|
||||||||||
About Us
|  |
WELCOME TO RELIGIOUS EDUCATION AT O.R.U.U.C!
"Some beliefs are like walled gardens. They encourage exclusiveness, and the feeling of being especially privileged. Other beliefs are expansive and lead the way to wider and deeper sympathies." ~Sophia Lyon Fahs, Unitarian religious educator MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR OF RELIGIOUS EDUCATION
Learning, in its essence, is the act of making connections--connections between subject and learner, connections from what is already known to new understandings, connections among co-learners and with teachers. 
Religious education, in its essence, connects thoughts, feelings and actions concerning those things that matter most in our lives. Who are we? Why are we here? How should we live?
To explore these quetions and make connections we offer gatherings throughout the week, with a special emphasis on providing sessions for every age and stage on Sunday mornings. Sunday Morning Religious Education begins when people walk across the threshold into our church building. How are they greeted? What is expected of them? What do they see others doing, or not doing? Who is here? Who is not here? What does Unitarian Universalism look like and feel like? Of course, there is also that hour or so on Sundays when people gather with a small group of peers and are led by trusted, caring leaders who have committed themselves to the group's religious growth and learning. This is a place to experience a sense of belonging--of knowing others and being known. This is a safe and sacred place to come together as liberal religious co-learners, where everyone's genuine questions are respected and different understandings of truth are honored. This year, our religious education focus is on the truths and connections found in ancient core stories. Every age group, from kindergarten through adult, will have opportunities to consider the same stories, one each week, throughout the church year. While the manner of exploring the story will vary according to age and stage, everyone will be on the "same page". This means that families can discuss the story on the ride home. It means that children might survey adults after the service to gather their opinions on some aspect of that week's story. It means that each person can be on an individual journey toward truth and meaning, while traveling in very good company! 
I hope that every child, youth and adult who comes through our doors feels welcomed and valued here. I hope that every person experiences a stirring deep inside, a call to live life fully and in accordance with our Unitarian Universalist principles. I hope we can help people feel proud to be Unitarian Universalists and able to say iin their own words what being a Unitarian Universalist means to them. I hope our children hear stories and songs that will carry them forward for a lifetime, that sometime, somewhere along their lives' journeys, the story of John Murray or the song "Spirit of Life" will be there for them when they need it. I hope that each person can come to know and be known in a small group of fellow journeyers.
May connections abound! In faithful partnership, Tandy Scheffler MESSAGE FROM THE MINISTER
William Ellery Channing was a leading Unitarian thinker in the early nineteenth century. In 1883, addressing a body of religious educators, he said:
"The great end in religious instruction, is not to stamp our minds upon the young, but to stir up their own; not to make them see with our eyes, but to look inquiringly and steadily with their own; not to give them a definite amount of knowledge, but to inspire a fervent love of truth; not to form an outward regularity but to touch inward springs...not to burden the memory but to quicken and strengthen the power of thought." What an inspiring model of education! What a vision of liberation! As teachers and leaders walk alongside learner's in our congregation, they do so in the light of Channing's words, with a view to our world-changing values outlasting our own lives. As ORUUC helps raise one more generation of truth-loving, clear-eyed, responsible, and courageous souls, all the world benefits. Thanks to our religious education leaders. And, because we are all teaching--through our choices, our actions, and our words, thank you, everyone at ORUUC. Faithfully, Rev Jake Morrill
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
| Copyright © 2010 Oak Ridge Unitarian Universalist Church All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. |
Send any questions or comments to webmaster@oruuc.org |