Upcoming Worship Services

Summer Theme: Letting Go and Beginning Again

June 30, 2024, “Up and Out” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
New Member Welcome Ceremony.  Volunteer Recognition. Report from General Assembly Delegates.  The service will be followed by our Congregational Meeting.
The sun has reached the highest point in the sky, and though the heat of summer still awaits, every day, now, will be a little shorter, the nights a little longer. So too, our church year continues through the end of August, but the end of June signals the end of our program year. We close the active part of our church year and turn now to needed rest. We recognize, we bless, and we release.
Call to Worship: 481
Opening Hymn: 204
Closing Hymn: 15
Benediction: 697

July 7, 2024, “Everyone Welcome and Included” Austin Heisley-Cook, Ryan Geller, Vickie Vining, and Pam Geller
Inclusion in an environment occurs when everyone feels respected, valued, welcomed, and has equal opportunities to be included and supported. Our 1st UU Principle: “The inherent worth and dignity of every person” reflects inclusion. Today we have two special UU speakers: Austin Heisley-Cook and Ryan Geller. We will have the opportunity to observe a Q&A  interview with Austin facilitated by UU member, teacher, and student advocate Vickie Vining. From Ryan Geller we will learn 10 things that neurodivergent iIndividuals and individuals on the autism spectrum would like you to know.

July 14, 2024, 
"Koheleth"
 Nicholas D’Agosto
UU seminary student (Meadville Lombard Theological School) Nicholas D’Agosto has been graciously invited by Rev. Rick to lead this service. He will be preaching a sermon out of the Hebrew Scriptures that is close to his heart. A central reflection of today’s theme is this: “How can living in the knowledge of our inevitable death enhance the meaning of our present moment?”


Nicholas D’Agosto (he/him) is a professional actor and UU seminarian at Meadville Lombard Theological School. His podcast God & Other Delicacies begins with the question, “How and when were you introduced to the idea of God in your life?” and follows the guest’s journey from there. 
A long-time LA resident who was born in Omaha, Nebraska, Nicholas lives in North Hollywood with his wife, son, and dog.




July 21 2024, “My Spiritual Journey” Steffi Prather
Last summer, Rev. Hoyt-McDaniels held a sermon-writing class for anyone who wished to write a sermon. Steffi Prather, a long-time member of UUCSC, took that class and crafted her own sermon. In Steffi’s words, “My theme will be my spiritual journey. The church. My deepening beliefs.  My experience of aging.  Being committed to what matters in the second half of life. What other religions can teach us and how we can be open to include what Judaism and Christianity can teach us to grow in tolerance and wisdom. I will tell a few of my own stories, my love of our church, and the direction I wish to follow."  Come, hear Steffi’s words and wisdom, shared with us.

July 28, 2024, “Space Available” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Before the invention of perspective in art, an artist was limited in their composition to the surface plane of the wall or the canvas. With perspective, though, an artist could seem to place images deep inside the picture as well as on the foreground. The spiritual need of vacation is to open up the flat surface of our regular lives to make space within ourselves in which new creation can occur.

August 4, 2024, “A Growth Year” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
As we near the end of one church year, we begin our preparation for the next by explicitly naming our intentions. I hope that our congregation will grow this year. To sustain the level of programming we all enjoy we need the resources of a congregation more like the size we were a dozen or so years ago. Let’s make a significant step toward that goal this year.

August 11, 2024, 

August 18, 2024, “A Search Year” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Perhaps our most significant work in the church in the coming year will be our search for our new minister. We have an excellent search committee in place who have already begun their portion of the work. But just as the results of the search will affect us all, so too does the work of the search belong to us all. Let’s set intentions this morning for how all of us will participate in making a successful search.

August 25, 2024, “A Faith Year” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
This church year will be my last year before retirement. Although I’m sure I’ll still preach occasionally, I don’t plan on seeking another regular church job. So this preaching year is my last opportunity to look systematically at some of the foundational categories and concerns of faith. Today I’ll invite us all to start a year-long journey of constructing a personal faith, whether you’re considering these questions for the first time or coming to some conclusions.

September 1, 2024 

September 8, 2024, “Beloved Community” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Ingathering, Water Communion
Our identity as individuals stands in tension with our identity as members of communities. Likewise, our membership in a single community, like a church, stands in tension with our aspiration to be connected to all others. The American Philosopher Josiah Royce gave the name “Beloved Community” to this ideal community of all persons of good will. Martin Luther King later borrowed the phrase. Jesus might have called it, “The Kingdom of God.”

September 15, 2024, “Free and Responsible” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Our spiritual development encourages us to become more fully who we are, and to work to remove barriers so that others may fully express their true selves as well. But without limits, a radically free individual can damage a shared community. The responsible individual voluntarily curtails their freedom, creating the defined self who may actually be the true self the healthy spirit seeks.

September 22, 2024, “Enough” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
My elevator speech for Unitarian Universalism is that “UUs believe that human beings are good enough, smart enough, and strong enough to create lives of health and joy for ourselves, for each other, and for the world we share.” It is my faith that while we aren’t everything, we are enough.

September 29, 2024 

October 6, 2024, “Sin and Forgiveness” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
High Holy Days
The language of sin is foreign to the positive and encouraging faith of Unitarian Universalism. But the High Holy Days remind us that we all stray occasionally from the ideal selves we can imagine and hope to be. Denying our transgressions would be only yet one more transgression against the ideal. Instead, the healthy spiritual path is to recognize where we and others fall short, and, admitting our imperfection, ask for and offer forgiveness.

October 13, 2024, “Past and Future” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Founder’s Day
As we mark our congregation’s 81st year and the beginning of our 82nd, I wonder what we owe the past? With a present full of excitement and action, and a future open to whatever our vision calls us to be, is the past simply over, or do our founders and members from decades ago still have a claim on us? Perhaps the answer appears when we consider how we hope the future church will speak of us when we are “past” ourselves?

October 20, 2024 

October 27, 2024, “To Be… Continued” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Halloween
Whether this mortal life is all there is of us or if our personal experience continues in some fashion after our physical death is one of the central mysteries of existence. The play of Halloween and the celebration of Dia de Los Muertos, release our anxiety about the mystery of death but don’t resolve it. Neither do the certainties of the religious answers satisfy. And so we live, and in choosing how we live, imply our answer.

November 3, 2024, “For Better or Worse” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Election Day
Without exaggeration, this Tuesday’s election may be the most significant any of us will ever participate in. The consequences come next year will be great. But it’s also true that whichever way the results come out, we will remain a nation divided with our democracy in peril. Whichever man takes the oath of office on January 20, our task will be the same: to remember we are citizens of the United States.

November 10, 2024, “Some Gave All” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Veteran’s Day
Spiritual health asks us to put aside self-interest for the good of others. That others are persons of worth as much as we are is a principle of our faith. Self-sacrifice, though, can sometimes ask us to value the lives of others more than we value ourselves, or put abstractions like honor or nation above actual human lives. Our Veteran’s deserve more than thanks, they deserve a careful calibration of the mark where virtue turns to tragedy.

November 17, 2024 

November 24, 2024, “Enough is as Good as a Feast” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Thanksgiving
The earth’s abundance is the glory of Autumn. Materialism advertises its delights, tempting us with more, more, more, but never satisfying our desire. Spiritual health recognizes not only the limits of the planet to give, but our own limits to receive with equanimity.

December 1, 2024, “Compassion” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
World AIDS Day, Bodhi Day
Buddhism’s First Noble Truth declares the truth of suffering. Buddha’s enlightenment revealed an eight-fold path that we can follow to end our suffering, our own suffering, that is, but not the suffering of others. Everyone must do the work for themselves. And so, as suffering persists, for others and ourselves as well, we are called to compassion.

December 8, 2024 

December 15, 2024, “Joy to the World” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Winter Solstice
Merry. Happy. Glad tidings. Comfort and joy. The words of the season, speak to the aspect of the spiritual life that should be filled with fun and pleasure. As the darkness turns to light with the solstice, may our spirits also turn to that which should be the goal of life in every season: joy.

December 22, 2024, “The Christmas Story” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Christmas
Of course it’s just a story: no star, no manger, no trip to Bethlehem, no angel. But the magic and meaning isn’t lost by calling it what it is: a story. Rather, the story communicates something the truth never could. Christmas isn’t less because it’s a story; if it weren’t a good story, it wouldn’t be Christmas.

December 24, 2024 Christmas Eve Service, 5pm  Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels

December 29, 2024, “Faithfully Flexible” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Hanukkah
The history of Hanukkah tells of people so committed to their faith that they went to battle rather than bend. Their choice is inspiring. But often we do choose to let go of cherished commitments. And sometimes letting go is the better, and even the more religiously principled, choice.

January 5, 2024, “Who Am I, Really?” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Epiphany
It’s easier toward the end of life to see that what we call the self is widely changeable. I’m not the person I was as a child, or teen, or young adult. My self becomes more stable as I age, but perhaps I’ve just given up exploring and experimenting out of laziness, or accepted a version of myself grown comfortable by habit. How, if I found him, would I recognize the me I was born to be?

January 12, 2025 

January 19, 2025, “The Ability to Achieve Purpose” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
MLK’s Birthday
The power to direct our lives and achieve our goals is essential to spiritual health. Where can we find our power? The life and work of Martin Luther King provide three answers. Natural gifts give power when matched to appropriate work. Faith gives power when we align our lives with divine aims. Righteous causes give power when inspiring dreams call us to action.

January 26, 2025, “Courage, Friends” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Courage, or fortitude, is one of the four cardinal virtues. Allied with wisdom (or prudence), temperance (or restraint) and justice (or righteousness), the ability to endure hardship without faltering and to move toward the good and best without fear encompasses all the other qualities that define the highest path of living.

February 2, 2025, “An Optimistic Faith” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Candlemas and offering blessing for the coming year

February 9, 2025, 

February 16, 2025, “Flawed Leaders for Flawed People” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
President’s Day. Our responsibility to hold our leader’s accountable.

February 23, 2025, <Auction Sermon> Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Stewardship Sunday.

March 2, 2025 

March 9, 2025, “Starting with Me” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Ash Wednesday, Lent. The work of faith begins with honest self-examination.

March 16, 2025, “Keeping it Real” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
A reality-based religion.

March 23, 2025 

March 30, 2025, “For the Beauty” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Spring equinox. Beauty as goal of life, the thing that we are living for

April 6, 2025, 

April 13, 2025, “Let Me Flower, Help Me Flower” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Passover, liberation

April 20, 2025, “Something Always, Always Sings” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Easter,

April 27, 2025 

May 4, 2025 

May 11, 2025, “Continuous Creation” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Mother’s Day

May 18, 2025,  Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Loyalty

May 25, 2025, Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Memorial Day

June 1, 2025, Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
REE Sunday

June 8, 2025, Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Music and Tech Sunday 

June 15, 2025,

June 22, 2025, Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels
Volunteer Recognition, Flower Communion

June 29, 2025, “The Last Word” Rev. Rick Hoyt-McDaniels