“Seeds for the New Year”
Seeds for the New Year
the Rev Dr. Sofia Betancourt, video message
Download the morning program here or read it below without having to download it.
What seeds are you planting for the new year? How are you weaving your magic into your relationships with others? How can we center beauty and goodness and love in all that’s ahead? These questions are at the heart of this special morning that will also include a charming children’s story Bridge of Flowers by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha.
Our morning assembly today was designed by the UUA and features a video message by UUA President Rev. Sofía Betancourt, Ph.D.
Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt
The Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt is a minister, educator, scholar, vocalist, poet, fiber artist, and change-maker. Her work in the world and her practice of Unitarian Universalism are informed by the belief that building mutual, accountable relationships with one another allows us to live our values more fully every day. Raised in New York City as the child of immigrants from Panamá and Chile, and the grandchild of a seventh-generation Unitarian, she knows the strength that comes from building lasting community at the meeting point of difference. She is an unabashed Universalist. The teachings of unearned grace, an all-embracing love, relational accountability, and dignity that surpasses all violent forms of oppression lie at the core of her understanding of life, living, and service in faithful community.
The Rev. Dr. Sofía Betancourt has served Unitarian Universalism for more than twenty years as a religious educator, minister, scholar, member of the UUA national staff and many volunteer committees at regional and denominational levels, and as interim co-president of the UUA in the spring of 2017. She holds a Ph.D. in Religious Ethics and African American Studies from Yale University as well as an M.Div. from Starr King School for the Ministry.
Betancourt has served congregations in Stockton, California; Norwich, Connecticut; Storrs, Connecticut; and Fresno, California; and has served on the faculty of Starr King School for the Ministry. She most recently served as Resident Scholar and Special Advisor on Justice and Equity at our Unitarian Universalist Service Committee. She is the author of Ecowomanism at the Panamá Canal: Black Women, Labor, and Environmental Ethics (2022).
NOTE: In case the announcement sounds really familiar … This morning assembly was originally scheduled for January 14, 2024 but weather caused the church to be closed that day.’
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