November 2022 Newsletter

Minister’s Message

Welcome to November. This month we celebrate the lives of our loved ones on ‘All Souls and All Saints’ Sunday; we mark Remembrance Sunday, and we learn the lessons of the Holocaust by remembering Kristallnacht, ‘the night of broken glass’; then we prepare the way in our souls for the movement of the Christmas Spirit anew with the season of Advent.

See if this community is for you; after all, theology and spirituality ask the great questions about life and truth, about the mystery and greatness of your life in God’s life; they involve exploring matters of ultimate importance. Theology and faith are the deepest conversations you can have about things that matter.

 

 

Rev. Ron Rosinsky

 

 

 

This newsletter is also available on the Coburg Uniting website and Facebook page.

Looking back: October’s topic

‘Trauma then. Poor mental health now. Befriend your soul- discover liberation’

 “Between stimulus and response there is a space.

In that space is our power to choose our response.

In our response lies our growth and freedom.”

– Victor Frankel, Holocaust survivor

 

• Temperament and emotions are not destiny.
• The power to choose your response – therein lies your growth and freedom.
• Your life will only be as good as your emotional re-learning.
• So what is ‘emotional re-learning’ after suffering trauma? Three views:
  • Attaining a sense of safety;
  • Remembering the details of the trauma and mourning the loss it brought;
  • Re-establishing and re-entering a ‘normal’ life. (Dr Judith Herman, Harvard psychiatrist)
• Remembering: “Scientists have found that trauma that has not been shared or properly processed is held in the primitive limbic system of our brain, and is frozen there for later processing … the traumatic memory feels as if it is till happening. But once it is talked about, and the feelings properly expressed, the trauma shifts across to the neocortex, where it becomes just memory, ‘something that once happened’, a story in our bigger life.” (Steve Biddulph, psychologist)
• “Thus says the Lord of hosts to all the exiles living in Babylon: build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters … seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” (Jeremiah 29: 6-7)

Jeremiah is telling the Jewish people living in Babylon that after bitter years of living in violence and isolation, it’s time to learn a new response; time to build a sense of safety and destiny. Time to establish the new normal. Their lives would only be as good as their emotional re-learning to live in a strange land.

 

Looking forward: November’s topic

‘Citizen or consumer? Awaken abundance and cooperation over consumption and competition.’

Featuring ‘The Abundant Community, Awakening the Power of Families and Neighbourhoods’, by Peter Block & John McKnight

• Community has a job to do: institutions and professional services have reached the limit of their ability to help us. And the consumer society tells us that we are insufficient; we must purchase what we need from specialists.
• But we need our neighbours and community to stay healthy, produce jobs, raise our children, and care for those on the margin.
• We look at how to reweave our social fabric, especially in our neighbourhoods. We energize the gifts and abilities of the people in the community, valuing their contributions, unleashing the power of soul and spirit.

First Sunday: Celebration of Communion, featuring music by Ruth Sandy and her singers

Second Sunday: Featuring music by Josh Cake

Third Sunday: Featuring music by Keith Hoffmann

Fourth Sunday: Featuring music by Josh Cake and the Coburg band

 

Special Services

• Sunday, 6^th November: All Saints Sunday
• Sunday, 13^th November: Remembrance Sunday, Rev. Craig Madden leading the service
• Sunday 20^th November: Kristallnacht, remembrance and healing
• Sunday 27^th November: First Sunday of Advent

Spiritual Growth Programs

November Topic for Men’s Group and Soul Group: Chapter 6 “Necessary Suffering” and Chapter 7 “Home and Homesickness”, from Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life by Richard Rohr.

• Men’s Group: Saturday 5 November 6pm-9pm. Dinner and discussion at church.
• Soul Group: Sunday 6 November, 11:45am-1pm. Discussion, mindfulness, spiritual formation.
• Meditation and spiritual practices group: Sunday 20 November, 11.45am-12.30pm.

 

Belonging Programs

• Social Board Games Night: Thursday 10 November and Thursday 24 November (2^nd and 4^th Thursdays), 7:30-10pm in the front room at church
• The Fourth Sunday lunch: Sunday 27 November
• Coffee Chat and Play: Playgroup every Friday 10:30am-12pm during school term
• Coburg Common: located behind Coburg Uniting Church. Come and garden, or buy a plant, or have a chat

Special Events

‘Reclaim the Void’ RUG HUB

is a project of reconciliation, healing and hope. The project was born from Ngalia elders in Leonora (Western Australia) expressing their pain and grief at ‘those gaping mining holes left all over our country’.

2pm-4pm Saturdays from October 22 to November 26.

No experience necessary to join this unique weaving workshop

Register here: https://bit.ly/3duWVHX

 

CAROLS FOR KIDS: A Nativity and carols service by Coburg Uniting Church

At Coburg Common, Sunday 11 December 4:15-8pm.

Sausage Sizzle from 4:15pm by The Gardening Mob.

Featuring Christmas carols from Ruth Sandy’s singers.

Special music by Josh Cake, Lucas Rosinsky, and Benjamin Coggins.

A family friendly, queer friendly event.

Coburg Uniting Church

Fighting against sexism and homophobia. Fighting for the planet.

We live and worship on the lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to their elders past and present. Sovereignty was never ceded. This always was and always will be Aboriginal land.