New Year Letter from Rev. Kent Matthies

Dear UUPLAN friends,                     January 1, 2012

            Feliz Ano Nuevo and Happy New Year!  May this time of year bring you blessings of joy and peace. 

I know that I am not alone in that my soul hungers to pause to connect with the holy and sacred.  Meeting this need in many of our Unitarian Universalist congregations we celebrate Chanukah, Winter Solstice, Christmas, Kwanzaa and the New Year.  I relish the rich, diversity of holiday spirit in our faith communities.  Lighting candles, singing songs and meditating our hearts on making the world a better place are rituals of meaning and rewards.

We are citizens of Pennsylvania who care deeply about the moral issues of our time.  Considering our passion and dedication we have a big year ahead of us.

-This year we will continue to focus on creating fair practices and policies for oil drilling in our state.  We intend to continue connecting with strong justice-making partners like Penn Future, and their campaign “Don’t Drill through the heart of Pennsylvania.”  Together we will work to protect our state parks and to stop any future drilling in our state forests.  This year I encourage every Pennsylvanian to advocate for stricter regulations, with full enforcements and more robust taxation on oil drilling in PA.

-Woman’s reproductive rights are under attack around the country including in Pennsylvania. 

 -We celebrate that in November of 2011 the Jenkintown Borough passed the states 25^th local non-discrimination ordinance for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people was passed.  We will work to establish similar ordinances in approximately 12 municipalities without such protection.  This is all moving us towards a day when the state legislature will pass such laws for all PA citizens.  Fortunately there is a new House and Senate LGBT  Equality Caucus with whom we can work.

-In 2011 the occupy movement showed great enthusiasm among Pennsylvanians to organize for a fairer world.  We will work on issues including fair wages and taxes for urban, suburban and rural citizens.

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UUPLAN is developing four working groups: environmental sustainability, economic justice, civil rights for gay, lesbian, transgender and bisexual people, and immigration justice.  I invite you to join one of our working groups so that you can make a tangible impact and bring blessings of peace and joy to others.  That is the holiday spirit in which we believe and dedicate ourselves. .

In Faith,
Rev. Kent Matthies

President

UUPLAN