To Live Powerful Purposeful Lives — Why We Remember

During our UUC services we sing* the words you see on the right below… and today, it being Memorial Day 2012 and because of the amazing service we had, my eyes were opened and I realized that these words can also be taken in the much broader context of commitment to service and giving that I've seen in just the last few days:

Some recent, compelling, examples of selfless giving … • The men and women whose dedication to preserving everyone's freedom trumps their fears — that I can hardly even think about — of going to war, • Aging hippies whose sweet voices remind us of the 60s music from Woody Guthrie and Simon & Garfunkel and brought me back to what's important … • A young boy who practiced and learned to play grand piano and then had the courage to come and perform it for the entire congregation, • The gifted men+women quartet from the UUC choir whose harmonies of “America, the Beautiful” really showed what an incredible song this is. • Ellen's compelling testimonial, the result of tedious research, and Rev. Elea's “Why We Must Remember” sermon that inspired me to write this, • I'm grateful for the opportunity to be part of a strong, committed team of men who dedicate themselves to mentoring men, young and old, to realize their full potential as mature masculine men via the upcoming Legacy Discovery weekend coming up June 8-11th in Fishkill, NY. (sign up)

Thanks be to all who freely give, who guide us in the way to live, with generosity of heart… inspiring us to do our part. * Sung to the familiar melody of The Doxology — the one where I can just barely keep myself from singing “Amen !” when we finish.

On Memorial Day (and every day) we remember… so that each of us can do our part to move mankind forward toward the elusive — but very achievable — dream of every human being living in peace and in harmony with every other man, woman, and child on this Earth today and in the future.

I've changed my Initial "placeholder for an animation" icon, on the left, to be a link to what that "idea" became: a separate page to which I've given the name http://bit.ly/WhatIsUU where you can navigate the UUC banners or see them in an animation which features the 6 posters that we have depicting “The Six Sources of Unitarian Universalism”. And now that I more fully understand this, the page also talks about how that relates to the 7 Principles of Unitarian Universalism and features links and searches to a myriad of related resources.