Although the Community Cupboard Food Pantry, which is located in the church, is economically independent and completely secular, it is warmly supported in its mission by the church. The Food Pantry is staffed by a coalition of volunteers from the church and from the community. For many people in the church, it represents a concrete way of translating our Unitarian Universalist commitment to service into direct action in the community.

The Community Cupboard Food Pantry collects donations of new school supplies at the start of every school year to distribute to families with children who use the food pantry. Parents and grandparents struggling to put enough food on the table often find it difficult or even impossible to buy some new school supplies for their children. If you can contribute some new supplies, we are very grateful. All new supplies are welcome, including: notebooks, pens, pencils, markers, crayons, backpacks, rulers, folders, packs of paper, calculators, erasers. If you wish to contribute, please bring your donation to the church (on Sunday morning you can leave it in the marked box on the stage in Benker Hall, the meeting room of the church). If you come at another time and no one is at the church, please inquire at Osgood House, the yellow house across the street at 141 High Street. If no one is there, you can leave your donation on the back steps of Osgood House clearly marked and we will get it. Donations are being accepted until the end of September. Thank you.

On the Tuesday before Thanksgiving each year, members of the church and people from the community come together to prepare Thanksgiving baskets for people who come to the Community Cupboard Food Pantry located in the church as well as for others in need in the community. As a way of learning first-hand about service to others, children in the church’s Religious Education Program play an active role in helping to prepare these baskets, although only adults are present for the actual distribution of the food.

More information on the Community Cupboard Food Pantry for prospective clients, donors and volunteers is available here.

Our two principle focuses are on immigration action and eco/social justice. Our Task Force on Immigration was a time-limited group which finished operations in May, 2010, operating under the aegis of the Social Action-Eco Committee. We are guided by a spiritual commitment to welcome the stranger and to treat all people with respect. Our goals are to deepen awareness of immigrant rights issues among our congregation and community and to take up activities that support immigrants and ongoing immigrant rights struggles. We meet every six weeks or so to share news and coordinate our tasks. Our perspective joins national, statewide and local issues.

Projects included:

• Participating in the local Metro North interfaith cluster of the Malden-based Refugee Immigration Ministry (http://www.r-i-m.net) that provides material and social support to refugees and asylum-seekers (and their families) in the Malden-Melrose-Medford area;
• Working actively to form a Greater Boston chapter of the New Sanctuary Movement (NSM), a national faith-based and interfaith movement that supports immigrant rights and that champions just, humane and comprehensive immigration reform in 2010 (http://www.sanctuarymovement.org);
• Popularizing the local English at Large program of one-on-one tutoring to recent immigrants;
• Supporting the work of Somerville-based Centro Presente and other Boston-based organizations working with immigrant populations;
• Offering services focussed around immigration to our and other UU congregations;
• Maintaining a bulletin board on immigration issues in the church’s Benker Hall.

Anyone who is interested in working with with Social Action-Eco Committee, please contact Hank Driscoll at hank.driscoll@comcast.net or Michael Glenn at michaelglenn01@comcast.net.

This report is meant to give interested UUCM congregants an update on the current struggle for immigrant rights and a description of what members of the UUCM are doing around it.

1. The current situation. The struggle in the U.S. over immigrant rights and immigration reform continues sharply, as everyone who reads a daily paper knows. Congress has not passed any immigration reform law, except one that increases border security. This summer, the state of Arizona passed a series of punitive laws aimed at addressing what it felt was a problem of undocumented immigrants; but the laws were challenged in court by the Obama administration and many of them are now on hold. Activists both pro and con have swarmed to Arizona to protest and rally, and some Republicans are now calling for a change in the 14th Amendment, which grants U.S. citizenship to anyone born in this country. At the same time, anti-immigrant furor has joined anti-terrorist anti-Muslim hysteria, and a nation-wide storm has broken out around the building of a community center and mosque only two blocks from Ground Zero in New York. Battles around immigration continue to be on the cutting edge of social justice and human rights concern—not just in the U.S., but around the world.

The Obama administration is deporting more undocumented immigrants per month than the Bush administration did. Hundreds of thousands of immigrants are detained each year in ICE prisons. Families are still being ripped apart. Workers are still being intimidated. Rather than focusing on workplace raids, the Obama administration has concentrated on informing employers that their workers are not documented: the employers then fire their workers. Immigrant communities are increasingly frightened and uneasy, as the environment around them continues to become more and more polarized.

In Massachusetts, two years after our Task Force on Immigration took up the state-wide “Welcoming Massachusetts Campaign” to make our state more welcoming for immigrants, anti-immigrant sentiment is at a new high. Anti-immigrant bills like the ones passed in Arizona were introduced in the state legislature this spring: some passed and the worst were barely defeated.

2. What the UUA and our church members have done about it. The UUA, led by President Peter Morales and coordinated through the “Immigration News” newsletter from the Office for Congregational Advocacy and Witness, has taken a leading role in the struggles for immigrant rights and immigration reform. Rev. Morales and many other UUs (both rank-and-file members and ministers) demonstrated in Arizona and have written widely about what is happening. The UUA has been active in the New Sanctuary Movement and other broader groups.

Recently, the UUA’s General Assembly designated immigration as a major focus of study for the next several years. Study plans have been drawn up and are available to any church that wants to pursue them.

Locally, our Task Force began raising issues around immigration two years ago. The Task Force has been active since August, 2008. Its work has included study programs, several Tuesday night events, films and discussions, a movie series at the Public Library, letter writing campaigns, a collection of books for immigrant prisoners, an public talk by Aviva Chomsky, and material support for both Centro Presente and Manny Exilhomme’s Haitian advocacy group, A Better Tomorrow Charity—as well as for immigrant worker struggles in Boston such as the Star Market strikers, the unpaid cleaners at Legal Seafoods, and so on.

In the fall of 2009 Task Force members helped found the Greater Boston chapter of the interfaith New Sanctuary Movement, which is now active in some ten to fifteen different churches in our area. In the past year NSM held a protest at the Suffolk County Jail where detainees were being kept, a silent vigil during the holiday season in Copley Square, and an informational picket about events in Arizona before a Red Sox – Diamondbacks baseball game. In May, NSM and Centro Presente organized a clerical press conference to support Centro Presente’s “Somos” [“We are (human beings)”] campaign, at which eight different area clergy spoke and gave their support. Rev. Hank Peirce was one of the group (!) and gave a rousing speech. Finally NSM joined the efforts of students who were maintaining a 24/7 presence outside the State House to oppose the anti-immigrant bills, by holding a prayer vigil to support their work. Just as the vigil ended, news broke the students had accomplished their goal.

Our Task Force also developed a UU worship service on immigration. We offered it in 2009 at UUCM. We presented it to the Malden church this past February. And we will be offering it at the Melrose UU church this October.

3. What we plan in the future. The Task Force on Immigration has now dissolved into the UUCM Social Action - Ecology Committee. This UUCM Committee is now working jointly with the Malden First Parish Church Social Action Committee. Why has this happened? Because the number of activists in both churches is very small, and we have joined together to continue meaningful work.

Last month, representatives from the two SAC committees will be meeting to sketch out plans for the 2010-2011 church year. In addition to maintaining a link with NSM, we will be discussing possible future programs that address what is happening in the country around immigration and other issues.

4. Resources. If you are interested in learning more about immigration issues, here are resources to consult:

Rev. Peter Morales has written about his experience in Arizona. Check it out here.

The UUA has a wonderful study guide to this entire topic, called “Welcoming Our Neighbors,” here.

UUA also has newsletters about social justice and immigration, available starting on this page.

Newell Hendricks from the Church of the Covenant in Boston has developed an eight-week plan of services and study around immigration. You can write him at Wnhen@aol.com

Mandy Neff at the First Parish Church of Cambridge has developed a Religious Education module on immigration. You can write her at: dre@fpcambridge.org

You can contact members of the Task Force now working through the UUCM Social Action - Ecology Committee. Or, even better, you can join this Committee in the fall and add your ideas and efforts to advance the work.

Thank you all for your support for our work over the past two years!

-- Michael Glenn

This report is meant to update interested UUCM congregants on the work of the Malden-based Refugee Immigration Ministry (RIM), and describe what UUCM members in RIM’s Metro North Cluster are currently doing.

1. About RIM. The Refugee Immigration Ministry provides community-based services for immigrant clients. Staff and volunteers help clients find an appropriate home and provide them with coordinated services until they can find a job and support themselves. This work provides UUCM members a chance to become involved with actual “hands-on” support work with newly arrived immigrants in our area.

RIM helps two groups of people: (1) asylum seekers, who have left home because of war, famine, or religious, political or other kinds of persecution; (2) refugees who, seeking a better life, come to this country through controlled international agencies. Asylum seekers need financial support until they obtain asylum, which may take 6-12 months. Refugees receive work authorization as soon as they arrive in the US, plus a stipend from the government; they also receive Federal support for eight months or until they find a job. Once they obtain asylum (and become asylees), asylum seekers also receive limited Federal support for up to eight months until they find a job.

During the period when these people arrive and are without viable means of support, local RIM clusters offer them social support and a helping community. This lasts until clients become self-sufficient, productive members of our community. RIM clusters bring together volunteers from different congregations in their area. The cluster’s ministry includes helping clients find a place to live; providing rental assistance and help with medical and legal referrals; and aid with education, transportation, food and acculturation to life in the United States. Most clients become self-sufficient within six and eighteen months. Our local cluster covers Medford, Malden and Melrose, and is called the Metro North Cluster.

RIM has been serving immigrants since 1986. In 2001 it became a site for work with asylum seekers for the Church World Service. In 2005 it became a Refugee Resettlement Site for Episcopal Migration Ministries. It currently administers five different clusters in Massachusetts.

RIM Programs include: community outreach; case management; training for volunteers; basic ESL; and a program for spiritual care givers who provide chaplaincy services to immigrant detainees at the Suffolk County House of Corrections.

When a church joins RIM, a few people usually serve as active cluster members, and a larger group of congregants volunteer their time as needed to aid local clients. The congregation undertakes to participate in RIM programs, such as educationals, yearly fundraisers, flower sales, and so on. And RIM staff and volunteers are available to hold programs or speak at the church.

2. What we have done at UUCM. Through the Task Force on Immigration, UUCM became involved with RIM in February, 2009. Initial efforts to work with the local Malden-Melrose cluster foundered because of a lack of resources and organization. In spite of this, our congregation participated enthusiastically in the 2009 Mothers’ Day flower sale.

Our first client, in the summer of 2009, fled his Medford apartment after a week because its close quarters reminded him of prison. In the fall of 2009 we stepped back from our commitment to RIM and reorganized our work. Four people – Lori Gardinier, Heather Gomez, Susan Jhirad and Michael Glenn – agreed to alternate attendance at the monthly RIM meetings and to regularly inform other interested church members about on-going RIM activities.

A canvas of church members created a “resource bank,” identifying people who were interested in helping RIM clients. Since that time we have had several clients:

a) V***, a young asylum-seeker from Rwanda, came to Medford in February, and was introduced to the church community with much enthusiasm. Congregants greeted her with an outpouring of interest and support. Close to 20 different church members helped V*** one way or another; and 30 to 40 people came to hear her present a Frontline documentary made about her and about the Rwandan genocide (from which she is an amazing survivor), and talk about her life, as a way of thanking the church for its support.

In May, V*** received asylum. After moving out of her initial rental, she rented the upstairs apartment of a UUCM couple for five months and is now moving into a studio apartment in Malden. She found a full-time job late in July, and is now self-sufficient financially. In addition, she will be taking an ESL course one evening a week at Bunker Hill Community College. UUCM members at the August 22nd service donated money to V*** for kitchen and bathroom supplies as a final “graduation gift,” for which she was touched and deeply grateful. Sometime in September, V*** will stop being an active RIM client, but she will remain a friend to her friends at UUCM.

b) A young Iraqi refugee couple with a small daughter, who lived in an apartment in Chelsea (near relatives of theirs) was assigned to us in March. We picked them up at the airport, shopped for them, pulled together furniture for them, drove them to appointments, and so on. No one at UUCM got to know them, however, because they quickly soured on Boston and left – after a month – for San Diego. In the process, though, we formed a friendship with their relatives in Chelsea, and began to learn more about the Iraqi exile community in Boston.

c) Another Iraqi refugee couple, S*** and A***, and their two daughters came to live in West Medford with S***’s brother, who was already in Medford and working. Several people from UUCM have now met this very gentle and charming family. A*** has begun a job; the older child has probably been accepted into a childcare program; and the family continues to adjust to life in the U.S. Through this couple, and through the Iraqi client manager at RIM, Sami, we have come to know many more Iraqi people who have recently emigrated to the Boston area.

d) Our most recent client is another young Rwandan woman asylum-seeker, C***. She has been accepted as a “client with limited support,” because she is still living with her cousin and her family in Chelsea. Over the next several weeks, we will try to introduce C*** to more members of the church.

NB: In addition to these clients, the Metro North cluster has a number of other clients who are also “our” clients. This includes a number of Eritrean people, many of them living in Chelsea; a woman asylum-seeker from Uganda; a Congolese woman in Malden; and two Iraqi men now living in Somerville.

3. RIM support. Members of the UUCM have been generous with their time and support for RIM. Many people have provided direct services to clients, donated clothing and furniture to RIM, and participated in organized fund-raisers.

In addition to providing direct client support, UUCM members of the local cluster coordinate on-going RIM support. This includes helping raise funds for RIM—most particularly, work with RIM’s fall bulb sale; its November 14th Annual Dinner, its Jazz For Peace concert in January, its Annual International Concert in March, and its May flower sale. We have also been active re: doing outreach work for RIM, meeting with people in other UU congregations in Malden, Melrose and Wakefield about expanding the work of our Metro North cluster.

4. Current challenges. Our small core of RIM representatives would happily welcome one or two more regular members. At the same time, we need to continue maintaining our broader “Resource Bank,” so that we can involve all interested UUCM members in the rewarding work of hands-on client support. It is important for all of you to know that, whatever your level of support for RIM – whether it is hosting a client for dinner, buying flowers in May and bulbs in the fall, attending a RIM event, or contributing needed furniture when we ask for it – we deeply appreciate your help.

Over the next months, we will also need to organize RIM fund-raising more efficiently.

We want to thank everyone at UUCM for their warm support for RIM over the past twelve months, and to invite any church member who is interested in becoming more active with RIM to contact one of us in the fall. We can certainly use one or two more regular members in our active core.

Thank you.

-- Michael Glenn

The purpose of the environmental arm of the UUCM Social Action – Ecology Committee is twofold.

One is to recognize the earth as a sacred ecosystem which we are spiritually compelled to honor and preserve. We recognize environmental degradation as a systemic problem which requires immediate and urgent action. Our goal is to promote education and action among ourselves and in our communities, in support of a healthier environment and a sustainable lifestyle. One example of this is our work with the Medford Climate Action Network to host a Global Warming Cafe in Medford.

Our second purpose is to assist those in our community who are in need of advocacy. One example of this is our work raising money and helping to publicize needs for the program English at Large, which matches English as a Second Language learners with adult literacy tutors.

Massachusetts Climate Action Network: MassClimateAction.net
Low Carbon Diet: MassClimateAction.net/lcl/home
English at Large program: EnglishAtLarge.org

Paul Grayson, a member of the UUCM from April of 2001 until his demise on March 12, 2006, was above all a teacher and a lover of learning. In his honor his widow, Bea Grayson, and the Board of Trustees have established the Paul Grayson Scholarship Fund.

The Fund has been established with an initial donation from Bea Grayson. Additional contributions are invited from those who wish to honor Paul. The Board has also voted to dedicate the plate collection on the second Sunday in March of every year to the Fund. The Scholarship Award in an amount up to one half of the endowment of the Fund will be made annually to one or more members of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Medford, young of age or young at heart, who plan to achieve an educational goal in the coming year.

The collection plate at the “Grayson Sunday” service on April 10 this year will be contributed to the Fund.

This year’s application deadline is April 30, 2011. The application may be downloaded from here. Grayson Scholarship guidelines are available from here. (Note: These two files are in RTF format. If upon clicking the links you do not get a “Save File” type option, you may have to perform your browser’s equivalent of right-clicking the link and choosing “Save Link Target As ...” to obtain a copy on your machine for printing out, or filling out and submitting electronically – one of the choices for the submitting an application to the Committee.)

“There is something empowering when one is supported by an entire community especially when one is passionate about a cause. In my case, the cause was to honor my late husband, Paul Grayson, upon an expressed desire to do so by Rev. Hank Peirce and the Board of Trustees of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Medford. The vehicle was the establishment of a scholarship in his name. The method was to fund the scholarships with the proceeds of the plate taken in on the second Sunday service in March, which is when Paul passed away three years ago.”

“Paul loved to learn as well as to mentor young people, and those young at heart, who wished to grow, expand horizons and try something new. This has actually happened eleven times in the past three years since the scholarship was established.”

“What is truly rewarding is what the recipients report back. Sometimes it is about the exotic places they visited; the extraordinary experiences they went through; the surprising people they met and helped and sometimes it was simply the fact that someone believed in their potential. For me, the Paul Grayson scholarship, and all it entails, is true ministry in action.”

Starting with the 2007 Christmas season, UUCM has sponsored a project where we cut back our individual expeditures on holiday gift-giving – some members by 50% or more – and contributed the amounts not spent on gifts to worthwhile organizations. The organizations are chosen each year from a list of candidates by the congregation children.

The purpose of the INYB project is to help us to gain control over our personal spending habits, contribute funds to local charities, help our children learn the value of contributing to others, and help our environment by cutting down on waste. The project helps us in regaining control of our religious lives, declaring that the holidays are Holy Days and that they belong to those who honor their spirit – not those focusing on making money off of them. A Boston Globe article on the 2009 drive can be found here.

The 2010 It’s Not Your Birthday drive raised $3159 on behalf of the UU Partner Church Student Scholarships, which funds the cost of tuition, books, uniforms and exam fees for Unitarian children in India; and Bridge Over Troubled Water, a Boston-based organization helping youth at risk.