District Executive Notes
by Rev. Mary Higgins

This past weekend (April 18 & 19), at the Districts’ Annual Conference and meeting, was glorious!  Our people were everywhere!  Our music was rousing!  Our energy was high and our tears were real.  I have a hard time communicating how wonderful the weekend was for me.  It was like waking up after a deep sleep and remembering everything about your dream:  It was delicious!  Friday night, my heart swelled, as forty nine congregational leaders shared the “Good News” of their congregations.  Many of our congregations are building or are having a resurgence of energy because of new Ministers who have arrived and programs going well.  The DVD of this Friday night session and also the sermon and banner unfurling from Saturday will be accessible from our website. 

The good news of the activities that are animating your congregations is inspiring.  Mimi Bornstein, Terrie Harman and Steve Finner coordinated our music and the three state choir and we sang as if we had something to sing about!  We debuted a new hymn, From the Mountains to the Sea, written especially for this consolidation weekend by Maine’s Grace Lewis-McLaren.  There are copies available for each of your congregations to sing just ask those who attended to share them with you or let the office know and we will send you your own copy!

For many years your Joint Task Force on consolidation and your Transition Team have laid careful groundwork so that this official consolidation weekend could go off without a hitch, and that it did.  We voted nearly unanimously to consolidate our two districts and to become officially the Northern New England District on July 1.  The banners of the Northeast and the New Hampshire/Vermont Districts were taken down for the last time by Charlie Boothby and John Sanders, Presidents of their respective districts.  Those two districts have served so many so well for so long, that many of our eyes glistened as Charlie and John marched their banners from the hall.  The new banner was unfurled by the Trustees to the UUA Board from the two districts, Roger Comstock and Will Saunders.  It is a beautiful banner, with the mountains of Vermont and New Hampshire leading to the coast of Maine rising from the Chalice of our faith.  

We are better together than any one of our congregations is alone.  We need each other and the varied and precious gifts each of you brings.  Nothing that happened when we were all together could have happened without a cast of thousands, each with a little bit of the picture and a piece of the vision.  Together, they made this a weekend that could hold the significance of our joining these two districts in its hands.  Thanks to Helen Zidowecki, Ann Kebbell, Belinda Nerl, Roberta Finkelstein, Mary Edes, Dena McPhetres, Joy Blanchette, all the musicians and choir members, the Transition Team, Board members and each of you.  The planning is done; the meeting is over; the good will continues and now it is time to stop meeting and planning and time to roll up our sleeves and make this new district reflect our deepest hopes.  Can you see yourself taking an active roll in creating our common future?  Let us know what part you can play.