Home, it comes from within a wise person told me recently. That's a notion I struggle with. For so many home is a physical place. Maybe you lived there for your whole childhood, maybe it's a place where you had a major life event or two. Maybe it's the places where you felt at peace and rooted. Right now I feel like I embody the song "Motherless Child" - a very long way from home. I do not feel connected to a place. Kentucky was home for 9 solid years but when I left and then went back it clearly was not home. Des Moines is my hometown on paper. Lived there since I was 2. It's the place I've come back to when needing to regroup. May parents and brother are there. My sister is not that far away. But it doesn't feel like home. I feel like a visitor in others' space. I don't see myself being here for an extended period of time, which is not all a bad thing either. So if I don't feel connected to a place then maybe my opening sentence needs further exploration. Home comes from within - feeling rooted to that energy/spark/brahma within yourself. How does one get into better connection with that inner energy? How does one get rooted in one's self. I've been a fan of mediation and journaling for years now. Both are good starts but both have to be done in honest ways. One has to be honest when doing both -truly acknowledging the feelings and emotions that come and go. Being real with myself in those times of quiet and really engage myself of really working at acknowledging this things, letting them speak to me with what needs to be said and then letting them go and pass on through. This is home within. For me it's a work in progress. Some days are better then others. I'll share more as I work on this. To find home within - a long journey of a lifetime.
For years now, I have heard in preaching and clergy circles about being political in sermons; the good, the bad and those who state that church shouldn’t be political. There are workshops, books, and podcasts talking about politics in the church with a variety of opinions. What do people mean when they make the statement that the church shouldn’t be political? The IRS has the most say about the rules for the separation of church and state/politics. If your church wants to be tax exempt, there are rules: don’t endorse any candidate or party, if you allow one party to use your space, other political parties also must be allowed to use the space, etc. The UCC’s general counsel, Heather Kimmell, has a webinar on this topic if you’d like to hear a more detailed explanation which can be found on the UCC’s YouTube channel. Churches have gotten “creative” in how to get around this, often partnering with another non-profit group to give support to a particular group. The UCC is proud to claim...
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