We are thrilled to once again be a part of the 2018 AIDS Ride Wisconsin! This year MUCC will be the first rest stop on the bike route with water, energizing snacks, and of course lots of cheers for each rider. ​There is still time to register as a rider or volunteer!  The 2018 ride is July 27-29.

​​AIDS Ride Wisconsin is a fully-supported cycling event through southern Wisconsin, raising critical funds to support the AIDS Resource Center of Wisconsin.
As a rider, your every need is taken care of by dedicated volunteers and crew: camp, medical, mechanical, on-route support, massage, chiropractic needs, and more.
Designed for all levels of riders, AIDS Ride Wisconsin - ACT Ride is perfect for people to challenge themselves, participate in a supportive and welcoming community, and raise funds to support those living with HIV/AIDS in Wisconsin.
Whether it's your first long distance ride or your thirtieth, AIDS Ride Wisconsin - ACT Ride is not to be missed!

Memorial Day began after the Civil War as an effort toward reconciliation between the families of veterans in the North and the South. After the war, there was already a tradition in the North of decorating soldiers' graves, called "Decoration Day." But in 1868 an organization of Northern war veterans decreed it ought to be a national holiday. May 30 was carefully chosen as the date because it was not the anniversary of a specific battle, and therefore would be a neutral date for both sides.

But human beings hold on to their wounds, and reconciliation takes time, grace and mercy. So initially, as the holiday spread, it was an occasion for both sides to give angry speeches about the wartime atrocities inflicted by the other side, and the righteousness of their own. However, as time went on, Memorial Day really did become a time to remember all veterans, a time to visit the graves of family and friends, and to remember their lives.

In 1968, the Uniform Holidays Bill moved three holidays off of their specific dates and onto Mondays, in order to create three-day weekends. Memorial Day came to be associated with the beginning of summer, as well as the Indianapolis 500.

Today, let us remember the spirit in which the day was conceived, as a way to bring together those who had once been bitter enemies. After the fighting is over, the loss and heartbreak are shared throughout the human family. God's mercy pours out over all God's children, with no respect for the borders of nation states, which are awfully temporary, from the perspective of eternity.

In coordination with the McFarland Food Pantry, a Giving Tree has taken root in the MUCC sanctuary filled with tags representing families in need throughout our McFarland community.​

You won't want to miss this lively service with palm branches for everyone and a play developed by children of the congregation!  CLICK HERE for a video invitation.
​

Good food, spiritual conversation and a chance to build relationships with your neighbors. Dinner church is one of the oldest expressions of church - gathering together, breaking bread, and making sense of scripture and life through conversation around the table. 

Dinner and worship begin at 6:15, and we should be done by around 8 pm. (Would you like to help with prep and setup? Email us to be connected with the ministry team, or arrive early; we create the setting together.) 

As with all McFarland UCC activities, this is cross+generational - all ages are welcome at Dinner Church.  
CLICK HERE to RSVP/share on Facebook

The annual Easter Breakfast is FREE and a great way to start the morning! 

MUCC's Easter Sunday service is a celebration with new and traditional music throughout.  Communion is open to all.  Whoever you are, wherever you are on life's journey, you are welcome here.

On Sunday, January 15 in worship we blessed individuals going to Washington DC over inauguration weekend to witness to our Gospel values, where they joined others holding forth a vision of a more just and generous world for all people.  Below is the online journal of several MUCC members who participated in the Listening & Witnessing trip: Kristin Gorton, Joan Jacobsen, and Maddie Loss.  

Want to see more pictures and stories?  Visit facebook.com/mcfarlanducc.  

And if you're curious about the ministry trip as a whole, CLICK HERE to learn more
​from the United Church of Christ.

The bus is packed and ready for the trip to D.C. with the Wisconsin Conference United Church of Christ.

#tellthestory  #bethechurch

MORNING: We arrived in the Washington DC area just after midnight yesterday.  Today dawns with a quiet morning of reflection and prayer.  This afternoon our sisters and brothers at Emmaus UCC will be hosting us for a day of sacred conversations around issues of interfaith and inter-race engagement.  An inter-religious worship service...and...of course...a community meal, will end the day.

You are invited with us in this digital sacred place to experience God's transformative love.  Blessings this day, and in the months and years ahead. You are a beloved child of God.

This morning's moment of faith included a scavenger hunt for copies of We the People posters.

MID-DAY:  An afternoon in community.  Reflecting on the faith tools we carry as followers of Jesus... tools that can transform.  Food. Community. Christ.

#loveoverfear
#Godisstillspeaking

We have spent the day talking and listening and learning.  The day ends with a shared worship with 6 different faith communities.  Praying for Peace and Understanding.

Visit facebook.com/mcfarlanducc to see more!

One of McFarland UCC’s participants in the
​‘Listening & Witnessing in Washington DC’ Mission Trip, January 19-21 2017. ​

(an edited version of her 1/8/2017 mission moment)

I’ve been coming to a United Church of Christ congregation for as long as I can remember. It’s what I know. I’ve gone through confirmation and other activities within the church. This church drew me to the General Synod in Cleveland, Ohio. This trip was where I became so enthralled with the United Church of Christ’s mission. The constant call for social justice. The daily grind to ensure that the world is a more just and loving world for all people. I was able to witness these moments of faith. The excitement when the supreme court ruled on the right for LGBTQ couples to marry, the sorrow filled moments in remembering the Charleston shooting, and the calls to action found on the plenary floor. I fell in love with the message. The message of extravagant acceptance and widespread love. Where no single person is left behind or forgotten or devalued. The message of loving all people regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, gender expression, sexual orientation, or religion.

I grew up hearing messages from the church that have shaped who I am as a person. That all were created in God’s image. That whoever you are and wherever you are on God’s journey, you are welcome. That all are blessed to be a blessing. And that ALL are welcome at God’s table. These messages. These messages pack all that this Church is about. These are all ideas that I witnessed as I was growing up that became such a constant part of my life. These are the messages that I heard in a setting that was loving and accepting. I desperately wish that all people can hear these messages for if the words are heard they can make the world a little softer and little more loving. It is a type of love that continues to lead my life today. And in these past few months I have formed my concept of the church leaving the building and heading to college.

College is complex. Because while it is believed that one pursues a degree, it is for yourself. But it is actually all about Him. You go to college to learn how to love God and His children better. Love His children regardless of their race, age, gender expression, sexual orientation, religion, or gender.

I went to college expecting that the majority of people that I met would believe the same and be aspiring to the same knowledge. That love and acceptance lived loudly. I was devastated to discover that this approach that I saw in the actions United Church of Christ and represented to myself was not widely accepted. I found myself participating in a campus ministry where other students rejected this idea just as firmly as the UCC embraces it. I felt like I had to transform my identity as a Christian to be viewed as a Christian among my peers in this group. Do I continue down the path that I belong on, a path of love and acceptance that my life has been shaped by? Or do I turn away from my prior identity to conform with this new group that I stumbled upon? Thankful for my decision to read “Let Your Life Speak” by Parker J Palmer I came across this paragraph. It was my involvement in this group that “made me feel inadequate to the tasks of living my own life, creating guilt about the distance between who I was and who I felt I was supposed to be.” And living these two lives left me exhausted and frustrated. But after I faced myself with this question the decision was an easy one. I made a choice that reflected who I had been, am, and always will be. But I was disappointed that I was even presented with this type of decision. I was hurt. Because as I moved through this process my country was moving through an election where some feel that they had not been the offered love and acceptance that they deserved.

After the election I listened to other new friends that I have met that are Jewish and Muslim. Friends that are sent flyers from Christian organizations on campus that preach about how the only way of saving the world is have everyone convert to Christianity. How this generation was going to fix the world by leading everyone to the one true savior. A belief that frightens my friends that are not Christian. My dear friend would question, trying to figure out where these actions come from. She would ask me, “But aren't you a Christian too?”. And I would respond with, “Yes, I am, but … I don’t believe that stuff. I believe all are equal, and that all can coexist, and that all are welcome in the world”. And this “but” made me even more confused. For the frustration of having to defend my own beliefs in response to other beliefs of Christians wasn’t something that I had exactly experienced before. And this reasoning wasn't enough and will never be a enough for members of the Islamic or Jewish faith. The faiths that believe in the same God, come from the same father, Abraham. And after a few weeks of school these excuses were not enough. Because I saw daily fear and knew I had to do something more. For my beliefs, the beliefs of love and acceptance have constructed who I am. And to see others so comfortable with rejecting this one core belief of my own God was brought out feelings that I cannot put into words.

After the election I witnessed the fear of females who are survivors of sexual assault. Women that attend school at a university where one in four of the undergraduates experience sexual assault. Women that live in a country where the general populace elected a man who brags of sexual assault. Terrified that the rhetoric of the election will come to normalize what they have survived. I watched as my friend moved through the process of receiving the justice for what she had gone through. The process of fighting the uphill battle and the heartbreaking realities in her life that she struggled to comprehend. And as things continued to stack up against her, she asked me if she could go to church with me. The hope that my religion of love and acceptance was prevailing over all of the voices that were shogun at her. She heard the calm beckoning of love and acceptance. Love and acceptance where even the most fragile could find solace in a vesper service on a cold, Sunday afternoon.
​
These experiences are just scratching the surface. And I am forever grateful that I followed the life that I was meant to live. I felt that I finally found my true being in these moments of tenderness and hurting and joy by striving to live through all that I was taught as a young girl. And now this is a continued version of the church leaving the building and heading to the streets. It first started by leaving to go to high school, then to college, and now to Washington DC.