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Pastor's Corner
Contact info:
Cell Phone: 415-577-5461 Email: pastorandreas@ulcoakland.com Pastor’s Office Hours: Tuesday 2-4pm or by appointment |
Dear members and friends!
As we are approaching Thanksgiving, we are reminded of what we can be grateful for: the company of family and loved ones, the pleasure of a enjoying a rich meal - while trying to somehow keep the calorie intake under control - the change of the seasons and the comfort of a warm and dry place we call home. In the company of our family, memories of past Thanksgiving gatherings are refreshed and we remember those who have gone before us. We can be grateful to have met and have come to know them, at least at family reunions and the Thanksgiving table.
Time flies and soon we may be thinking of what lies ahead: the many sale offers trying to catch our attention, the plans to go shopping soon and the many festive occasions to take part in and enjoy in the run-up to Christmas. The recent wildfires in our vicinity (the congregations in Napa and Sonoma now belong to our newly-formed Bridges Conference) remind us that few things will truly last and those we take for granted in our day may no longer be around the next month or year.
I am grateful to have been called as your pastor, and I am also grateful for the generations of the past the fruits of whose planning I see every time I enter the premises and enjoy the view from the sanctuary out over the Bay. The resources they left for us are meant to put to good use as just happened by providing grants in the GIR program for social justice and ministry projects in our county.
On Dec 3, we will enter into the new church year. As always, it begins with the season of Advent. The four Sundays are meant for our preparation of the arrival (=Advent) of our Lord into our world that finally occurs during the night of Christmas Eve. Advent is a season of waiting. It requires patience, which in itself is a useful spiritual practice.
Patience is less and less appreciated in a time when messages and images can be transmitted from coast to coast, and even one end of the world to the other, in mere seconds. But patience enhances the joy (yes, I hated it when as a boy I was told that I could not have what I wanted right way but rather had to wait until its time arrived). But it can hardly diminish the joy.
Thus, at United we will observe Advent as a season of preparation and not as the beginning of Christmas. After all, who celebrates the new year in early December? Who celebrates one’s birthday three weeks before the actual date? For a long time, Advent was regarded even as a second Lent: a season of fasting and praying and turning inward to make room within us and our busyness for the special present God bestows on us.
During Advent we will hold regular services every Sunday at 10.30 am. The fourth Sunday falls on 12/24. Then I will offer a special meditation service with quiet Taize chants and meditative texts at 10.30 am. Later that day , on 5.30 pm on 12/24, we will burst into joy with a ‘Candles ’n’ Jazz Christmas Celebration’ with guest musicians (voice, bass and drums). Please spread the word!
As we assume that our joy will continue all through the night, we will stay home to celebrate with our loved ones on Christmas Day (12/25), the first day of the twelve days of Christmas that run through 1/6.
As we are approaching Thanksgiving, we are reminded of what we can be grateful for: the company of family and loved ones, the pleasure of a enjoying a rich meal - while trying to somehow keep the calorie intake under control - the change of the seasons and the comfort of a warm and dry place we call home. In the company of our family, memories of past Thanksgiving gatherings are refreshed and we remember those who have gone before us. We can be grateful to have met and have come to know them, at least at family reunions and the Thanksgiving table.
Time flies and soon we may be thinking of what lies ahead: the many sale offers trying to catch our attention, the plans to go shopping soon and the many festive occasions to take part in and enjoy in the run-up to Christmas. The recent wildfires in our vicinity (the congregations in Napa and Sonoma now belong to our newly-formed Bridges Conference) remind us that few things will truly last and those we take for granted in our day may no longer be around the next month or year.
I am grateful to have been called as your pastor, and I am also grateful for the generations of the past the fruits of whose planning I see every time I enter the premises and enjoy the view from the sanctuary out over the Bay. The resources they left for us are meant to put to good use as just happened by providing grants in the GIR program for social justice and ministry projects in our county.
On Dec 3, we will enter into the new church year. As always, it begins with the season of Advent. The four Sundays are meant for our preparation of the arrival (=Advent) of our Lord into our world that finally occurs during the night of Christmas Eve. Advent is a season of waiting. It requires patience, which in itself is a useful spiritual practice.
Patience is less and less appreciated in a time when messages and images can be transmitted from coast to coast, and even one end of the world to the other, in mere seconds. But patience enhances the joy (yes, I hated it when as a boy I was told that I could not have what I wanted right way but rather had to wait until its time arrived). But it can hardly diminish the joy.
Thus, at United we will observe Advent as a season of preparation and not as the beginning of Christmas. After all, who celebrates the new year in early December? Who celebrates one’s birthday three weeks before the actual date? For a long time, Advent was regarded even as a second Lent: a season of fasting and praying and turning inward to make room within us and our busyness for the special present God bestows on us.
During Advent we will hold regular services every Sunday at 10.30 am. The fourth Sunday falls on 12/24. Then I will offer a special meditation service with quiet Taize chants and meditative texts at 10.30 am. Later that day , on 5.30 pm on 12/24, we will burst into joy with a ‘Candles ’n’ Jazz Christmas Celebration’ with guest musicians (voice, bass and drums). Please spread the word!
As we assume that our joy will continue all through the night, we will stay home to celebrate with our loved ones on Christmas Day (12/25), the first day of the twelve days of Christmas that run through 1/6.