The Nicene Creed
We believe in one God,
     maker of heaven and earth,
     of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in Jesus Christ,
     the Word of God,
     through whom all things were made.
     By the power of the Holy Spirit,
              for the salvation of the world,
              the Word became flesh
in the womb of Mary, his blessed mother.
     He was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
 suffered, died, and was buried.
     On the third day Jesus rose from the grave
and ascended into heaven,
promising to come again
to judge the living and the dead.
We believe in the Holy Spirit,
     the breath of God and giver of life;
     she speaks through prophets and sages
     and creates a new community of God’s people.
     We place our trust in God’s promise of forgiveness,
     and we look with hope for the resurrection of the dead,
     and the life of the world to come. Amen.
(version in inclusive language by Rev. Dr. Jay Johnson, rector of All Saints Episcopal Church in Saugatuck, MI)

Although it’s a holiday weekend, we have a lot going on in the upcoming week and month, so I urge you to look at the events referenced here, put them on your calendar, and join us live or on Zoom as seems appropriate. Here are some things I want to highlight:

This Sunday is observed as Trinity Sunday throughout the Christian Church. Although not foregrounded so much in UCC churches in our part of the country, in congregations in the East and Midwest, which trace their roots back further than the mergers that created the UCC in 1957, the Nicene Creed is still used in weekly worship. It is even used weekly in worship as a reminder of our historical belief in the sometimes mysterious doctrine of the Trinity. Of course, in the UCC we deeply value our individual rights to affirm or doubt various doctrines, but I’ll use this occasion to revisit why Christians talk about “God in three persons, blessed Trinity” as we’ll sing in a favorite old hymn on Sunday: Holy, Holy, Holy.

We will also commemorate the 100th year anniversary of the Tulsa Race Massacre and listen to a brief video testimony from a survivor, 107-year-old Viola Fletcher, who told her story before Congress this last week. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/may/19/viola-fletcher-tulsa-race-massacre-congress-oldest-survivor. We’ll also have an update from Vickye Robinson, our delegate to the Northern California UCC, about their recent Special Meeting. (Vickye will be our preacher on the last Sunday in Pride Month as we commemorate the Stonewall Uprising that is often seen as a significant catalyst in the modern gay rights movement.)

We cannot allow the almost commonplace occurrence of mass gun violence to go unmarked. Yesterday in San Jose 9 people were killed by one gun man with semi-automatic weapons. We will have a brief witness this Sunday, May 30, 1 pm to 1:45 pm outside Foster City Hall in Foster City. Alexis and I are organizing this with short notice with friends from Brady United, San Mateo Chapter (@SanMateoBrady on Facebook), with whom we had an outdoor prayer vigil at church last year. Please come, masked, and invite friends. We feel it’s important to express – by showing up with our bodies – our solidarity with 9 grieving families and our desire for more significant gun control and background checks. Nonpartisan, nonsectarian, peaceful, socially distanced. Check the IUC Facebook page for latest updates.

Two years ago our church was instrumental in getting Foster City to issue its first official Pride Month Proclamation. Last year, after some controversy, our church’s own rainbow flag was flown over City Hall for the last week of the month. This year our flag will again be raised for the entire month of June, without controversy. You are invited to the flag raising on Tuesday, June 1, at 2 pm at Foster City Hall. There won’t be a lot of fanfare, and it won’t be advertised because of COVID restrictions. Wear a mask if you want to come and be a witness. Take some pride that our Open and Affirming Commitment made over a decade ago is still having an effect in the world. And what a great way to kick off our church’s Pride Month activities.

Stay tuned for more exciting things taking place. I’m still trying to work out a sensible and safe plan particular to our congregation and our small and shared church building for when and how to re-open. There are a lot of moving parts to this consideration, so I’ve been letting you know some of the variables and why I’ve changed the plan a few times now. Continue to pray for an end to this pandemic, and please understand why we might not do it the way some other churches are doing it in our city. If you have particular thoughts or questions, please let me know.

With love and hope,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

P.S. A school update will be coming next week. We are more or less on the schedule we released to you last month. We are planning to honor all of the church members who have supported All Are Friends as a church program over the years on Sunday July 4. Please help us reach out to anyone you know who should be recognized and invite them to our first in-person (masked, socially distanced) service on July 4. Will there be singing at this service? I don’t know. https://religionnews.com/2021/05/25/is-it-safe-to-sing-at-church-yet-depends-who-you-ask/. But this I do know. Please, please, please get vaccinated. And – when you’re at church, expect to wear a mask, no exceptions for now.

This week at the church I noticed that the foliage was blooming in shades of red, and it put me in mind of this Sunday’s observance of Pentecost. In a clergy meeting where we discuss the lessons for the next Sunday, we talked about the parallels with the early church as they began a new phase of their movement on Pentecost, which is often called the birthday of the church. We are about to start a new phase, a new kind of birthday or rebirth. What manifestations of Spirit will we see? Wear something red for the Zoom camera, and join us for Pentecost.

We’ll look at two different ways that the scriptures talk about the Holy Spirit, as both breath and as embodied advocate. Come and pray and let the power of the Spirit be felt among us on a new kind of Pentecostal power.

See you Sunday,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

P.S. We’re trying to be responsive to still unfolding news about the safest practices. For now, let’s plan our first in-person gatherings for Sunday, July 4 and Sunday. August 1, with the other Sundays on Zoom only. We can perhaps resume weekly in-person worship starting Sunday, September 5. Let me know what you think!

This Sunday is Ascension Sunday, the very last of our Easter observances.

Our guest preacher helps us pose the question of “What’s next?” The Board is working thoroughly, thoughtfully, and diligently to help us in the transition of drawing down our current way of managing All Are Friends as a church program and introducing a new management model within the next several weeks.

I am looking at how we can transition back to public worship and other gatherings in person, though not yet. I know some churches are doing so, but we have particular reasons for being cautious. At present, I can say we will not begin worship in our space until at least July, but we will continue gathering on Zoom.

I have tentatively calendared an outdoor social gathering for Sunday, June 13, at noon in the church parking lot. Are you interested in helping with that? Let me know.

Soon we will be together again in person. Until then, let’s continue to gather faithfully in prayer via the Internet.

Hope to see you Sunday.
Rev. Jim Mitulski

Thank you so much for your birthday wishes last Sunday. Also, I appreciate your prayers on Tuesday when I had surgery on my forehead. It was successful, and I will be in church on Sunday. Please be patient because I am not starting back to work until next week.

We have a great guest preacher this Sunday, my long-time friend and colleague Rev. Stedney Phillips, who will help advance our theme of Asian American History Month. Always an important observance, this year it feels especially important that we express our solidarity and commitment to the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, who are strongly represented in our church and in our wider community.

I look forward to seeing you all on Sunday.

In love and faith,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

We are continuing in the Easter season. I realized at the book group this week as we concluded reading Anne Lamott’s Dusk, Night, Dawn how reading this throughout April has nurtured my own capacity to continue to look at, explore, and experience resurrection. It has acclimated me to seek it and see it way beyond the simple Easter story with which we began the month.

She says of hope:

“Hope springs from realizing we are loved, can love and are love with skin on. Then we are unstoppable. This hope is from a deep, deep place that somehow my parents seeded. Love is not a concept. It’s alive and true. A generative and nutritious flickering force that is marbled through life.

This is the theme I will explore on Sunday through the gospel reading and look at what resurrection means in the midst of change. I hope you’ll be there.

Rev. Jim Mitulski 

Please join us this Sunday for a special service in honor of National Poetry Month, curated by Jessica McFarland, a minister and poet especially for our church.  Of course, we are still in Eastertide.

We had a great turnout for the Congregational conversation last Sunday, and we will continue our discussions over the weeks to come. There is a regular meeting of the Board this Sunday at 12 noon if you are interested as well. Please join us!

Yours in faith,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

Mighty God,
in whom we know the power of redemption,
you stand among us in the shadows of our time.
As we move through every sorrow and trial of this life,
uphold us with knowledge of the final morning
when, in the glorious presence of your risen Son,
we will share in his resurrection,
redeemed and restored to the fullness of life
and forever freed to be your people. Amen.

Please join us for worship this week and for the congregational conversation afterwards.

In my sermon we’ll look in Luke 24:13-48 at how Jesus steadied the faith of the people in his community in the midst of change. Our country is going through changes; our church is changing. Yet one thing remains – the love of Christ and the capacity for new beginnings and ongoing resurrections.

We hope you’ll join us.

In faith,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

Grant, we pray, O God,
that we, who share in the paschal celebrations,
may, through your goodness,
hold fast to them
in the way we live our lives;
through Jesus Christ
who is alive with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and forever. Amen.
(from New Zealand Prayer Book)

Easter is a season of resurrections – fifty full days, an extra ten days to compensate for the seriousness of Lent. It’s also a season of change. This week at church I noticed the calla lilies and the wisteria in bloom. It just breathed new life! new life! everywhere I looked, even though it was still a little brisk outside.

This week I’ll reflect on “Faithful Thomas” as I invite us to think of him this year, as told in John 20:19-31.

This will also be Rev. Elisabeth’s last Sunday with us as interim associate minister. We will have the opportunity to thank her and appreciate her for her faithfulness in ministry among us over the last few years. Plan in advance what you might want to say, or email me something you might want me to read at [email protected].

I look forward to seeing you.

With love,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

O God of unchangeable power and eternal light:
Look favorably on your whole Church,
that wonderful and sacred mystery;
by the effectual working of your providence,
carry out in tranquility the plan of salvation;
let the whole world see and know that things
which were cast down are being raised up,
and things which had grown old are being made new,
and that all things are being brought to their perfection
by the one through whom all things were made,
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Easter IS Coming! We’re almost there. It is a holy time of year for many of our friends and neighbors as well. We are still in Passover time. My editorial from last week’s San Mateo Daily Journal was reprinted this week in the Jewish Weekly. I have heard from many of our Jewish friends how important it is that we Christians recognize that this can be a sensitive and difficult time for them https://www.jweekly.com/2021/03/26/christian-pastor-this-holy-week-im-giving-up-antisemitism/  Our friends from the Peninsula Multifaith Coalition remind us it is a holy time for Hindus too https://youtu.be/a0HGV8Ark44.

This is still the week of Christ’s Passion, his great suffering and his great love for us, love that is stronger than death. As I write this, I have been watching the trial of Derek Chauvin, and the painful and unseemly spectacle of children testifying to what they witnessed, the death of one man at the hands of another, empowered by the state. A reminder that crucifixions continue, and a challenge for us to make sure they don’t.  George Floyd did not have to die. Before we get to Easter, we still have to grapple with Good Friday.

I was so moved on Tuesday when the current members of the reading group read the final chapter of our latest read, Know My Name by Chanel Miller. It was divided into eight voices, and they took turns reading it aloud. It was like a modern day reading of the Passion, a powerful narrative that took place locally, a story that many women experience and that does not always get told. Thank you, readers, for sharing this story out loud and for your willingness to share it with us. You don’t have to have read the book to appreciate the testimony. If you want to deepen your spiritual life during Holy Week, listen to these women read this testimony. Note: There is graphic material in this testimony. https://youtu.be/lN7NYdcl-q0

I am raising these instances because they are our reality. Also because I believe Resurrection is and can and will be our reality. After a year of sheltering in place I know we are ready for resurrection. This year we are looking at Mark’s version of the Easter story, 16:1-8.  It’s a simple and direct version, reminding us that we will find the Risen One “in Galilee” – in our lives just as we are living them. Between now and Sunday, look around for signs of resurrection. Start now. Don’t wait until then, and don’t stop after Easter. As always at Island United Church, come as you are on Easter Sunday – in Easter finery with hats, or in your bunny slippers and bathrobe. Be part of our resurrection celebration. Bring bread and cup for communion. Be prepared for trumpets and alleluias and new beginnings.

With love,
Rev. Jim Mitulski

Assist us mercifully with your help, O God of our liberation, that we may enter with joy upon the contemplation of those mighty acts, whereby you have given us life and immortality, through Jesus Christ, Amen. (Adapted from the Book of Common Prayer)

This Sunday begins Holy Week, a week full of passion, excitement, action, drama, emotion, betrayal, and suffering. It is also a story of Jesus showing his love for humanity, then and now, using his body to show solidarity and his spirit to demonstrate eternal life.

Stick with the story every step of the way, which begins this Sunday with Mark 11:1-11. Stick with the journey as it unfolds throughout the events with which we are so familiar: the Last Supper, Crucifixion, and the period of waiting. These last few weeks we are hearing about widespread suffering, continuing acts of prejudice, horrific gun violence – all real. We have an acute need for the imminent Season of Resurrections. But for now, stick with the Lenten journey a little longer.

Yours in faith,
Rev. Jim Mitulski