This Week at UBC
Updated every Monday
"What God has made clean, you must not call profane."
— Acts 11:9
May 12, 2025
Hello Friends:
We had a great service on Sunday. Thanks to the Bell Choir, who completed another year of playing under the incredible directing of Jean Lubke. Can you believe that she has been directing the Bell Choir at UBC for over 30 years?
Students are busy finalizing projects and getting ready to end the semester and/or their college careers. I always look forward to seeing how these newly educated and credentialed students will make an impact on our world. We wish them Godspeed. I, for one, cherish their idealism and their passion. May they channel that energy and insight into making their part of the world more caring and just.
The UBC Council is meeting tonight to finalize our budget proposal. If you have any last minute pledges that you would like to submit (and make our jobs easier), please contact Chris Follett at chrisf2828@yahoo.com. We received another $3,180 in pledges on Sunday, which will reduce our deficit, but we still have a ways to go. The good news is that our pledges to date are the highest they have ever been. Unfortunately, our costs are also the highest they have ever been. Help us keep the momentum in the right direction.
The UBC Garden Team is once again meeting. We gather at 9am on Wednesdays and work until we get tired. We’re usually done by noon. Bonus: you get to smell the flowering crabapple trees as you rest from your labors.
For those of you who have annual reports to submit, please send them to info@ubcmn.org by Wednesday of this week.
This Sunday, we’re continuing to look at the early church’s growth in the years after Jesus’ death and resurrection. This particular passage (Acts 11:1-18) deals with the church’s experiments with inclusion. Peter recounts his vision that declared foods to be no longer clean and unclean, sacred and profane. Without the food distinctions, it’s not too much a leap to understand that people are no longer clean and unclean, sacred and profane. If identity is no longer defined by insiders and outsiders, then the whole concept of borders and the nationalities that they protect become suspect. The early church had to decide whether they were going to be an exclusively Jewish movement (based in Jerusalem) or were they going to be an international movement. What interests do our borders protect? Think about that. My sermon is entitled, “Beyond Nationalism.” The UBC Chorale will sing and Paula Moyer will be the worship leader.
Blessings and Peace,
Doug Donley
This week's schedule:
Monday
5:30pm UBC Council Meeting
Tuesday
5:30pm Sacred Harp
7pm Memoirs Group
Wednesday
9-noon UBC Garden Team
Noon-1:30pm UBC/FCC Partnership Team meeting
6pm UBC Chorale
Thursday
1:30pm Solidarity Circle at University Lutheran Church of Hope
Saturday
9am Bible Study
Sunday
10am worship
11am or so Joys and Concerns on Zoom
11:30-ish Bible Study and Forum: an update from Faithful Hospitality with Annessa Ihde
Meeting ID 839 4725 7444 passcode 257750
12:45pm Worship Planning Team
