Minister’s Blog

Greetings and well wishes church family, I sure am looking forward to seeing you and hearing about how you are. I’ve missed you! I’ve loved getting back into the rhythm of church life and feel that we have some beautiful things to look forward to in the coming months. This newsletter is bursting at the seams with news and events, so I hope you will take the time to slow down and read it closely. This is the beginning of my 5th year of ministry with First Parish (wow, right?), and this felt...

Blessings to you these days dear friends. We have had a beautiful year together. For this I am grateful. The state of the country and world has my heart in a constant state of breaking. No one of us can claim immunity to the madness, nor have we had time to properly process much of anything. But amid all this we have held tight to our faith and values, and we have come home to one another week after week–to worship, to pray, to share joys and sorrows, to make coffee, to tidy, to tend to the...

Greetings Church Family, May has arrived and the glory of Spring is bursting forth. My body and being has been longing for some warmth and beauty. The sun, birdsong and blossoms feel like a great mercy, don’t they? Revel in it and take from it what you need! Over the next two weeks I will be taking some Study Leave days. Part of being a minister means making intentional time during the church year for study and spiritual retreat with other clergy members. During the first week of May, I will...

Lately the words of Walt Whitman have been coming and going for me. From Song of Myself: “…Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes…” I take a lot of solace in wisdom like this–it helps me feel like a whole person, instead of a sliced and diced version of myself. I am large, I contain multitudes! We can spend so much time trying to be one thing, don’t you think? Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself… Church is a good...

And just like that, it’s March! This is a bustling time of year at First Parish. I tend to think that this puts us in step with the spirit of Spring, which is almost here! Most of your leaders are thinking about all the wonderful things that lie ahead in our giving, membership and nominating seasons. Planning for our next church year begins to descend on our minds and hearts. It’s not hard to feel a sweet burst of newness germinating, and right alongside this, the good question: what needs to...

Greetings Dear Ones, It’s been a hard last few weeks. I have felt exhausted, outraged, numb, bereft…right alongside being moved by goodness, beauty and small acts of kindness and care. If any of this resonates with you it means you have a pulse, are human, and are doing the best you can amid unfathomable times. All that you are feeling right now, and how you are trying to cope and get through, is natural, normal and understandable. I honor how much you care, and I also honor your body and...

Happy New Year’s Church Family! I pray that you found good ways this past week to recalibrate after the holidays and have stepped into 2025 well. I’m not much of a New Year’s Eve person, but I love New Year’s Day–mainly because I get to hang up all my new calendars. Yes, I’m a passionate and highly discerning calendar collector. I begin sniffing around the calendar sections of bookstores, museum gift shops and stationary stores come September. Calendars that track the moon and planets are a...

Over the past four weeks I have watched our sanctuary swell. Just this past Sunday we were bursting at the seams–at one point I had to go out to the welcome area to bring in more chairs! I’ve been casting my eyes carefully around the sanctuary, gazing into the faces of our kids, parents, newcomers, longcomers, wanderers who have been coming and going for years–and I keep thinking to myself this is what church is for: a sanctuary for the soul. It’s been a heck of a month, and you are wise to...

Morning Church Family, We have made the decision to indefinitely postpone the screening of “The Night Won’t End” scheduled for this Sunday, November 17th at 4pm here at church. This was an offering organized in partnership with Watertown Citizens for Peace, Justice and the Environment–who many of us have worked with and alongside over the years. We were inspired to bring this film to FPW following this year’s UUA General Assembly where an Action of Immediate Witness resolution passed asking...

Hope is a spiritual armor for fighting righteous battles! These are the words of the great Dr. Cornel West who I was blessed to be taught by in seminary. He shouted these words to us just days after the 2016 election results came in–and then he put on the music of Sly and the Family Stone and Funkadelic and we formed a dancing, clapping, singing circle that made me think: “WOW, this is what hope feels like!”   Personally, I plan to do a lot of dancing, singing and music-playing over the coming...