Category: Uncategorized
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Wash, Pray, Love
What does “love your neighbor as yourself” look like today? The economic fall-out from the Great Hunkering is taking a particularly heavy toll on small businesses, especially those in which human contact is inevitable. The profit margins for restaurants, hair salons, small shops and bookstores can be pretty slim; a sharp decrease in appointments and…
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Grace For the Naughty And Nice!
By Rev Kate Braestrup When preaching for my local United Church of Christ congregation, I generally “preach from the lectionary,” meaning that I read and meditate upon the Bible verses assigned for that week by the denomination and offer the sermon thereby sparked. It is an opportunity to work within boundaries that are different from…
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Oh, I Remember This…
I just sent this video to all the past, present and future mothers on my list. It is an astonishingly high resolution video of a 20-week old fetus. She or he is wiggling around inside his/her mother’s body: Just watching it brought back, with visceral clarity, what it was like to have another, lively human…
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Virality
My husband brings me coffee one recent morning, and as he hands me the cup he says “Kate, you’ve gone viral.” A story I told for my favorite NPR show, the Moth Radio Hour, has been posted as a video online…and it has now received more than three million views. Instantly I have an image…
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We Need To Talk!
Dear Readers and Friends! Many of you have confessed to sharing with me a certain frustration with the dismal state of American public discourse. However you describe it (“ideological bubbles” “political correctness” “sound and fury signifying nothing”) it is a problem nationally, within our communities and our churches, even within our own families. Having spent…
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He’s Still A Drummer…
My son’s Peter’s band, Five of the Eyes, is going on tour to promote their new (and already rave-reviewed) album “Venus Transit” and coming soon to a venue near you! 9/30 Portland House of music, 25 Temple St, Portland, ME 04101 10/13 Sherman Showcase, 522 Main St, Stroudsburg, PA 18360 10/14 Graperoom, 105 Grape St,…
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Marriage Ends
Once upon a time, I was a parish minister and one of my elderly (90-ish) parishioners, “Sally,” was dying. I went to visit her in the hospital, finding her semi-comatose in her bed, surrounded by an encampment of family members and with her not-dying but very old and dignified husband beside her. The husband—I’ll call…
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My Boy’s Band and Maternal Inadequacy (Updated!)
I’m not a music person. I’m just not. Yes, I used to play the piano. Still do, when I happen across one, but otherwise? I barely even listen to music on the radio anymore. I wouldn’t have said that my children’s dad was especially musical either, yet somehow we managed to produce Peter. Who has…
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Sermons and Events, Fall 2017
] Sunday, August 27 Sermon, Lincolnville Center (ME) United Christian Church Thursday, September 14th “Two Old Cops And An Angel” with Mark Nickerson and John Ford Gray Library, Gray ME 6:30 pm Sunday, September 17, Sermon, Lincolnville Center (ME) United Christian Church Sunday, September 24th Sermon, Lincolnville Center (ME) United Christian Church Sunday, October 8th…
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Sermons and Talks, Spring ’17
Sunday, April 2, Lincolnville United Christian Church, Lincolnville, ME 9:30 AM Saturday, April 8, Maynard Book Festival, Maynard (MA.) Public Library 3:30 PM Sunday, April 16, Easter Service, First Universalist Church of Rockland, ME. 10 AM Sunday, April 23, First Universalist Churches of West Paris and Norway, ME 9 and 11 AM Sunday, May 7,…