Dear Members and Friends,

Now that summer has arrived, and it actually feels like it, I hope you are finding some time to enjoy one of the reasons so many of us choose to live in the Pacific Northwest. Annie and I will spend some time at Lake Chelan with some of our family in July. And of course, with another grandchild born in June, we will spend this summer helping that young family find its new rhythm as a foursome.

Plans are slowly being made to offer another New England Pilgrimage this fall from October 3–9. We will use Cambridge, MA as our base to explore sites of Unitarian Universalist interest in Cambridge, Concord, Harvard (the town) and Boston. Some of those sites include the Harvard Divinity School, Mt. Auburn Cemetery, the homes of Emerson, Alcott and Thoreau, Walden Pond, the Fruitlands commune, the Arlington Street Church as well as many more sites in Boston. We gather on Tuesday night, October 3, and the trip officially ends on Sunday afternoon, October 8, though some of us stay into Monday. There is still room in this trip for you! If you are interested, please send me an email at jon.luopa@uuchurch.org. Single and double rooms are available. And the dates have been selected in the hopes of enjoying peak foliage.

On behalf of the staff let me thank you for allowing us to close the church for one week this summer, July 31-August 6. There will be no meetings at church that week and there will be no summer service on Sunday, August 6. Pastoral emergencies can be reported to the church’s Care Line (206.454.7722). That team is able to be in touch with one of the ministers. Hopefully all other routine church business can be communicated before or after that week.

It has been a very rich and remarkable church year. My thanks to the hundreds of you who help make this a special Beloved Community.

Warmly,