invocation which has become part of our holiday fair tradition. We breathed together and let ourselves be reminded that not only were we there to raise money, but the fair was an opportunity to represent our church to community members and to practice giving love and care to all we encountered. We raised money (yahoo!) and we were supportive of each other throughout the day. Frankly, the fair is not my favorite thing, but working together really is! I’m so grateful for this church and the open hearts and minds that make it beautiful.
Your elected Board of Directors is balancing supporting the current work of our church and exploring structures needed for a thriving future while taking care of each other. Among these structures are a mission statement to guide us, fundraising to support us, volunteer coordination so all we share the work. To keep the wheels turning: self care and communication.
Communication is always, always one of the hardest things to manage and may always, always be that way. Our marvelous new website is designed to help but may take some getting used to; the interactive calendar feature informs us about events and multiple embedded forms allow us to add to it, to update information and to communicate with many of the church’s leaders. Our Directory tells how to reach contact persons for each active committee or ministry. Hopefully we can maximize the use of the many bulletin boards located throughout the church’s common spaces to learn about upcoming activities and the functions of our church operations.
We welcome your questions and answers! Contact any Board member (listed below and wearing green nametags on Sundays). BoT Meetings are the 1st Wednesday of each month at 10 a.m. in the Green Room. You are welcome!
Love, Randa Thomas
President, Board of Trustees
From the Treasurer
If you have questions about the budgeting process, contact Jean H. or Wendy.
Hello to the Wonderful People of UUCSB!
Happy season of Advent! Several years ago when life had dealt me a huge helping of grief and I ended up moving far from my support network in Seattle to the relative wilds of coastal Maine, a friend back in the Pacific Northwest sent me a surprise box of tiny hand picked and wrapped presents numbered 1-24 which arrived just after Thanksgiving so that each day of Advent I’d have at least a moment of connection and, hopefully, delight to get me through my first Solstice/Holiday season of a what had been the least festive year one could imagine. As I acclimated to a new landscape, internally and externally, the tradition continued, only now I send one to my friend, as well. Ten years on, it sometimes feels like a race to see who can text the tracking number for this year’s advent box to one another, thus proving we were somehow more eager than the other to serve up delight, now that the surprise is gone.
Each week when I build the online version of the Friday Flyer, I prepare to remove the old one by transferring Rev. Lori’s message to a stand alone post which will then live on the blog for folks to return to or, as new congregants arrive, discover for the first time. These little morsels of goodness lay out the seasons of the year, but also seasons of life so that when you find yourself struggling in a time of transition you can return to Lori’s Samhain message about finding compassion in the liminal times or when you need a moment of reflection and want to seek out a framework, you might explore the offerings of Lectio Divina and guided meditations that run throughout Rev. Lori’s messages like this one. You may also gift yourself a return to a handful of sermons which now live in text form on the website, such as last month’s entitled This is My Song: An Anthem for my Country.* In this way, I hope the blog, found under the heading Beyond Sunday: Reflections, News, and Flyers is like a perpetual advent box full of hope, community, inspiration, and love.
With appreciation,
Rev. Morgan Rowe
Web Chaplain
*Did you know that you can request that a sermon’s text be added to the online archive? If you’ve been particularly moved by a Sunday sermon and feel it should live online as a touchstone for yourself or others, just ask!
Ways to Support UUCSB’s Bottom Line
By Mail: Send donations and pledge payments to: UU Church of Saco & Biddeford, 60 School Street, Saco, ME 04072
Help UUCBS by returning your bottles and cans through the CLYNK service at Hannaford.
Green bags may be picked up at the welcome table when you come to church on Sundays. Please remember that Market Basket labeled bottles and cans are not accepted by CLYNK.
Would you like to donate to the church in a way that doesn’t cost you anything? If you buy your weekly groceries with a Hannaford gift card purchased from UUCSB, the church gets 5%. Our church depends on this fundraiser to contribute to its operating budget. Cards are available in $100 or $50 denominations. Gift cards are for sale in the Parish Hall every Sunday after the worship service. If you are worshiping virtually, just call or email Jane P. and make arrangements to pick them up at another time. Thank you for participating in this fundraiser in support of our church.
Are You Thinking About Becoming a Member of UUCSB?
To learn more about our congregation:
Please speak to any member or someone from the Membership Welcoming Committee. Plan to attend a Sharing Your Spiritual Journey orientation.
To learn more about our faith and practice:
Various aspects of Unitarian Universalism are explained in brochures kept in a rack as you enter the sanctuary. You are welcome to take these home. You can also talk with members of our congregation.
Our Church:
We are a voluntary association of those committed to this special religious community. We share common values, but we do not require or expect conformity to any specific religious beliefs. We welcome each person’s spiritual exploration and expression.
Our Church Administrator is Brian Dustin
Hours: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday
8 to 10 am
(207) 282-0062 or (207) 632-4512
Congregants of UUCSB can find forms to add, change, or recommend items on the website in the Congregant Portal found in the footer of our website. Stop by and see Brian if you need the password.