A monthly exploration of church-wide ministry themes for children and adults. This class meets the first Sunday of each month from 12-1 p.m., and provides families with activities and resources for deepening your understanding of Unitarian Universalism while exploring our monthly theme together. Family resource packets are also available in the Lighthouse building, or join our online parent group for further support and idea sharing.

OCTOBER: What Does it Mean to be a Family of Belonging? 

 “A place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively, wrenches it from itself, shapes it, renders it, loves it so radically that he remakes it in his own image.”  — Joan Didion

Are our homes open to this kind of soulful reshaping by all its inhabitants? Does our shared physical space reflect our entire family? Is time shared in a way that honors each member of the family?  I hope the answer is yes, and I hope we can offer ourselves grace when the shaping of our space and time accidently leaves a family member feeling a bit outside of the belongingness between us.

This month, we’ll be reckoning with belonging in our most intimate spaces, beginning with our own hearts–to whom do ours belong, and in whose do we belong?

Sadly, we have very little control over how our children will remember and refashion the childhoods that were lived under our love and protection. But, we sure can make some memories that will help those stories to include a good deal of bonding, knowing and being known, including, and otherwise experiencing a sense of belonging in our first and most powerful group: family.

Adapted from Soulful Home, October 2019