"Uncovering Joy in Stories of Resistance"

The Manna Food Center, our Share The Plate Partner this week, is well known to all of us here at UUCR through the collection bins that are kept and open at the main doors. Opened in 1983, the Manna Center’s mission is nothing less than the elimination of hunger in Montgomery County through food distributions, education and advocacy. From humble beginnings in a vacant elementary school with a single $3,000 donation, Manna Center’s current base in Gaithersburg serves 12,000 pounds of food a day, serving around 61,000 people.

In addition to the direct food collection and distribution services that we at UUCR know, Manna’s programs include a mobile kitchen and pop-up pantry, a “food for families” initiative that picks up donations from grocery stores and farmers markets for sorting and packaging for families, a farm-to-food bank program that directly links fresh farm produce, meats and eggs with community clients, and school-based nutrition education and food access programs.

Central to Manna’s theory of change is the idea that no one agency or organization can end hunger alone. Manna therefore has built a support network that now includes more than 350 different organizations, including government agencies, corporations, faith-based associations and congregations, non-profit groups, schools, doctors and employee assistance programs. Over the past year, volunteers donated more than 33,500 hours of their time, the equivalent of 16 full-time employees.

Ever-increasing community support has allowed Manna to try and effectively meet the ever-increasing nutritional need throughout Montgomery County. As you are willing and able, please join this movement with a generous contribution to the Manna Food Center.

Online giving options include: Realm or Paypal, at https://uucr.org/give;

Or you may mail a check to UUCR at 100 Welsh Park Dr, Rockville MD, 20850

OFFERTORY ANTHEM “Romance Op. 36" by Camille Saint-Saëns, Arr. Mason Jones- Kathy Long and Justin Furnia, Piano

REFLECTIONS - Brian Sullivan and Ginny Folsom

CLOSING SONG - “This Joy" by Resistance Revival Choir - Congregation, Amy Heath, and Elsa Powell Strong

BENEDICTION & CHALICE EXTINGUISHING - Brian Sullivan

POSTLUDE - Justin Furnia, Piano

Lyrics

#38 Morning Has Broken

Morning has broken like the first morning,

blackbird has spoken like the first bird.

Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning!

Praise for them, springing fresh from the Word!

Sweet the rain’s new fall sunlit from heaven,

like the first dewfall on the first grass.

Praise for the sweetness of the wet garden,

sprung in completeness where God’s feet pass.

Mine is the sunlight! Mine is the morning

born of the one light Eden saw play!

Praise with elation, praise every morning,

God’s recreation of the new day!

#123 Fuente de Amor / Spirit of Life

Fuente de Amor,

ven hacia mí.

Y al corazón, cántale tu compasión.

Sopla al volar, sube en el mar,

hasta moldear la justicia de la vida.

Arráigame, libérame,

Fuente de Amor, ven a mí, ven a mí.

Spirit of Life,

Come Unto Me.

Sing in my heart all the stirrings of compassion.

Blow in the wind, rise in the sea;

Move in the hand,

giving life the shape of justice.

Roots hold me close, wings set me free;

Spirit of Life, come to me, come to me.

“This Joy” by Resistance Revival Choir

This joy that I have

The world didn't give it to me (oh)

This joy that I have

The world didn't give it to me (don't you know that)

This joy that I have