Skyline Community Church United Church of Christ

Skyline Celebrates Black History Month. We work for justice and peace, both locally and globally. Every Sunday 10 AM you're welcome to join our live church service with music, messages, prayer, & community. Skyline Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/716026467 This month, we celebrate Black History Month. Here are just a few opportunities to join us throughout February: https://skylineucc.org/skyline-celebrates-black-history-mo/

From Pastor Laurie - Let Us Be the Light, Together: Inauguration Reflections It’s Wednesday Jan 20th, a new day, Inauguration day. The sunlight broke through the clouds over our nation’s capital this morning, in this epiphany moment. I’d like to share two moments that moved me deeply this morning, and look forward to hearing your experience of this historic day. First, Amanda Gorman, a 22-year-old poet, read an original work at President Joe Biden’s inauguration. Her words... click here to read more: https://skylineucc.org/let-us-be-the-light-together-inaugu/

From Pastor Laurie - Since last week, I have been wearing my I voted sticker on my Nike just do it cap! The I voted sticker reminds me of the prophetic words of John Lewis: "The vote is precious. It is almost sacred. The vote is the most powerful nonviolent tool we have." Let’s exercise our faith by voting. Follow the link for where to find ballot boxes, how to register late, recommendations on the ballot initiatives... https://skylineucc.org/vote/

From Pastor Laurie - Our UCC conference, and our church, voted in 2015 to become Jubilee conferences, which honors the biblical concept of debt relief for the poorest. I encourage you to read these addresses from Eric LaCompte, Executive Director of Jubilee USA, addressing the UN conference on Covid 19 crisis recovery and debt relief. This year's Jubilee Weekend 2020: Curing Poverty, Inequality and the Coronavirus , will be held October 16th - 18th, the same weekend as the major IMF and World Bank meetings this year. We lift up our voices in defense of the world’s most vulnerable during this critical time, to help expand debt relief for the 73 poorest countries...READ MORE at the link: https://skylineucc.org/debt-relief-jubilee-weekend-2020/

In the words of Rev Dr Martin Luther King Jr, and through the singing of my friend Ken Medema, May your vote bend the arc of history toward justice, be a light in the darkness, and help give birth to a transformed America, let us begin to see now, ever more clearly, through the eyes of love.

Rev. Laurie Manning and Ken Medema, of Skyline Community Church, offer these words and song to inspire us all to vote for America through the eyes of love.

From Pastor Laurie: Most of us, myself included, are experiencing anxiety as we reflect upon the upcoming election. Now, even as we grieve the passing of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, there is a fast-tracking of a new conservative justice. How did we become so divided? How did our relationships become weaponized? How did we come to accept such lack of integrity in our leaders? How did we create worlds based on radically different sets of facts, and how do we reestablish ...a shared reality? Here are a few resources that I find helpful in answering these questions, and more importantly, in responding constructively. Brian McLaren (yes, the same author of the "Great Spiritual Migration" that we are reading!) provides a short video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9w5NE4Qm-GQ&authuser=0) on Kitchen Table Logic, describing the emergence of a new electorate that represents the deep disruption we see today. READ MORE at the link: https://skylineucc.org/resources-to-respond-to-the-divide-/

Looking for disinfectant sprayer for our preschool to use on toys, hard surfaces. Anybody have recommendations?

From Pastor Laurie: On Wednesday morning, here in the Bay Area, we awoke to the strangest shared experience. Even our cats were wondering what’s going on? Why is the sky as orange as a pumpkin? Why is it getting darker rather than lighter? Why can’t I smell smoke? Will it get worse? When will the locusts come? As Marvin Gaye once sung it, What’s going on? By now, many of you have read about what’s going on. What’s really going on? Human induced climate change. Let’s do what we can in this upcoming election to support the Green New Deal! Thank you to our denomination, the UCC for being the first Christian body to endorse the Green New Deal! ... read more at this link: https://skylineucc.org/orange-sky-in-the-morning-is-a-call/

Can you believe it? This weekend is Labor Day! Where has the summer gone? Where has 2020 gone? I imagine far fewer of us are getting away for Labor Day weekend, so perhaps you’ll have time to remember the unique origins of how and why the US decided to change Labor day from May 1st, ’International Worker Day, from the rest of the world, to a sleepy weekend at the end of the summer. As is so often with history, there is a political battle for who gets to tell the story. In ...fact, it often is HIS story (a white wealthy, male landowner) telling the story. Far too often, history is told by the winners, while the voices of the marginalized and the oppressed are hidden. We are wise to learn from these hidden histories, so as not to repeat it..... READ MORE at the link: https://skylineucc.org/our-story-we-are-in-this-together/ Image by ElisaRiva from Pixabay See more