We are in the middle of July 4th celebrations and what a great time it has been (even the weather has mostly cooperated)! Midnight Madness at UUHoulton was a little wet and it certainly cut down on foot traffic, but we had a good evening of curry, mac & cheese and lots of conversations with friends and new friends. The cafe space ended up being drier than the outside space…More events are going on all weekend.
If you didn’t get curry or mac & cheese (or would like more), we still have some available and it will be on sale during coffee hour on Sunday if you’d like to take some home. Sale price is $8 for a 16oz container. This Sunday we have another open pulpit service. We invite you to bring a reading, poem, a show and tell object or a personal observation to share with the group. Once again there is no specific theme or topic for the service, but since it is July Fourth weekend, please keep that in mind.
YouTube Channel content is a summer meditation by the minister titled “The Wild in Wildlife.” It includes a short slide show of local wildlife sightings and a couple of bear stories too. Our interface with nature is a reflection of the soul and the divine.
We hope you can join us for one of the services online or in-person.
In Ministry,Dave“Elbow’s Up” RallyJuly 5th 10AM – 11AMIn front of the courthouse
It looks like Saturday will be a beautiful day for our Elbows Up! rally to support Canada and celebrate our friendship with Canadians! The word is out and we’re hoping for a good crowd.We have permission to stand on the sidewalk in front of the courthouse, wrapping around the corner and up Military Street. We can also stand on the opposite side of the street and wrap around that corner. The wide turn spaces around the curve from Court Street to Military Street will be reserved for those who are sitting. People are welcome to bring signs with messages of love and friendship for Canada as a friendly neighbor and a free, independent, and sovereign nation. Canadian flags are also welcome! We will sing “O Canada” (words on the back of the flyer) and some other songs. We also have some good, uplifting chants, and a megaphone to help everyone hear them.Let’s stand shoulder to shoulder so everyone’s sign is visible and we take up a long stretch of the street!
Since this is the first Saturday of the month, everyone is also invited to attend a meeting immediately after at the Cup Cafe in the basement of the Unitarian Church to debrief and plan future events.
Please plan to bring your holiday guests – they can take in the farmers’ market and craft fair before and after. Then the Rotary’s International Food Festival and the high school at 1:00 pm. A great day to be in downtown Houlton!
Hope to see you Saturday.
Restore OrganizersUpcoming EventsFiesta MexicanaSaturday, July 19th
Unitarian Concert Series:
Gunther BrownAugust 9 Saturday Night 7PMOn the Sanctuary Stage
$20 tickets
$15 student price
(children under 12 are free)
Tickets available at The County Co-Op & Farm Store
and online at uuhoulton.org
Gunther Brown
Pete Ryan: Guitar & Lead VocalsChris Plumstead: Lead Guitar & VocalsMark McDonough: BassDerek Mills: Drums
Gunther Brown is coming back to Houlton, Maine for a concert on the sanctuary stage on Saturday, August 9th. The band hadn’t played since Covid, but we gave them a call and talked them into a “One Night Only Reunion Tour” in Houlton. This is a night you won’t want to miss! Pete and the boys put on a great show and local celebrity Derek Mills still holds down the drums. Concessions will be available during intermission.
Tickets are now available at The County Co-Op & Farm Store in downtown Houlton
and online at uuhoulton.org (just click on the front page image or go to “concert series”)
Press Reviews:
Gunther Brown is a roots-rock Americana band from Portland, Maine.
The band’s most recent album, Heartache & Roses, was released in February, 2020, with reviews proclaiming “Gunther Brown is the Portland-based band that will make you fall back in love with Americana music. ”
After a European tour in 2017 Gunther Brown took an extended break due to a change in the lineup and, after playing just two shows in support of Heartache & Roses, was stalled once again- this time by covid.
Gunther Brown introduced themselves to the world with Good Nights for Daydreams, in 2014. The band’s full-length debut received only great reviews, both in the band’s hometown and internationally.
The Portland Phoenix said, “The guys in Gunther Brown can lay on the biting spite pretty thick, but they also embrace pure emotion. With Gunther Brown’s debut full-length, (they) have created the most sorrowful local record since Ray Lamontagne’s Till the Sun Turns Black.” AmericanaUK added, “Gunther Brown’s debut album is forty minutes of resignation and despair set to one of the most mournful soundtracks you’re likely to hear this year or any other. Leader and songwriter Pete Ryan is a master of despondency.”
In 2016, Gunther Brown released, North Wind, a new 10 song album, on vinyl, CD and digital formats. The album was released in Europe on CRS. Reviews of North Wind heaped praise on the band with statements like, “…one of your great Americana promises for 2016,” and “…North Wind is many things at once: tender, fierce, thought-provoking, powerful and even fun. Could lavish praise on every track…this band is really onto something.”
THIS WEEK’S YOUTUBE SERVICE:
HERE IS THE SERVICE LINK FOR THIS WEEK’S YOUTUBE SERVICE
(Please note it won’t be active until 10AM on Sunday morning)
HERE IS THE ZOOM LINK FOR SUNDAY COFFEE HOUR:Topic: UUHoulton zoom coffee hour & check-inTime: Jul 6, 2025 11:00 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada) Join Zoom Meetinghttps://us06web.zoom.us/j/86124829981?pwd=Qjcj4CwqxrDO7ecH6qVkeYoBFBLfl9.1
Meeting ID: 861 2482 9981Passcode: 760323
Calendar of Events @UUHoultonJuly 5 “Elbows Up” Rally 10AM
(in front of the courthouse)July 6 Sunday Service: Open-Pulpit ServiceJuly 13 Sunday Service: David HutchinsonJuly 14 UUHoulton Board Meeting 4PM in the parlorJuly 19 LGBTQ+ Luncheon 12 NoonJuly 19 Fiesta Mexicana Event Trivia Night and Tacos 5PM July Jam 6-9PMJuly 20 Sunday Service: David HutchinsonJuly 27 Sunday Service: Rev. Dale HoldenAug 3 Sunday Service: David HutchinsonAug 9 Gunther Brown Concert 7PMAug 10 Sunday Service: Stephen KinneyAug 11 UUHoulton Board Meeting 4PM in the parlor
Virtual Offering Plate
If you would like to send in your pledge or donation simply drop an envelope in the mail. The address is listed below. You can also send your donation electronically with our payment system on the church website. Simply go to uuhoulton.org and click “Donate” on the menu and it will explain how the system works. You can set up a regular monthly payment plan or donate in single transactions. Thank you for your generous support!
UU Church of Houlton
61 Military Street
July 3, 2025
And on July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, declaring: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”
For all the fact that the congressmen got around the sticky little problem of Black and Indigenous enslavement by defining “men” as “white men,” and for all that it never crossed their minds that women might also have rights, the Declaration of Independence was an astonishingly radical document. In a world that had been dominated by a small class of rich men for so long that most people simply accepted that they should be forever tied to their status at birth, a group of upstart legislators on the edges of a continent declared that no man was born better than any other.
America was founded on the radical idea that all men are created equal.
What the founders declared self-evident was not so clear eighty-seven years later, when southern white men went to war to reshape America into a nation in which African Americans, Indigenous Americans, Chinese, Mexicans, and Irish were locked into a lower status than white Americans. In that era, equality had become a “proposition,” rather than “self-evident.”
“Four score and seven years ago,” Abraham Lincoln reminded Americans, “our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” In 1863, Lincoln explained, the Civil War was “testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”
It did, of course. The Confederate rebellion failed. The United States endured, and Americans began to expand the idea that all men are created equal to include Black men, men of color, and eventually women.
But just as in the 1850s, we are now, once again, facing a rebellion against our founding principle as a few people seek to reshape America into a nation in which certain people are better than others.
The men who signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, pledged their “Lives, [their] Fortunes and [their] sacred Honor” to defend the idea of human equality. Ever since then, Americans have sacrificed their own fortunes, honor, and even their lives, for that principle.
Lincoln reminded Civil War Americans of those sacrifices when he urged the people of his era to “take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
Words to live by in 2025.
Heather Cox Richardson is an American historian who works as a professor of history at Boston College, where she teaches courses on the American Civil War, the Reconstruction Era, the American West, and the Plains Indians. In 2019, she started publishing Letters from an American, a nightly newsletter that chronicles current events in the larger context of American history. Richardson focuses on the health of American democracy. She lives on the coast of Maine.
One of our UUHoulton members shared this with me and I thought it was a most decent article to include on the PageA decent human beingLUCIAN K. TRUSCOTT IVJUN 29
We live in dangerous times. We spend so much time dealing with the ugliness brought on by certain actors in American political life, and with the danger to ourselves and others, we sometimes forget why we are here.We are here to lead by example. There is a lot wrapped up in that sentence – Why us? What is it to lead? But most of all, what example should we set for others?Above all else, we should endeavor to be decent human beings.It’s a simple thing, when you come down to it, one of those you-know-it-when-you-see-it things in life. If you look for it, decency is all around us. I saw it today walking Ruby, our dog, not once, but twice! A guy on a bicycle passing by on the street waved and said, “Good morning!” With an exclamation point on it! A car full of young people stopped at the stop sign just down the block at the corner of Third Street. I always wonder what young people see when they pass me and Ruby walking slowly down the street. These young people waved and called through the car’s open back window, complimenting Ruby and wishing us a nice day.This is what you might call lived decency. Given a moment to act or not to act, they chose to lift my spirits, and their own, by calling out a cheery “hello.” It wasn’t a big thing, but it was a thing. It happened. The day brightened. A ray of hope showed through the gloom of a news cycle that had proved, once again, how much trouble we are in, and not only that grim bit of news, but that one of our key institutions, a leg of the tripartite system of government under which we live, is not trustworthy.But what is not working in the life of our nation is not as important as what is working. I now have thousands of subscribers to this newsletter, and while I have gotten to “know” some of you from your comments and well-wishes as I endured a rather long winter of discontent earlier this year, I cannot become acquainted with more than a small percentage of my readers.And yet, I know that most if not all of you went to sleep last night and awoke this morning and had a cup of coffee or some other restorative and probably something to eat. I assume that some of you worked today, a Saturday, and probably more of you enjoyed, or tried to enjoy, a day off. I believe in my heart that certain of your relationships with others were enhanced by a look, or a word, or a small act of kindness, but I realize as well that the day held heartbreak for some, and you suffered pain.A day like any in our lives. All is not well, and yet some of it is.So, what does “leading” consist of? It means being aware of the world around you and caring about that world and the people in it. It means acting as if you are the one who is being acted upon, because you are. Interaction of being alive among others is inescapable. If you pay a bill, someone, or some thing such as a business, benefits from your payment. If you answer a phone call, the person who called you experiences a little thrill, in this day and age of contactless connection. If you link yourself to others electronically on your phone or computer through a system such as Facebook or Instagram or even X – cough, cough – the world inhabited by others out there at the other end of the electrons benefits because of who you are and what you have done.These are decisions. Leaders make decisions and act on them. Deciding to attend a No Kings demonstration was an act of leadership, because leaders add rather than subtract, and your body, yourself, was an addition to that demonstration, to that movement. We learned over the next couple of days that millions of us made a decision to attend demonstrations in thousands of towns and cities. That is leadership. It was an example to the country and to ourselves of who we are and what we stand for.The example we set was one of commitment to ideals larger than ourselves. We stood up for something, and we did it peacefully. We are too often mistaken about what we think of as “peace.” It is not over there, waiting for bullets to stop flying. It is not with “them,” with others who must be convinced to stop conflict and division and too often, hate. Peace is within us. It belongs to us. It is ours to use, to live by, to love as we love life itself.Just as bad ideas have consequences – look at what the Congress is about to do, for an example – so do good ideas. Did you hear the great sucking noise of a vacuum after we showed our numbers and ourselves on the streets in No Kings demonstrations? The other side had no replies to our urging that the sick should be healed and the hungry should be fed. We asked for decency. Since the Congress continues its march to harm Medicaid and Medicare and Social Security and funding for SNAP and WIC, the supplemental nutrition program for pregnant women and infant children, polls have shown that the counter argument for indecency is unpopular even among those on the other side politically.Politics is a popularity contest of people and ideas. We should be proud of who we are and what we stand for. To be a decent human being is to lead by example. It gives our lives meaning. Hope is our strength. Decency is how we get there. To live decent lives is what we can do for others and ourselves with our bodies and our ideas and our votes. Everybody hates it when the lights go out. Decency brings light into darkness. It is how we win.**Lucian K. Truscott IV, a graduate of West Point, has had a 50-year career as a journalist, novelist and screenwriter. He has covered stories such as Watergate, the Stonewall riots and wars in Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan. He is also the author of five bestselling novels and several unsuccessful motion pictures. He has three children, lives in rural Pennsylvania and spends his time Worrying About the State of Our Nation and madly scribbling in a so-far fruitless attempt to Make Things Better. You can read his daily columns at luciantruscott.substack.com
We had a UUHoulton Social Action Committee meeting earlier this week and Kathryn shared a conversation she had with a UK colleague earlier in the day. A couple of days later, it is content in Kathryn’s latest Substack offering. Here it is.Crows Come Home to RoostSubstack
Kathryn Harnish
An Unhappy 4th of July
(And sadly, I doubt this is the only post with that title today…)
| JUL 4 |
Earlier this week, I spent time catching up with a colleague in the UK, someone that has been using his entrepreneurial spirit and technology talent to build software that enables communities to be their best. We’ve been talking about ways to bring his platform to Aroostook County, and while I haven’t been able to get funding for this project (yet!), I believe that we need to find a way to support neighbors helping neighbors, especially in today’s political and socioeconomic climate. So together, we continue to talk, plot, and dream.
My colleague is sharp, thoughtful, and well-informed — someone who pays attention to what’s happening in the world. But even he was shocked as I started to explain what life looks like here right now.
I told him about the massive Medicaid cuts proposed — and since passed — in the One Big Beautiful Bill, a name so juvenile and ridiculous that I would laugh if its realities weren’t going to harm millions of Americans. I shared what these cuts will mean for the hospital in my small northern Maine town. It’s already struggling, and these cuts will very likely close it — and many other rural hospitals that cannot absorb the costs of care they are legally and ethically required to provide to people who will no longer have insurance. As this financial burden increases and falls to hospitals that are already on the brink, services will be reduced and facilities will be shuttered. The recent closure of Houlton Regional Hospital’s Labor & Delivery unit is just the tip of the iceberg.
I spoke about how it won’t matter if a person is liberal or conservative, rich or poor, young or old — soon, we all may be driving an hour or more if we need emergency care. And here’s something few are thinking about: local ambulance crews won’t be able to keep up. If they’re all out on long-distance runs to the nearest available Emergency Department, response times for anyone else with a critical need will get dangerously long. Fun times.
I also shared the stories of folks who are terrified of losing access to Medicaid-covered medications that literally keep them alive. Many of these drugs cost hundred or thousands of dollars a month. If you’re uninsured and not independently wealthy, you’re out of luck. Imagine living with cancer. Epilepsy. A blood-clotting disorder like I do. All things that can kill you if not treated consistently and effectively. This will be life — and death — in Trump’s America.
I told him that in Aroostook County, more than a quarter of our population relies on SNAP nutrition benefits to put food on the table. That 7,500 households depend on the LIHEAP heating assistance program to stay warm during the winter months, some of the coldest in the country. When these programs are gutted, the costs don’t magically disappear. They just shift from the federal government to the states, and then to the local level. And I don’t know of a single municipality in The County prepared — or resourced — to address what’s coming.
Finally, I told him about the Coast Guard flights from the little airport that serves our region, loaded with Black and brown people who will be flown to and detained in what are essentially concentration camps. Without due process. Without any hope. One of those facilities, dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” was the site this week of a totally Trumpian field trip — complete with photo ops of Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, with Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, all of whom seemed to be having a good laugh at the idea of caging human beings in this environment. And of course, also in Trumpian fashion, there’s already merch. One pro-Trump influencer proudly posted a picture of himself wearing a hat emblazoned with camp’s nickname, leading a commenter to remark, “At least the Nazis didn’t have a gift shop.”
Throughout all of this, my colleague listened quietly. And when I got to the part about the detentions — about Black and brown people being sent, without due process, to remote camps — he was shocked. He couldn’t even find the words to respond. And that sort of undid me. Because this is mycountry that he’s horrified by. This is the country I love, even when I’m not proud of it, even when I can’t recognize it. And in the moment of his reaction, I felt something rupture within me.
I live exactly 3.96 miles from the Canadian border, just a few minutes’ drive from a country that, while far from perfect, has a functioning social safety net, protects LGBTQ+ rights, and is actively exploring ways to regularize the status of undocumented immigrants — a recognition of both the value that they bring to the country and the vulnerabilities they experience without legal status. Less than four miles separate me from a country that hasn’t criminalized being poor, or of color, or disabled, or otherwise being perceived as “less-than”.
But today, those miles feel like a million. The line dividing my town from Canada has never felt more arbitrary — or more monumental. On one side, normal. On the other, definitely not normal.
So no, this isn’t a happy Fourth of July. It’s a day of grief. Of shame. And still, somehow, of hope that we can pull ourselves back from the edge before our country turns 250 next year. If indeed it does.
It’s a line in the sand.
Do we fight — and yes, it will be a fight — for freedom, dignity, and equity, or do we just pretend that this is normal by going about our daily routines as the world falls apart around us?
Letting the days slide by, letting the values that we cherish be eroded further, is a decision, one made by overwhelm and fear. But that’s what The Regime wants — to normalize the very worst human instincts, to make cruelty feel like policy, to turn injustice into something we don’t have the ability to question.
So, today, as we shoot off fireworks and eat hot dogs and wave flags at parades in celebration of our nation’s independence, remember that none of this is normal, and nothing about it should be.
Resist, friends.
Prayer List
For those working for social justice and societal change
Pray for peaceful action and democratic process in our nation
The war in Ukraine continues
Prayers for the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza
Prayers for those affected by recent governmental (and policy) changes in DC
Concern over the increasing tension between India and Pakistan
Prayers for those affected by the recent tornadoes and storms in the American Midwest and South
Prayers for those affected by the Canadian wildfires in Saskatchewan and Manitoba
Prayers for our friend Joe Hogan who is at House of Comfort in PI
Prayers for those affected by the tragic airliner crash in India
Prayers for Peace in the Middle East
Prayers for those affected by the floods in Texas
Prayers for our country and democracy as we celebrate our 249th year
The Four Limitless Ones Prayer
May all sentient beings enjoy happiness and the root of happiness.
May we be free from suffering and the root of suffering.
May we not be separated from the great happiness devoid of suffering.
May we dwell in the great equanimity free from anger, aggression and delusion.
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