Unitarian Universalist Small Group Ministry Network Website

Chalice Circle Session - Story

Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Newark, DE, Rev. Andrew Weber, November 2016

Chalice Lighting:

Those who tell the stories, rule the world.

- Hopi Proverb

Check-In: What’s going on in your life?

Readings:

Remember, you don’t fear people whose stories you know.

- Margaret Wheatley

Research consistently shows that stories mold us. The more deeply we are cast under a story’s spell, the more potent its influence. In fact, fiction seems to be more effective at changing beliefs than nonfiction, which is designed to persuade through argument and evidence. Studies show that when we read nonfiction, we read with our shields up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story, we drop our intellectual guard.

- David Zahl

There are no true stories; we are making up every one of them.

- Pema Chodron

There are only true stories. We are discovering the truth in them.

- Christina Baldwin

The silver-haired gentleman was in truth nothing like the man Harold had first imagined him to be. He was a chap like himself, with a unique pain; and yet there would be no knowing that if you passed him in the street, or sat opposite him in a café and did not share his teacake. Harold pictured the gentleman on a station platform, smart in his suit, looking no different from anyone else. It must be the same all over England. People were buying milk, or filling their cars with petrol, or even posting letters. And what no one else knew was the appalling weight of the thing they were carrying inside.

- Rachel Joyce, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

“That can not be, Manuscripts don’t burn.”

- Mikhail Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita

Questions:

1. What spoke to you from the readings or the theme packet (tinyurl.com/UUFNThemes)?

2. What’s your sentence? What’s your story? Share pictures if you brought them.

3. What story does/did your family of origin tell about you? Does it “fit”?

4. What story did you walk away from? Are there parts of an “old” story you need to reclaim?

5. How do you use story? When you tell stories, what is most often the purpose?

Check-Out: One sentence on “likes and wishes” from the session.

Closing:

Stories are told as spells for binding the world together. - John Rouse

Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Newark

Spiritual Practice - Story

November 2016

This month our Ministerial Theme is Story, and our living this out in community is twofold. You are invited - and challenged - to compose one sentence which describes your life story. This is a way to focus in on what your purpose and meaning is. Author Daniel Pink describes the exercise here: tinyurl.com/sentence16. After you have your sentence, try to keep in mind: post it on your fridge, keep a copy in your wallet or purse, have it as your phone’s standby screen... And see if what you do fits your sentence.

As a further story sharing, you are invited to share your story with others. Share your sentence and, if you are able, share other parts of your story - use pictures of places or people if that helps. Be open to sharing your story, and be open to hearing other’s stories. (If you are part of a Chalice Circle at UUFN, bring your pictures to your November meeting.)