Why We Come to All Souls

Let’s talk about what All Souls is really about…
All Souls is the 187 year old congregation that has been through so many upheavals and a couple of closings and has survived and is now thriving as a Beloved Community.
All Souls is the Pew Crew that spent a year meeting twice a week to work together to solve the problems of adapting our beautiful pews to our needs.  They toiled and fussed and argued and worked and cooperated and learned and worked together and dug each other out of the mud when the lane to the workplace was awash in the winter – and the result was the beautiful, literally built-by-love pews that we sit in each week.
All Souls is the kitchen window downstairs -  There are two members involved with a project to replace the worn out window and frame above the refrigerator.  Another labor of love, actually.   One wants vinyl – the other wants no vinyl. They can’t get together on the material but they will – and that’s what’s so marvelous about it..  It’s just a window but the friendships and respect for each other is what’s holding it together.
All Souls is our ‘coffee and conversation’ after church services each week.  Some call it noisy.  Others call it – Energy.   Whatever it is – it is a family of people who love and care for each other and enjoy having the weekly time to chat and talk about what concerns them and to be listened to and heard and go away from church feeling invigorated and validated.
It’s Reed Richmond who took over publication of our newsletter a couple of years ago and somehow, magically, has it here for us each month.
All Souls is Joan Richmond and the chorus she’s building in our church and the love and patience she brings to that process and the beautiful music she is teaching us to sing each month.  AND it’s Ayesha Manley playing our organ, commuting here from Galion and Wooster four trips per month to bring us that music. It’s the Carol Bernhardt Trio playing for us every other week.  And it’s the organ itself and the winter that Joyce Fenton spent repainting each of the 21  pipes on the front of the organ – restoring them to their original beauty. AND it’s Sean Burns who, unless there’s a big sports car race is at church nearly every week taking care of the sound system – keeping the screeches out and constantly learning and figuring out new tricks and techniques he can use with the sound system.  And – it’s Amy Burns who brought us the concept of Whole Church Worship when the kids stay upstairs in church for the whole service.
All Souls is the little church that supports and sponsors ministerial interns and helps them get ordained and fellowshipped.
All Souls is all of the Social Action activities people from this church are involved in.  Without an organized committee or operation there are dozens of people in this church who are giving themselves and their time and money every week to various causes and organizations that they believe in and support.  It’s Floyd and Ruth Moody who wanted us to create a FINCA bank and kept after it until it was done and now there are 70 or so women in Haiti who have businesses and their lives are improved forever. AND it’s our support of Aloys Kamwithi’s orphanage and school in Kenya AND it’s Sandy MacPherson taking on supporting Aloys out of her pocket and time and helping him prepare and get all the hundreds or thousands of books we’ve accumulated for his school shipped to Kenya.
And – it’s Laura Crabtree who, for two years has been coming here and providing such wonderful care of our children during services so the parents can have the hour to stay in services – most Sundays.   And now she’s a full-time nursing school student with a job – and she still comes and takes care of our kids.
All Souls is Doug Wilson who took a large broken piece of stained glass and created our chalice and then created the chalice art pieces we have in the church and in some of our homes.  Totally a labor of love…
It’s the loving care we give each other in times of need and pain and the knowing that we’re safe here and loved and accepted – mostly accepted for who we are and for our foibles and forgiving when we make mistakes and supporting and listening and just loving and caring for each other so very much.
It’s the action by the Board in July of this year to take down the attendance / contribution board because people have more than enough monetary stress now and All Souls needs to be a place for peace and not another place hammering away at us for our money every week and All Souls will survive with less revenue for a while.
It’s Reed Richmond giving us the posters he made for the walls in the sanctuary with the Seven Principles and the Blake Covenent which remind us of who we are and what we try to be to each other and to the community.  AND – it’s Renie Gilbert who offered to put those posters in beautiful frames, a project that is in the works.
And it’s Jay Gilbert who each week posts the calendar on the website and each week prepares and publishes the bulletin for our Sunday services – and it’s Lou Green who makes sure there is an article in all the local newspapers each week announcing our presence and our service and our activities..
It’s Jane Price who, on the day I delivered a message here about listening, during the postlude was playing a measure off from Carol and Pam and stopped in the middle of the music and said  “Wait!  Start over, I wasn’t listening!”   And it’s Jane Price who comes and accompanies the chorus each month without charge, even though she is not a member of the church.
All Souls is our wonderful children’s RE teachers who are teaching the kids a curriculum called ‘Tapestry of Faith’ which is about there are lots of religions in the world including Unitarian Universalisn – and that they all are valid and they all teach mostly the same values and just do it in different ways.  They’re teaching the kids about the 7 principles in words and phrases and lessons that make sense  to anyone and are giving the kids a belief basis to grow their lives around.  AND – it’s Janet Chandler and others who keep coming up with and leading programs for adults to participate in for further education and learning beyond the services and coffee hour.
All Souls is our becoming a young church as the average age of our membership drops and new, young families come and we have more wonderful children learning and being in our church each or most weeks.
All Souls is LD Ball and the love and meticulous care he has given the building and keeping it in such beautiful condition, ever since he took over the position from Mike Garber who had done those things before him.  It’s Mike Garber and Judy Shaffer who give a lot of each Tuesday to the task of cleaning the church – delivering us a clean carpet and pews and seats every single week.  And it’s the Kilgores who take care of the grass and flowers and the kitchen and the coffee and conversation room so we are always provided with a facility that we are comfortable and safe in.  And the Kilgores who magically – every week of the year – provide flowers for our table at the front of the church.
All Souls is the entire set of responses to the bat situation last winter and the response to the loss of money that we had to figure out and the way we sailed through those tough times, almost without real pain – and we have mostly forgiven that and moved on.  And it is that we have *mostly* forgiven all of that…. many have, but some haven’t – and that’s OK.
It’s the people who come here just to attend worship services. And those who come for coffee hour and not services and those who come here whenever there is something going on in the church and those who don’t.
There are so many wonderful things about All Souls that I have not mentioned – the list goes on and on and on and I haven’t left anyone out on purpose, but I know I have left people out.  The list is just endless and the reasons just keep coming and coming and I could go on and on and never express all the beauty and wonder that is All Souls.
All Souls is the beautiful, loving, accepting tapestry of all of us.
All Souls is our church – our Beloved Community in the fullest and richest sense of those words.  It’s amazing and wonderful and sometimes agonizing, but full of joy and opinions and feelings and loyalties and love for each other and the way we are – together.
And because we’re UUs and we have and are encouraged to share our own opinions, sometimes we can and do have differences that need to be resolved and they always are and then it’s OK.  That’s part of encouragement of each person’s search for truth and meaning.
That’s what All Souls is to me!
Bill Millikin
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