SUSU commUNITY farm exists to co-create a homemade field of love for the next 7 generations through the healing, affirming, and liberation of Black, indigenous, people of color and their allies. We welcome them to this First Sunday service, and look forward to sharing our offerings for this month with them.
We anticipate that this service will be both in-person and on Zoom. Click right here Sunday shortly before 10:00 a.m. to join via Zoom. Click here to read our protocols
“A Field of Love:
Sowing Seeds of Liberation in Vermont”
Guest Speaker: Amber Arnold
Service Coordinator: Karen Tyler
Order of Service
Sunday, October 1, 2023
Board Welcome & Announcements Jamie Gibson
Prelude Bondens Sang (Farmer’s Song) Edvard Grieg
Eva Greene, piano
Chalice Lighting by Katie Sivani Gelfand Marie Gorst
We light our chalice as a symbol of gratitude
as we celebrate the abundance of our lives together.
In this sanctuary we harvest bushels of strength for one another,
and offer our crop with the hands of compassion and generosity.
In the authentic and gentle manner of our connections,
we cultivate a simple sweetness to brighten our spirits.
May we be grateful for the ways we nourish and uplift each other,
For it is the sharing of this hallowed time together that sustains us.
Lighting Our Children’s Chalice
We light this chalice to celebrate Unitarian Universalism. We are the church of the open minds. We are the church of the helping hands. We are the church of the loving hearts.
Opening Words Karen Tyler
Song #38 Morning Has Broken
Story for All Ages “If You Plant a Seed” by Kadir Nelson Beth McKinney
Anthem: Peace Like a River based on an American Spiritual, arr. by Donald Moore
All Souls Church Choir, Tom Baehr, Director
Reading: Harvest Moon Beth McKinney
The dark magnolia leaves and spreading fig
With green luxuriant beauty all their own,
Stirless, hang heavy-coated with the dew,
Which swift and iridescent gleams shoot through
As if a thousand brilliant diamonds shone.
Afloat the lagoon, water-lilies white
In sweets with muscadines perfume the night.
A song bird restless chants a fleeting lay;
Asleep on all the swamp and bayou lies
A peaceful, blissful moonlight, mystic haze,
A dreaminess o’er all the landscape plays,
While lake and lagoon mirror all the skies.
There is a glory doomed to pass too soon,
That lies subdued beneath the harvest moon.
–George Marion McClellan
Hymn #207 Earth Was Given As a Garden
Offering: Guest Speaker-Amber Arnold, Co-founder and Collaborative Director of SUSU commUNITY Farm
Offertory Quiet Nights (Corcovado) Antonio Carlos Jobim
Eva Greene, piano
Candles of Joys and Concerns Karen Tyler
Hymn #123 Spirit of Life
Reading: Merry Autumn Beth McKinney
It’s all a farce,—these tales they tell
About the breezes sighing,
And moans astir o’er field and dell,
Because the year is dying.
Such principles are most absurd,—
I care not who first taught ’em;
There’s nothing known to beast or bird
To make a solemn autumn.
In solemn times, when grief holds sway
With countenance distressing,
You’ll note the more of black and gray
Will then be used in dressing.
Now purple tints are all around;
The sky is blue and mellow;
And e’en the grasses turn the ground
From modest green to yellow.
The seed burs all with laughter crack
On featherweed and jimson;
And leaves that should be dressed in black
Are all decked out in crimson.
A butterfly goes winging by;
A singing bird comes after;
And Nature, all from earth to sky,
Is bubbling o’er with laughter.
The ripples wimple on the rills,
Like sparkling little lasses;
The sunlight runs along the hills,
And laughs among the grasses.
The earth is just so full of fun
It really can’t contain it;
And streams of mirth so freely run
The heavens seem to rain it.
Don’t talk to me of solemn days
In autumn’s time of splendor,
Because the sun shows fewer rays,
And these grow slant and slender.
Why, it’s the climax of the year,—
The highest time of living!—
Till naturally its bursting cheer
Just melts into thanksgiving.
Paul Lawrence Dunbar
Song #305 De Colores
Extinguishing the Chalice by Andrew Pakula Marie Gorst
May you know fully and deeply the blessings of each of your heart’s seasons
The inward turning of Winter
Springtime’s lush renewal
The effortless, steady growth of summer
And autumn’s rich harvest
May your passage from season to season be blessed—
Eased by hands to hold, and by the light of love to guide you on.
*Closing Circle “Carry the flame of peace and love”
until we meet again.” (sung 2X)
*Please stand as you are able
Benediction Karen Tyler
“We are each other’s harvest:
We are each other’s business:
We are each other’s magnitude and bond.”
Gwendolyn Brooks
Coffee Hour and Conversation