Our Mission… To inspire love, to seek justice, and to grow in community.

This year’s Stewardship campaign theme song “Glorious” says,

“It’s so amazing, what we’re all creating. It’s like a symphony, just keep listening, and pretty soon you’ll start to figure out your part. Everyone plays a piece in their own melodies, in each one of us, oh, oh, oh, it’s glorious!”

These words and the definition of “stewardship”—“managing something with care and responsibility”—remind us of what our pledge campaign is all about. This Church, our Church, is created by us and for us, and each one of us has a part to play in protecting and maintaining its well-being. Our Church changes lives; it is our responsibility to make sure our Church has the resources it needs to accomplish this sacred task. We must all value and support our Church and the gifts it gives us; we must commit ourselves to keeping it “glorious!”.

This is not an easy task at the best of times, and these are not necessarily the best of times. Obviously, we support our Church and its activities through attendance at services, through volunteer work, through serving on committees and taking on leadership roles, through participating in workshops and discussions, through helping those in the congregation and the greater community who need us, etc., etc., etc. All this is wonderful, “glorious,” in fact! But all this is not enough. Our Church is entirely self-funded. We need each other’s generous financial commitment to keep our doors open, to function
effectively, to fight for social and environmental justice, to give a voice and a sanctuary to marginalized and vulnerable groups, to pay our deserving staff–who take care of our Church with grace and generosity of spirit–a fair wage. In addition to all of this, we need to be able to keep the lights on and to buy toilet paper!

So, if we want to be good Church “stewards,” we need to pledge ourselves to manage our Church with “care and responsibility.” To do this, we need to meet this year’s pledge goal of $309,674, an increase of 14% over last year. The proposed budget will allow us to satisfy a very important need, to employ a full-time minister for the next three-year period, and to provide modest increases to our staff salaries. If we exceed our projected goal, the additional funds will go towards augmenting our staff salaries to recognize their hard work and to bring our salaries closer to the UUA fair compensation guidelines.

We’re asking a lot of you. No, that’s not accurate. Our Church is asking a lot of us, and since we are our Church, we’re asking a lot of ourselves. We’re asking ourselves to dig deeper, to stretch our resources, to pledge generously because when we do, “it’s like a symphony”! We each “play a piece in our own melodies, and in each one of us, oh, oh, oh, it’s glorious!”

Your Stewardship Team:
Sandy Eaglen, Kate Garner, Kat Holtz, and Randy Ruchotzke

Dear Members and Friends of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Kent,

Welcome to the 2025 Stewardship (or Generosity) season: a glorious invitation to live our values! Last summer, Unitarian Universalists confirmed GENEROSITY as one of the core values of our faith, with LOVE AT THE CENTER of everything we are and do.

Generosity is love-in-action. It’s what leads us to use our powers to help another person in distress. It’s what helps us commit to hours of work for a cause we care about. And it’s that heart-expanding feeling we get when we “give until it feels good” to an organization we love. When you make a pledge of any amount at the UU Church of Kent, you give us a glorious gift that keeps on giving: you allow us to plan and budget, with a good idea of the resources we’ll be working with in the coming year, in order to take care of our beautiful, historic church, and meet our glorious dreams for the future!

We know we need progressive religious voices now more than ever. Our nation needs organizations that will speak truth to power; advocate for justice & equity; and most of all, build Beloved Community. At UUCK, we are doing these things every day, and there’s so much more– we can’t even name all the ways that UUCK lives our mission. With your help, the year ahead will be a glorious new season of growth, blossoming, and renewal.

I hope you’ll put love into action this year by making a pledge, in whatever amount you are able, to the Unitarian Universalist Church of Kent! And I hope you know how grateful we are for your support, your generosity, and your love.

Blessings, Rev. Kristina

Dear UUCK Community,

Your Board is happy to join in this glorious work of planning for our Church’s future. Especially amid the cacophony of voices that stress competition, greed, intolerance, and self-indulgence, raising our own voices in love and mercy can be a powerful descant and source of strength. As environmentalist Winona LaDuke has said in the face of adversity, “What we all need to do is find the wellspring that keeps us going, that gives us the strength and patience to keep up this struggle for a long time.” We can help each other in finding–and being–that wellspring.

Our goals this year are ambitious, but we are ready to sustain glorious work together. “Let us be the ancestors our descendants will thank,” Winona LaDuke has urged. Your Board is proud to work with all of you in contributing our resources and time to the future generations of UUCK.

Ginny Horvath, Board Moderator
and the 2024-25 UUCK Board of Trustees

Kay Eckman, Kara Kramer, Claudia Miller,
Randy Ruchotzke, Susanna Smart, and David Weaver

“Here is my one-sentence thought about our glorious church. (I could write volumes!) Our Church is glorious because it is a place where I can be my authentic self and be accepted for it.”

– from Bonnie Harper

“It’s glorious that I feel free to express my chosen spirituality without judgment or condemnation. Our glorious historic church building and our shiny expansive social hall make my heart sing.”

“Our family is grateful for the opportunity to be members of a collaborative team working on the shared goals of our Church mission.”

“A safe and sacred space where I can share joy during the best of times and find comfort during the worst.”

“I found this place a month after my 40th birthday. My life is now divided into pre-UUCK and since. It’s my soul home and where I met dear friends who I cannot imagine life without. I found my spirit voice as a Worship Associate, and it is an on-going joy to serve my beloved community.”

– from Elaine Bowen

“When I want to stoke the embers of my heart, I connect with the glorious fire of our UU community. UU Kent has been there for our family through thick and thin.”

“I have made a conscious effort not to dwell on life’s worries, but to embrace life’s gloriousness. This Church gives me a vehicle to express my appreciation for life’s glories and to spread the word.”

– from Kirt Beiling

“When I start to feel too angry or too sad or too focused on petty grievances (both given or received) or like I’m being crushed under the weight of life’s challenges and responsibilities–just too small–I come to Church. I usually walk out feeling a bit more “sane” and a lot more loved. This is where I come to find peace and hope in a chaotic world.”

“A glowing kernel of authenticity lives here, one I’ve found in no other church.”

– from Carolyn Schlemmer

“It’s hard to consider a word such as ‘glorious’ when it feels like you’re living in a dystopian nightmare, but that is exactly why we need this word right now. Our Church holds love, glorious love, at its core. It is the basis for all of our actions. Our glorious differences make us stronger and better and should be celebrated! We offer the glorious vision of a world where we take care of each other and our planet. We feel glorious when we share that message. I offer my financial gifts to support our Congregation as we continue to counter hatred with Glorious Love.”

“UUCK has given us a real sense of community. We have participated in other UU churches in the past, and UUCK felt especially welcoming when we started attending more than a year ago. We appreciate the wonderful music, the thoughtful services, the friendly atmosphere, and the group activities. The connections we have made with other newcomers as well as longtime members have helped us feel part of the community.”

– from Debbie and Merle Johnson

UU Congregations don’t tell you how much to give, but we do find that our members and friends appreciate a guide to giving.

Because our congregation depends heavily on our staff to help provide a caring and inclusive community, and we are fully member-supported, giving levels are in a different category than, say, NPR or the Sierra Club. It is not unusual for a household’s annual pledge to be equal to the sum of all other charitable giving.
Because we all have different resources and responsibilities, we ask you to consider income, wealth, and comfort when determining how much to pledge.

You might start by asking yourselves the following questions about your income:

• Is your income steady?
• Are you and your family homeowners or landowners?
• Have you had ease accessing and affording health care or health insurance for yourself and your family members?
• Do you have no/minimal debt such as student loans, credit card debt,
  and medical bills?
• Do you have discretionary income for entertainment, eating out, and/or travel?

Were the majority of your answers yes?

• Consider pledging 5-10% of your net income.

Did you answer some yes and some no?

• Consider pledging 2-4% of your net income.

If a pledge does not fit your financial situation, you can make a one-time donation, or you can contact Rev. Kristina for other options. Your pledge and any financial donations are personal and confidential and will not impact your relationship with the congregation.

Although we keep confidential how much each individual or household pledges, we are transparent about trends in giving.  This is a broad brush view of our giving levels with the following information:

• Percentage of the total “Pledged Income” for each group
• Range of Annual Gift amounts for each group
• Number of households in each group