November Shared Offering: Champaign County Health Care Consumers

Champaign County Health Care Consumers (CCHCC) is a grassroots non-profit organization founded in 1977, with the mission of health care for all. CCHCC provides a variety of free services to community members, as well as advocacy and community organizing to make improvements in the health care system, and in policy and legislation at the local, state, and national levels.

CCHCC provides free direct services to about 700 clients a month through its Hotline, Medicare 100/Plus Program (for low-income Medicare beneficiaries) and its Dental programs. CCHCC also runs a mobile dental clinic for low-income seniors twice a month in its office.

CCHCC’s community organizing campaigns work with local residents to improve the health care system or to advocate for policy and legislative changes. Current campaigns focus on access to care, protecting Social Security and other vital programs from budget cuts, and the 5th & Hill Neighborhood Rights Campaign (an environmental justice campaign).

http://www.healthcareconsumers.org/ 

Book Discussion Group; Prothero

Beginning on Thursday, November 3rd, at 7:00 p.m., Axel Gehrmann will be leading a ten-session discussion on the book “God Is Not One” by Stephen Prothero. Prothero offers a unique and timely approach to the world’s dominant religious traditions, which stands in sharp contrast to the perspectives offered by scholars we have discussed in years past, such as Huston Smith and Karen Armstrong. Prothero’s book is “an indispensable guide to the questions human beings have asked for millennia - and to the disparate paths we are taking to answer them today.” The group will meet on the first and third Thursdays. Please sign up on the sheet Minister’s Office door, or contact Axel (minister@uucuc.org) with questions or childcare needs.

Feeding Body and Soul:UPDATE! 11-16-11

 The storytelling celebration, with performances on the theme of food, raised $566 for the Eastern Illinois Foodbank on Saturday, November 12 at the church.  Performances by Dan Keding, Barbara Bolser, Camille Born, Kathe Brinkmann, Linda Dust, Sue Searing, Kim Sheahan, and Hal Southern entertained a crowd of about 60 people in Fellowship Hall.  Thanks to Pat Nolan and Lynne Handy for all their work in helping organize the event, and to the Hunger Initiative Volunteers who provided deserts!



A Tellebration Storytelling Celebration and Benefit for the Eastern Illinois Foodbank November 12, 7:30 pm $5 minimum donation Unitarian Universalist Church 309 W. Green St. Urbana, IL 61801 384-8862 Performers: Dan Keding, Barbara Bolser, Camilla Born, Kathe Brinkmann, Linda Dust, Sue Searing, Kim Sheahan, Hal Southern For more information, contact Kim Sheahan at kimtales@mchsi.com The Champaign-Urbana Storytelling Guild, in partnership with the Unitarian Universalist Church of Urbana-Champaign, will be hosting a benefit for the Eastern Illinois Food Bank on Saturday, November 12. "Feeding Body and Soul", a storytelling celebration, will be held in Fellowship Hall starting at 7:30 p.m. and will feature storytellers Dan Keding, Barbara Bolser, Camille Born, Kathe Brinkmann, Linda Dust, Kim Sheahan, and Hal Southern. The evening will be a feast of stories to entertain and engage the mind and heart -- with a sampling of tasty treats for the body as well. Suggested donation is $5.00, with all proceeds going to the Eastern Illinois Food Bank.

Coffeehouse October 8th! Please Join Us!

Greetings All!
The first UU Coffeehouse of the year will be Saturday, October 8th from 7-10 pm at the UU Church of Urbana-Champaign, 309 W. Green St., Urbana, IL.  We are planning this event as an unofficial kickoff to our church-wide project of addressing hunger in our community.  We are asking everyone who wishes to participate to consider songs, poems, stories or other performances that in some way address hunger, and the other related issues of poverty, injustice, discrimination, etc.  As always, we welcome all performances, even if they are not related to the hunger issue!  If you need more information, contact Sam Beshers at beshers@illinois.edu or John Coppess jcppss@aol.com.  Thanks!
 

Get Involved in our Hunger Initiative!

To help address hunger in our community, the church is in the beginning stages of a two-year church-wide social action initiative around the problem.  To start things off, we have developed a website! Visit http://uucuc.org/hunger-initiative to review the Initiative’s background and events coming up. We are now coordinating volunteer efforts and would love to hear from you. 

Until our online volunteer site is ready, just email us at: hunger@uucuc.org   

Also, don’t miss the upcoming 5th Annual Hunger Symposium 7-8:30 pm Monday, Sept. 26: Illinois Terminal in Champaign.

We hope you will get involved! 
 

September Shared Offering: Education Justice Project

September’s Shared Offering is the Education Justice Project (EJP), at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Under the inspiration and direction of Dr. Rebecca Ginsburg (Professor of Landscape Architecture), the EJP offers upper-level university courses and related activities to incarcerated people in Illinois. The related activities include tutoring, an on-site resource room, bilingual Spanish-English instruction, book clubs, a speaker series, and support for a network of families of EJP students. The program currently operates at the Danville Correctional Facility for men. Nearly all staff in the program are trained volunteers from the university and the local community. The program is grounded in a well substantiated body of research. College-in-prison programs reduce arrest, conviction, and reincarceration rates among released prisoners. College-in-prison programs are also linked to fewer disciplinary incidents within prison and thus safer environments for prisoners and staff alike. College-in-prison programs also have benefits for inmates’ families and, hence, their communities. The strongest predictor of whether a given person will attend college is whether her or his parents did. So, when an incarcerated person receives a college education, his or her children are more likely to pursue their own educations. In spite of these significant benefits, there has been a precipitous drop in college-in-prison programs around the country. There were over seven hundred degree-granting programs at their height, in the early 1990s. In 1994 the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act eliminated the use of Pell Grants for prisoners, and most prison college programs closed, including Illinois’ BA-granting programs. Bachelor degrees have not been offered in Illinois prisons since 2002. The EJP is a vital program, seeking long-term responses to chronic structural problems like crime and incarceration, both of which disproportionately affect the poor and people of color in our society. Please check out the website http://www.educationjustice.net/ or ask Jennifer Greene for further information.

Snack and Chat UU Community Fair; Sept. 25

Get Connected at the Snack and Chat UU Community Fair on Sept. 25 Find out about the many opportunities for involvement and connections at our church at this year’s UU Community Fair; Representatives from our church’s committees and small groups will be in the Fellowship Hall after each service on Sunday, Sept. 25. Stop by their tables, sample tasty snacks, and find out how you can get connected with others at church and contribute your time and talents to the many facets of our UU community. Questions? Contact Peggy Patten at m-patten@sbcglobal.net.