Ask your computer to reserve for you some hours for each day, Wednesday, June 23 through Sunday, June 27, 2021. Those are the dates for the Livestream and Zoom General Assembly (GA) of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations. This annual convention is the voting business meeting and elections of the UUA, and more importantly, offers scores if not hundreds of workshops, worship services, great music, big name lectures, reunions and one continuous party. For the fifty plus years that it was an in person gathering on a college campus or major city convention center it attracted each year between 3,000 and 7,000 UUs including essentially all UU minsters and thousands of lay UU folks.

Last year, with the pandemic, the gathering was converted to Livestream and Zoom and attracted almost 5,000 UU folks, including 16 from UUCUC. While I loved the in-person GA events in cities around the U.S. and I have been to a dozen or more GA conventions, it was expensive. With registration fees, travel, hotel and meals, it was a $1,000 or $1,500/person expense. This year, the registration fee is only $200 and there is no travel expense. Our church has funds available to support that fee for anyone who requests such.

UUCUC will have ten voting delegates – seven lay, our two ministers and our RE Director. While it is important that UUCUC folks vote in national UUA elections and issues, a first time GA participant will find more freedom to roam around the program and events without the obligation to vote in the plenary sessions. There is NO upper limit on the number of UUCUC folks who can participate in GA. The more, the better.

For information on the GA experience, please do not hesitate to contact David Gross (DLGgeology@aol.com) or Rev. Florence (minister@UUCUC.org).

Last year, our UUCUC delegation enjoyed a lot of local email and phone messages as we chatted about GA issues and developed strategy about who would attend which event. For the Livestream events you can attend in your PJs, but for the Zoom events a clean shirt is good.