Christ Life Church invites the public to attend its spring ladies event “Faith, Love and Waffles.” It will be fun, sweet and memorable when it happens at 10 a.m. Saturday, April 18, at Christ Life Church, 1137 E. Warner Rd., Tempe. Tickets are $3. For more information, call (480) 777-9803.
First Baptist Church of Sun Lakes
A Church of Joy Committed to the perfect Word of God, living under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, and worshiping with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.
Dr. Marc Drake, Senior Pastor 9535 E. Riggs Road Sun Lakes, Arizona 85248 480-895-1088 www. csl.org
Sundays: Bible Study: 8:30 am Worship: 10:00 am
VUU Celebrates 50 Years!
Sunday, April 12
10:30 a.m. service includes:
• Special song commissioned to honor past, celebrate future
• Senior Minister Rev. Andy Burnette on “50 Years: Just the Beginning”
• With special guest Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) President Rev. Peter Morales
• Followed by lunch, entertainment, kids’ activities
Temple Havurat Emet to hold Second Seder at Chompie’s
On Saturday, April 4, the community is invited to the Second Seder, at Chompie’s, 3481 W. Frye Rd., Chandler. It will begin at 5:30 p.m., followed by a service led by Mel Moss and the Seder Meal at 6:30 p.m. The Second Seder is $40 per person. The menu will include gefilte fish with beet horseradish, chicken soup with matzo ball, tender braised brisket of beef with pan gravy, roasted potatoes with caramelized onions, glazed carrots and holiday cake. The meal will be served family style. The usual glass of wine, three extra bottles will be provided, as well as Matza plate and Charoset will be available.
Attendees with dietary concerns should inform Temple Havurat Emet so the necessary arrangements can be made for the meal.
The title for Haggadah is “A Family Haggadah” edition II by Shoshana Silberman. Let Temple Havurat Emet know if copies need to be borrowed.
Service to be held April 17
Since the first Friday of the month falls on the first Seder of Passover, Temple Havurat Emet will not have services. The April service will be moved to 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 17, at the Lecky Center of the Robson Library, 9330 E. Riggs Rd., Sun Lakes.
The special service will celebrate the B’nai Mitzvah of the 2015 adult class. Three very special women have been studying for their Bat Mitzvah for quite some time and are going to make this happen at this ideal time and place.
Hear the VUU Adult Choir perform the premiere of “Song of the River,” written by Jason Shelton, with words by Kendyl Gibbons
The Chalice Singers, VUU’s children’s choir, will also sing the Miley Cyrus song “The Climb”
Join us for a celebratory lunch immediately following the service, with musical entertainment, kids’ activities and more.
ALL ARE WELCOME!
Former, current and prospective members are encouraged to attend
Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation provides a welcoming diverse community that nurtures each person’s life-long spiritual journey, creates a place of peace and celebration and strives for social justice and sustainable living. Within this liberal religion, VUU members seek to create lives of integrity, service and joy. VUU holds Sunday services at 10:30 a.m. For information, call 480-899-4249; check out the Facebook page at Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation, Chandler AZ; or visit www.vuu.org.
6400 W Del Rio, Chandler, AZ 85226 | (480) 899-4249
Rev. Andy Burnette Senior Minister
Rev. Peter Morales UUA President
VUU congregation celebrates 50 years in the community
Water has been an important theme for the Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation (VUU) since the first church building was acquired in 1965 on South River Drive in Tempe, to the current sprawling campus on Del Rio in Chandler.
The 50th anniversary of VUU will be celebrated on Sunday, April 12, with a special piece of music commissioned for the occasion called “Song of the River.” Jason Shelton wrote the music with words by Kendyl Gibbons, and the VUU adult choir will premiere it during the 10:30 a.m. service.
“We talked about using desert imagery, but also about how important water is in a desert and how the water theme has followed us over the years,” Minister of Music the Rev. Kellie Walker said about the collaboration with the songwriters. “Although we wanted to honor our past, we also wanted the piece to be looking forward to the next 50 years.”
Walker said the “river” motif is present in various repeated phases of the song, which includes “river of healing,” “river of kinship,” “river of freedom,” “river of justice” and more.
The anniversary service will include The Chalice Singers, VUU’s children choir singing the Miley Cyrus song “The Climb.”
“It’s a song they love, and it’s rather appropriate for the occasion, talking about how the journey is more important than the destination,” Walker explained.
The 50th year service will be led by Senior Minister the Rev Andy Burnette, who began with VUU in August 2012.
Entitled “50 Years: Just the Beginning,” Burnette said on April 12, he will shift his focus to be on the future of VUU, which he said “is bright for this amazing congregation.”
“I believe Unitarian Universalism is the religion for today and is poised to be the religion by tomorrow. The fact
that we focus less on belief about the supernatural and more on the ways we live in the world helps us offer a religious home to people with a wide swath of personal beliefs.”
The golden celebration will be marked by gold and blue balloons and will also feature Unitarian Universalist Association President the Rev. Peter Morales as the guest speaker, with his portion called “Fail Often.”
“The key to thriving in the next 50 years is failure,” Morales said. “We must learn to fail often, fail together and fail strategically.”
The service will be followed by a celebratory lunch with musical entertainment, kids’ activities and more.
Since his formal installation Nov. 11, 2012, Burnette said he has been pleased to lead this vibrant group of UU members.
“I am proud to serve with a
Temple Emanuel’s Community Seder set for April 4
Passover is traditionally celebrated with a Seder at home. The celebration tells the story of the Exodus, how Moses led the Jewish people out of slavery in Egypt, in a ritual with a festive dinner as its centerpiece.
For those who are not able to attend a
Seder on the first night of Passover, which began at sundown on Friday, April 3, or for whom one Seder is not enough, Temple Emanuel is offering a Community Seder on the second night of Passover, at 6 p.m. Saturday, April 4. Rabbi Dean Shapiro and Cantorial
congregation of people who works hard to create a world where love is the law, and justice is the norm. Our worship services are full of passionate, talented people.”
Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation provides a welcoming diverse community that nurtures each person’s life-long spiritual journey, creates a place of peace and celebration and strives for social justice and sustainable living. Within this liberal religion, VUU members seek to create lives of integrity, service and joy.
VUU holds Sunday services at 10:30 a.m. For information, call (480) 8994249; check its Facebook page at Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation, Chandler AZ; or visit www.vuu.org.
Soloist Emily Kaye will lead the Community Seder, at the Temple, 5801 S. Rural Rd., Tempe. Dinner will be catered by Chompie’s.
Cost is $40 for adults and $20 for children. There are only 130 seats available for the expected sell out event.
RSVP early to ensure there will be a seat by calling (480) 838-1414 or by emailing eve@emanueloftempe.org.
For more information, visit www. emanueloftempe.org.
Sun Lakes Jewish Congregation ready to meet
At 7:30 p.m., the Sun Lakes Jewish Congregation, an established reform congregation, meets on the second Friday of the month, at the Sun Lakes Chapel. Meet new people during the service, while connecting with Judaism and learning about the faith. New attendees also connect with the congregation. The new attendees are also invited to be introduced at the service.
Oneg Shabbats will be available to new members to ask questions and learn more about the congregation immediately after the service at the Sun Lakes Country Club.
The annual Passover Seder, which will be conducted by Rabbi Irwin Wiener, will be held on Saturday, April 4, by SLIC at the Sun Lakes Country Club. The Seder provides an opportunity to share Passover with friends and family without having to cook.
It is $40 per adult; $12 per child 4 to 12 years old and free for children 3 and younger.
Food will be catered by Heidi’s Events and Catering. Everyone is welcome.
Passover, which is also referred to as the Spring Festival, coincides with the start of the Israeli harvest season, celebrating spring and rebirth. Passover festivities are meant to evoke empathy for past suffering and encourage observers to strengthen Jewish culture and community.
Passover is observed on the 15th of Nissan on the Jewish lunar calendar, which
usually occurs in April on the Gregorian calendar. The holiday stems from the religious story of the 10 plagues, in which God forced the Egyptian pharaoh to release the enslaved Jews by causing a series of catastrophic events. For the final plague, God took the lives of the firstborn child in every family, including the Pharaoh’s son. However, the Angel of Death “passed over” the homes of the Jews, sparing their children from the deadly plague.
The holiday starts with a dinner ceremony, known as a Seder, and lasts eight days in Israel and seven days worldwide. Observers abstain from work at the beginning and end of Passover and temporarily remove all leavened bread from their diets, replacing it with unleavened bread known as matzo. This important tradition honors the exiled Jews, who fled their homes so hastily that they could not allow their bread to rise properly.
The Joint Yom HaShoah Service will be held at the Sun Lakes Chapel at 3 p.m. Sunday, April 19. It is marked on the 27th day in the month of Nisan, a week after the end of the Passover holiday. It also marks the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising.
Jews in North America observe Yom Hashoah within the synagogue as well as in the broader Jewish community.
Commemorations range from
synagogue services to communal vigils and education programs. Many Yom Hashoah programs feature a talk by a Holocaust survivor, recitation of appropriate songs and readings, or viewing of a Holocaust themed film.
Some communities choose to emphasize the depth of loss that Jews experienced in the Holocaust by reading the names of Holocaust victims one after another— dramatizing the unfathomable notion of 6 million deaths. Many Jewish schools also hold Holocaust-related educational programs on or near Yom Hashoah.
In 1979, the president’s commission on the Holocaust, established by President Jimmy Carter, commemorated Holocaust
Remembrance Day in the U.S. capital with an unprecedented ceremony attended by the president, vice president and many members of Congress. Since 1979, civic ceremonies have been held in Washington, D.C., and in individual states and cities.
The 20th anniversary Concert for the Interfaith Music Festival was held March 8. This concert was an opportunity to support Neighbors Who Care. The director of this event was Lana Oyer, who is also the director of the SLJC Choir. The Sun Lakes Jewish Congregation Choir and the Sun Lakes Interfaith Choir, with Soloists Cantor Ronda Polesky and Holly Pyle performed. The event was hosted by The Sun Lakes United Methodist Church.
The Sun Lakes Jewish Congregation Choir and the Sun Lakes Interfaith Choir, with Soloists Cantor Ronda Polesky and Holly Pyle, performed during the 20th anniversary Concert for the Interfaith Music Festival. Submitted photo
SPIRITUAL CONNECTIONS
Call ahead to confirm information, as details occasionally change after print. If you have a recurring monthly support group or meeting you would like listed in Spiritual Connections, email complete details to News@SanTanSun.com.
Bible Study
Meets twice a month
Members of the Women’s Life Group study the Bible and discuss how the lessons can relate to their lives.
Sun Lakes United Church Of Christ, Chandler
Info: Jan Olson at (480) 802-7457 or Joy King (480) 588-1882
Career Connectors
9 a.m. to noon Tuesdays
Nonprofit organization connecting professionals in career transition to high-quality resources and hiring companies; each event includes professional career speakers with presentations on relevant job search topics, three to four hiring companies, networking, resume help, career coaches, LinkedIn coaches and business portraits.
Central Christian Church, Gilbert Campus/Student Center, 965 E. Germann Rd., Gilbert Info: www.careerconnectors.org, (480) 442-5806
Christian Business Networking, Tri-City Chapter—Chandler, Tempe, Mesa 7:15 a.m. Tuesdays
Offers members the opportunity to
share ideas, contacts and business referrals.
Crackers and Co. Café 535 W. Iron Ave., Mesa Info: Maia, (480) 425-0624, www.christianbusinessnetworking.com
Christian Business Networking, Chandler Bi-Monthly Chapter 7:30 a.m. second and fourth Tuesdays each month
Offers members the opportunity to share ideas, contacts and business referrals.
Chandler Christian Church, Room C100 1825 S. Alma School Rd., Chandler Info: Maia, (480) 425-0624, www. christianbusinessnetworking.com
Christian Business Networking, East Valley Chapter 7:30 a.m. Wednesdays
Offers members the opportunity to share ideas, contacts and business referrals.
Mission Church Seminar Room 4450 E. Elliot Rd., Gilbert Info: Maia, (480) 425-0624, www. christianbusinessnetworking.com
Celebrate Recovery Men’s Step Study 5:30 p.m. Sundays
Chandler United Methodist Church
8:30 a.m. and 10:00 a.m.
SUNDAY SCHOOL For Children, Youth & Teens
8:40 a.m. and 10:10 a.m.
Adult Class 9:45 a.m.
Gender-specific accountability groups that meet for 28 weeks and use the eight recovery principles.
CrossRoads Nazarene Church 2950 W. Ray Rd., Chandler Info: (480) 722-0700 or celebraterecovery@crnaz.com
East Valley JCC Parent & Child Playgroup
9:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Fridays Playgroup for parents with children ages 12 months to 2 1/2 years old.
East Valley JCC
908 N. Alma School Rd., Chandler Info: Emily Malin, (480) 897-0588, maline@evjcc.org
East Valley Jewish Couples Club Offers once-a-month social activities such as dining, movies and plays for Jewish couples in the 45- to 65-year-old age range.
Info: Melissa, (480) 785-0744, beadlover@cox.net
Forever Marriage Ministries Marriage Restoration Support Group for Wives Offers hope to the hurting Valley-wide through one-on-one Biblical marriage teaching, God-honoring wife discipleship and marriage restoration mentoring to wives seeking God’s will in the restoration of marriage.
Info: Lisa (602) 377-8847, Marriage@lisacmyers.com, www. forevermarriageministries.com, www. facebook.com/forevermarriages.
WebXtra: For a complete list of Spiritual Connections, SanTan Sun area monthly support groups, study groups and spiritually stimulating meetings, visit SanTanSun.com and click on “Spirituality.”
Spiritual Reflections
Share your spiritual reflections...
The spiritual leaders of SanTan Sun area churches, temples, mosques and other religious and spiritual gathering places are invited to contribute their Spiritual Reflections in essay format by sending their thoughts, enlightening insights and other writings of a spiritual nature to News@SanTanSun.com.
Be certain to put “Spiritual Reflections submission” in the subject line, and keep your articles around 200-300 words, or they may be edited for length. Include your first and last name, title and facility name, address, phone number and website.
Spiritual Reflections are printed on a space-available basis, and submission does not guarantee print. The opinions represented in this column are those of the author and not that of the SanTan Sun News.
