“Visioning:” or “Some of this will sound familiar”

At present, a handful of people are working above their normal duties towards two different but
complementary goals. The first being the invigoration of the lower, or basement floor of
Parish Hall. The second being the use of our property, buildings, and perhaps a re-examined
marketing structure to better express/advertise who we are, and what we are about.
In regard to revitalizing the Parish Hall basement…we are exploring the possibility of
making the lower men’s bathroom and back doorway both handicap accessible and more
attractive. A group called Beehive, coordinated largely by Jeanne C, has been commissioned to
work on this. This is both in the works, and pretty exciting. Well, at least as exciting as what a
new-er bathroom can be.

Revitalizing the downstairs men’s bathroom into a handicapped accessible one, that doesn’t look
like it is a preserved set piece from a 1950’s movie is only part of a slightly larger, but
manageable vision of cleaning up Parish Hall’s lower classrooms. Although the vision of exactly
what a more attractive, functional, and handicapped accessible lower Parish Hall could become
remains unclear, one possible idea has been to dedicate a room to become a creative
“makers/space,” and see if we couldn’t invite people, both inside and outsiders for some regular,
or even more spontaneous creative arts. In short, although Sai Baba’s need for 5 classrooms each
Sunday, provides some cautions and concerns, creating a room dedicated to crafting has come to
be a real goal.

However, if revitalizing our Parish Hall basement is of any interest to you, keep your eyes peeled
for an upcoming basement workday. It looks like that is coming. The likes of myself, Kathleen,
Jeanne, and really anyone on the board, are open to your ideas of what might be possible.
In terms of better utilizing our location and property, the possibility of a new large highly visible
church sign, or “wayside pulpit” is also brewing. We all agreed that signs and images that would
be clearly seen by traffic traveling in both directions on Church Street should be a priority. If
that idea comes to fruition, there will over the next year be one far larger permanent church sign
installed and accompanying that some version of evolving high-quality provocative signs that
better express to all who pass by, who we are and what we believe. Those will likely accompany
always evolving images inside the sanctuary, like the red and framed list of new UU values, and
our movable history posters.

So, with the understanding that too few people know what our church stands for, and/or ever
enter it, we are taking steps to, step out. We welcome others to join us.