‘There go my people. I must find out where they are going so I can lead them!’ 
~ Alexandre Auguste Ledru-Rollin

Anyone who’s been around the last few years knows that I’m happy that the Finding Our Future workshop is happening this weekend. Early in my tenure, I encouraged our leadership to engage in creating a new mission, and when there was no energy to undertake that process, I let it go. But I never stopped thinking that it was a needed step in the transitional time that we’re in.

There are several reasons to take up this work, and for it to engage as many members as is possible:

• To hear ideas and visions from a wide range of voices.
• To create the cross-pollination of hopes and dreams.
• To energize members and friends by engaging imagination and centering on what is essential in this time.

Especially as we face the rising authoritarianism of the Right, the ever deepening climate crisis, the persistence of misogyny, racism, and the neglect of the poor – the list goes on forever – it matters that we know who we are and what it is we are trying to live out in our personal lives and our community. What is it that we hope to embody, to do, to create in this time?

In the next year or so, QUUF will begin the search for a new called minister. One of the questions that ministers in search for a congregation want to know is the vision for the future that each congregation has. That is answered in part, at least, by what their mission statement is.

When a mission statement is owned by a congregation, it helps to focus and direct their activities and plans. Ministers in search will want to know all of this: What is most important in this community? What have they given their hearts to?  What does their mission call us to do?

Your voice matters in all the work that we’ll do at the Finding the Future workshop. Your energy, your visions, your wisdom, and your companionship in this process will make a vibrant and alive mission statement that can carry QUUF boldly into the future. I hope I will see you there!