First Parish Bedford UU

Second Service Envisioning Task Force

Deb Bodeau
Karen Bray
 Laurie Groves
Bob Johnson
Anita Raj

First Parish in Bedford Unitarian Universalist
January 2009



Summary

In October of this church year, the Parish Board acted upon the recommendation of the Sustainable Growth Team and formed the Second Service Envisioning Task Force (2STF) to envision how First Parish could move to two Sunday services and to recommend alternatives to be acted upon this year. This envisioning builds upon the work done by the Planning Our Growth (POG) Task Force. (See Appendix A.) This document presents our findings and recommendations.

Findings:

    The POG analysis and recommendations continue to hold. Crowding in the sanctuary continues to be an issue, creating current discomfort and limiting future growth.

    Some steps have helped, or could still help, with over-crowding.

    The Bacon Room has been made a more welcoming space, usable by more people.

    The POG recommendation that “the announcement that invites children to leave for their classes should also invite people to come down from the upstairs and take some of the seats that become available” still holds.

    The congregation has now heard repeatedly of the need to move to two services.

    The POG Report recommended starting two services in Fall 2008.

    The Sustainable Growth Team recommended investigating moving to a second service in the 2009-2010 Church Year.

    More than 50 other UU congregations hold two largely identical Sunday services. The structure of the Religious Education program varies. Only a handful of congregations that hold two Sunday services also have a Forum or Lyceum.

    Moving to two services will alleviate one major stress – overcrowding in the Sanctuary – but will create other stresses.

    Running two services will entail additional work for staff, increased financial costs, and additional volunteer work.

    The transition to two services will be an emotionally challenging one for parishioners. In any change, what is lost is easier to see than what is gained. 

    Consideration of two services reveals a number of areas in which First Parish is “just getting by.” These areas should be addressed, independent of how we go to two services.

    The transition to two services will involve transformation of how First Parish runs its Religious Services, Music, Religious Education, and other Sunday programs. This transformation is not part of the charter of the existing RS, Music, and RE committees.

    The transition to two services presents numerous opportunities for First Parish to improve how we accomplish our mission.

    We will be able to continue to grow, in size and in service.

    Without the current crowding in the sanctuary, our services will feel more intimate for our current members and more welcoming to newcomers.

    We will be able to provide more opportunities for lay participation in services.

Recommendations:

    The Parish Board should affirm that First Parish will offer two Sunday morning worship services throughout the September 2009 – June 2010 church year, with the expectation that, with some adjustments based on that experience, we will continue to offer two Sunday services in subsequent church years.

    The work entailed in going to two services (in particular, in restructuring the RE program) is too great to try offering two services for less than a year.

    We must expect and plan to learn from experience.

    There is no current need to consider two services during the summer.

    The Parish Board should investigate possible external sources of funding to support the transition to two services. However, even if we cannot find such support, and even though moving to two services will increase our costs, we should make this transition.

    The Parish Board should charter a Second Service Implementation Task Force, to include members of the Leadership Team and members (or past members) of key committees, to support the move to two services. That task force could divide its work into teams:

    A Worship Service Team, responsible for transforming our current process for creating and running worship services. This team should include the Senior Minister, representatives of the RS Committee, the Music Director, and representatives of the Music Committee.

    A Religious Education Team, responsible for transforming our current Sunday RE program. This team should include the Director of Religious Education and representatives of the RE Committee.

    A Sunday Programs Team, responsible for transforming how we handle coffee hour; talkback; the Lyceum; and committee, Parish Council, and parish meetings. This team should include representatives of the Hospitality, RS, Membership, and Lyceum committees.

The Second Service Implementation Task Force will be responsible for

    Coordinating among the Worship Service, RE, and Programs Task Forces;

    Identifying to the Parish Board the needed financial and volunteer resources; and

    (Most importantly) working with the Parish Board to communicate with the congregation about the transition.

This Task Force should include Parish Board members and the Leadership Team.

    During the rest of this church year, the Parish Board and the Leadership Team should plan and execute a multi-pronged communications strategy to communicate the reasons for and expected benefits of moving to two services and to elicit and respond to concerns from the congregation. The prongs should include open meetings of various forms, articles in the Parishioner, discussion on the Discussion List, mentions during the Sunday service, and at least one Sunday service dedicated to the transition.

    During the rest of this church year, the Parish Board and the Leadership Team should continue to identify and plan to address areas in which we’ve been “just getting by.” (Note that work is underway in some of these areas.) These include:

    Staff evaluation policies and procedures.

    Renegotiating staff contracts to reflect staff responsibilities more accurately.

    Contingency / disaster planning and procedures, including holding a Sunday morning fire drill.

    Additional staffing needs, including an RE Assistant, an Office Assistant, a Music Assistant, and a Building Manager.




1. Approach

We began with the “Envisioning Two Services” section of the POG Report, which is excerpted in Appendix A. That report discusses alternative models for services and religious education. We decided to identify and compare alternative models in several areas:

    Worship: Two identical sermons (or other worship centerpiece)? Two different sermons? Two almost-identical sermons, subject to calendar offset?

    Religious Education Program: Two identical programs? One full program, one “Way Cool Sunday School” program? A split program?

    Music Program: Same program for each service? Different programs for the two services?

    Coffee Hour:  One coffee hour between the two services? Two coffee hours?

    Lyceum: Before the first service? Between services? Not on Sunday?

    Talkback: After each service? After only one service?

    Timing: For what times are the two services scheduled? 9 and 11?

We looked at what other congregations with two services do. See Appendix D for details. We identified several topics to address in our analysis:

    Impacts on church staff, including the Senior Minister, Assistant Minister, Ministerial Intern, Director of Religious Education, Music Director, Volunteer Coordinator, and Office Administrator. These impacts typically include extra work (e.g., planning and preparation) and extra time on Sunday mornings.

    Impacts on volunteers involved in the Sunday program, including ushers, RE teachers, choir members, coffee service / hospitality, Membership Committee members, and the Lyceum Coordinator.

    Impacts on other church committees and groups, who use coffee hour to promote their efforts, raise funds, or sign up participants, or who schedule meetings before or after church.

    Space use impacts.

    Financial or other resource impacts.

    Interactions with other areas and other issues.

We also met with members of the Leadership Team.









2. Implications of Alternative Models

We looked at the Web sites of more than 50 different UU congregations that hold two Sunday services, focusing on the service times, Worship models, and RE models. See Appendix D. The information provided on Web sites regarding talkback and music programs was sparse.


2.1 Common Changes

Some changes are independent of the different models for Worship, the RE Program, the Music Program, Talkback, the Lyceum, etc. These include:

    We will need twice as many ushers, coffee-hour helpers, and volunteers to run the Sound Board.

    The Membership table will need to be staffed after both services, in order to welcome and orient newcomers.

    Assuming that Joys and Concerns will continue to be part of the service



 Joys and Concerns take an unpredictable amount of time. The predictability advantage gained by not including this as part of the service, however, is outweighed by the community loss. We recommend preplanning ways to shorten other parts of the service (e.g., by singing fewer verses of a hymn), in case J&C runs long., we will need two representatives from the Lay Pastoral Visitors.

    Two people (one for each service) will be needed to make planned announcements (e.g., Canvass, Plant Fair) during the service.

    We will need to renegotiate the contracts of the Senior Minister, Assistant or Associate Minister, DRE, Music Director, and organist to reflect the additional work on (and in preparation for) Sunday mornings.

    We will need to increase the number of hours for Nursery care providers.

Except in the unusual situation when the two services differ (e.g., two different lay-led services, one Intergenerational service and one adult-oriented service; see below), we will only need to videotape one service.


2.2 Worship Centerpiece

Following the lead of the POG Report, we did not consider two totally different worship programs, seeking instead ways to get two nearly identical services.

 The Sunday service provides a common experience for the entire congregation. Typically, as a congregation grows in size and/or diversity, congregation-wide common experiences (e.g., potlucks, fund-raisers) become scarcer, as it becomes harder to find a time when everyone is available or an activity in which everyone is interested. Growing congregations offset this difficulty by providing more opportunities for in-depth common experiences among smaller groups (e.g., Small Group Ministry, affinity groups, adult and intergenerational programs); a common Sunday morning experience is important to prevent fragmentation.   We also did not consider a non-Sunday alternative. Some congregations hold a Saturday or Sunday evening service in addition to two Sunday morning services, with the same worship program as those services.

A number of congregations (including many that hold only one Sunday service) hold an evening service – e.g., Soulful Sundown, Vespers – once a month, to provide an alternative worship format. This serves as an addition, rather than an alternative, to the Sunday worship.

The most obvious model is for the same speaker to give the same sermon twice. This is the model used by the vast majority of congregations with two Sunday services. (A few have genuinely different services, with the first a more meditative one.)

An alternative model involves scheduled offsets (e.g., on Week A the Senior Minister speaks at the first service and the Assistant Minister speaks at the second; on Week B, the Assistant Minister speaks at the first and the Senior Minister at the Second). This would force both speakers to be present both weeks, and makes integration with the RE and Music programs more difficult. It would also make the scheduling of guest speakers more complicated. We did not find any examples of congregations using this model.

For most speakers, presenting the same sermon, talk, or pop-up creates additional stress. When the speaker is a minister or professional speaker, this stress is not an unreasonable expectation. For lay-led services, additional rehearsals might help manage this stress. Alternately, two different lay-led services could be held; this would provide more opportunities for members of the congregation to share the pulpit. Once or twice a year, we might have one Intergenerational service and one adult-oriented service. For music services, different alternatives will need to be explored.

Some congregations have a Worship Associates program, which takes a structured approach to involving lay members in the definition of worship themes and in parts of the service. It is unclear whether such a program actually takes any of the burden of designing and holding Sunday services off the minister.


2.3 Religious Education Program

Four models can be identified from the survey of churches with two services:

    Identical programs at the two services.

    Nearly identical programs, with the same classes offered for preK-5th grade at both services. (Usually, programs for middle, junior high, and senior high school students are offered only at the later service.)

    Split programs, with classes offered for preK-5th grade at one service and programs for middle, junior high, and senior high school students offered at the second. During the second service, some congregations offer Way Cool Sunday School or another one-room program, while others provide no programs for the younger students.

    RE at one service only.

Identical and nearly identical programs greatly increase the number of teachers required. RE at one service only bifurcates the Sunday services between families with children in RE and individuals and families without children. A one-room schoolhouse model for the second service can help avoid such bifurcation, but requires multiple teachers as well as careful preparation to provide a quality experience for the range of ages involved.

Lisa Rubin, our DRE, has expressed an interest in a split program. During the first service, we would offer preK-5th grade classes (using 7 classrooms); during the second, we would offer 6th-8th grades and Youth Group, with Way Cool Sunday School or a similar one-room program for those younger than 6th grade. OWL might also be offered on Sunday mornings. However, Coming of Age (offered for 9th graders) would remain in the evening. This would increase the number of teachers required, to cover the one-room program, but would not double the number required as two identical (or nearly identical) programs would.

Discussion with Lisa and Julie Zacharakis, the Chair of the RE Committee, revealed a pent-up need for an RE Assistant, working 12-15 hours a week, to perform tasks that currently fall on the RE Committee and Lisa at the expense of more strategic work. Those tasks would include purchasing and preparing materials for classroom use (e.g., “cut out 50 stars”), and handling such paperwork as special needs forms, registration, and announcements. This would free up Lisa to look at the needs of our youth, and the RE Committee to work on curriculum, policies, procedures, and training.


2.4 Music Program

Information on music programs was not as visible on the Web sites of other congregations as information on services or RE. A few congregations have multiple choirs, and thus can support different music at the two Sunday services, and (as noted above) a very few have genuinely different services, and thus different music. It appears that most congregations offer the same music at both services.

Moving to two services roughly doubles the number of Sunday hours for paid staff (Music Director, Organist, KidSing and Youth Choir Directors), and for guest musicians. This must be budgeted for. If a staff member or guest musician cannot stay for both services, coverage for the second service must be arranged.

As noted in the POG Report, the services could be structured so that the choir does not have to sit through the sermon twice. Because the choir needs to rehearse, and some choir members might come only for the second service (while others might come for the first service only), the Sanctuary will be in use between the two services. In addition, the Bacon Room would not be usable for a between-services program.

It may be infeasible for children and youth to sing twice. As is currently the case, KidSing and Youth Choir performances will need to be coordinated with the RE program.


2.5 Coffee Hour

Information on coffee hour was not as visible on the Web sites of other congregations as information on services or RE. A few congregations have only one coffee hour, between the services; most have two. Since most members of the congregation have learned how to make coffee and feel empowered, it would be unrealistic to expect not to have coffee after both services.

Two coffee hours will double the need not only for coffee-making volunteers, but also for representatives of committees, task forces, and projects with a presence at coffee hour. The amount of coffee supplies consumed each Sunday can be expected to increase, since the staff and some members of the congregation will be present for both services, and some people who come for the second service will go to both coffee hours. 


2.6 Lyceum

Only a handful of congregations with two Sunday services also hold a Lyceum or Forum on Sunday morning. (See Appendix D.) All but one schedule the forum between the services. At least one holds the forum in the sanctuary; others use a different room, which makes the sanctuary available for between-services music warm-ups and rehearsals.

If the RE program is split as discussed above, we could use a classroom for a between-services Lyceum. The Common Room will hold coffee hour, and a presentation in the Bacon Room will impeded by the music warm-ups. See Section 3.

Other models for the Lyceum include holding it before the first service (such an early time could discourage both attendance and potential speakers), after the second service (competing with talkback), at the same time as the first service (raising space use issues), and on a different day (making it a different program than it currently is).


2.7 Talkback

Information on talkback was not as visible on the Web sites of other congregations as information on services or RE. However, holding talkback between services could distract the speaker, and would compete with the Lyceum if it were held then.


2.8 Timing

As Appendix D indicates, there is considerable variation in starting times. The 9 & 11 start times proposed by the POG Report are typical. To allow for music warm-up, 9 is the earliest time the first service should start.










3. Notional Timeline for a Typical Sunday

The table below is a notional timeline for how the different rooms in the building would be used. While other uses are possible, the timeline demonstrates that we can have two services, a split RE program, and the Lyceum in our existing space. We assume (but do not show, to avoid complicating the table) that the children will continue to start in the service, and leave after the Story for All Ages.

Location

8-9

9-10:15

10:15-10:30

10:15-11

11-12:15

12:15-12:30

12:30-1

Sanctuary

Music warm-up

1st service

People filter out

Music warm-up

2nd service





Bacon Room

Video set-up

1st service

Video transcription

2nd service



Talkback

Common Room

Coffee hour set-up

Children’s in-gathering (9:15-9:30)

Coffee hour

Coffee hour set-up

Coffee hour

L02

RE set-up

RE – K

RE clean-up

Available





L03

RE set-up

RE – preK

RE clean-up

Available





L04

Nursery set-up

Nursery

Nursery

L05

RE set-up

RE – 1st grade

 

RE clean-up

Available





L06

RE set-up

RE – 2nd grade

RE set-up

RE – 6th grade



201

RE set-up

RE – 3rd grade

RE clean-up

RE – 7th grade



202

RE set-up

RE – 4th grade

RE set-up

Way Cool Sunday School (combine rooms)



203

RE set-up

RE – 5th grade







204



Lyceum set-up

People filter in

Lyceum (10:10-10:50)

RE – 8th grade










4. Resources

The UUA published “Adding Worship Services: A How-to Manual” in 2004. See http://www.uua.org/documents/congservices/addingworshipservices.pdf

The Woburn Fund (http://www.mbduua.org/resources-services/grants-panel/the-woburn-fund/) provides grants to facilitate growth.










Appendix A. Background

The Parish Board has asked the Second Service Task Force to develop scenarios based on three annual growth rates  (such as 0% or decline, 2%, 5% per year5) to guide development of options and timing.

The following is excerpted from the POG Report:


Envisioning Two Services

A great deal has been written about the issues involved in two services, and District Executive Terasa Cooley had much to tell us. We also had the benefit of visiting churches that have made the transition to two services, some successfully and some not. Even churches that are now happy with two services often have had to do something different from what they originally pictured.

Although we are not recommending that First Parish start a second service in the near future, what we outline in this section is not a straw man. This is our best attempt to answer the questions that two services raise. If First Parish does not want to spend the money to add seating, or decides to have two services for some other reason, we believe the implementation discussion should start with this proposal.

At the same time, our proposal should not be read as a set of marching orders. The transition to two services would require the cooperation of the whole congregation. The church’s committees and other interested groups should be given ample opportunities to negotiate their roles.


Nearly Identical Services

One way two services fail is if they divide into the “main” service and the “other” service, which eventually dwindles down to nothing. For this reason we scheduled our hypothetical services at 9 and 11 and gave them nearly identical content. Both services should be natural successors to the single service we have now.

 Churches that are looking for an alternative worship format typically do it in a third service either Saturday night or on a weekday evening.

“Nearly” identical means that whenever possible the services would share the same order of service: The speaker gives the same talk.

 We were not sure how to handle lay-led services. Some parishioners may be discouraged by the prospect of doing their service twice in one morning, so we leave open the possibility that the two services may have different lay speakers. But we would not recommend scheduling a lay service opposite a professional service. Music is usually identical, or at least of equal quality.

 Many churches avoid having the choir sit through the same service twice by giving them an orderly exit after their second-service performance.


Identical RE Programs?

RE programs are harder to split than worship services. Children are especially insistent on being with their friends, and families want all their children to attend the same service. One church we visited tried to offer two identical RE programs, only to have almost all the children migrate into one. But we also visited churches that had successfully split RE into two identical programs.

The main alternative is to have a complete set of RE courses in one service (usually the early one), while the other service offers an all-ages program similar to the Way Cool Sunday School that we occasionally do now. In practice, this causes families with children to favor the complete-RE service and may make it larger than the other service.

Size, we believe, is the determining factor in deciding which way to go. If the single RE program is overcrowded and the adult community is large enough to supply two sets of teachers, two identical RE programs makes sense. But if current space is adequate and teacher-recruitment challenging, the non-identical choice is better.

Right now First Parish is at an in-between size; we could go in either direction. But if we picture adding seats to the sanctuary and only starting a second service after several more years of growth, we should definitely have two complete RE programs.


Lyceum and Talkback

The Bedford Lyceum could not be done twice. Speakers are volunteers and attendance is often 20 or less. Moving it to 8 a.m. would also probably kill it, and noon would make it inaccessible for those who attend the first service. We would schedule the Lyceum between the two services, and hold a Talkback only after the second service. This may not be ideal, but seemed to us more likely to work than the alternatives.


More Disciplined Timing

Today, a typical First Parish service runs 60-75 minutes, but 90 minutes or more is not unheard of. In order to get two services done each Sunday, their timing would need to be more predictable. Speakers would need to be more disciplined about fitting their message into the allotted time slot. Service organizers would have to learn to say no to people who want to add new elements to a service. Open-ended segments like announcements or candles would have to be made more predictable or moved out of the worship service.

This might be difficult for First Parish, which has never been a punctual, disciplined congregation. The idea that “things will take as long as they need to take” is one of those small-church attitudes that many parishioners are attached to and would resist giving up.


Appendix B. Growth Statistics

church year

members

pledges

RE enrollment

attendance-John

attendance-other

1999-2000

294

167

135

167

88

2000-01

300

173

111

194

114

2001-02

304

189

130

193

110

2002-03

306

195

130

167

138

2003-04

312

197

150

175

163

2004-05

326

212

122

198

135

2005-06

327

210

132

214

172

2006-07

340

221

135

228

182

2007-08

352

224

121

240

178

2008-09

360

223

120

233*

200*



The POG Report stated:

These attendance numbers are annual medians, broken down by whether or not John Gibbons was involved in the service. They are based on the counts taken by the ushers before the children leave for their classes. We chose to list medians rather than averages to minimize the influence of bad weather, special events, and other one-of-a-kind factors.

The numbers other than attendance come from the annual reports First Parish sends to the UUA. (Thanks to Joan Petros for looking them up.)

We give the full table because any individual statistic is an unreliable measure of church growth. Membership numbers are influenced by when we choose to purge the list of inactive members. Pledges also reflect the economic situation. Sunday attendance is affected by any number of factors unrelated to growth. Seen together, though, these statistics paint a much clearer growth picture.

A number of factors have influenced the attendance figures, which don’t start showing a clear growth pattern until 2002-03. We begin this table at 1999-2000 to avoid the artificial effects of the construction project in 1998-1999: Attendance was not taken at the 9 a.m. family service held during construction, and attendance at the later service was correspondingly lower. The full RE program was not re-established until late in 1999-2000, which undoubtedly depressed attendance that year as well. John’s attendance numbers in 2000-01 and 2001-02 benefited from his sabbaticals in those years: We saw less of John, so a Gibbons service was more of a special occasion.

The 2001-2002 membership number was revised downward from the original 326 after the every-member canvass in the spring of 2002. Most of the inactive members taken off the roles that year were probably also inactive in the previous two years, so the growth in membership since 1999 is probably somewhat larger than this table suggests.

We updated the table from the POG Report. The attendance figures for the 2007-2008 church year must be interpreted in light of John’s sabbatical. The attendance figures for the current church year are, of course, based on incomplete information. Again, thank you to Joan for looking up the information that we provide to the UUA Directory.

 


Appendix C. Classroom Capacities

The information in this Appendix is taken unaltered from the POG Report.

The UUA makes the following recommendations on the number of RE students per room and the number of square feet per student.

Age

Persons per room

Square feet per person

Infants

4-10

*

Toddlers

6-10

30-35

Twos

6-10

30-35

Threes

8-12

30-35

Kindergarten (4-5 yrs.)

10-20

30-35

Elementary (grades 1-6)

12-25

25-30

Youth (grades 7-12)

12-25

20-25

(*Cribs of infants are recommended to be separated by at least three feet.)

The following table gives the measurements of our classrooms and the number of students that they could accommodate at 30, 25, and 20 square feet per student.

Room

Ft

In

by

Ft

In

Cutout

Sq Ft

20/Per

25/per

30/per

Use Now

L01

13

10

x

17

0



235

12

9

8

Office

L02

18

3

x

23

0



420

21

17

14

Classroom

L03

21

0

x

19

0



399

20

16

13

Pre-K

L04

18

0

x

19

0



342

17

14

11

Nursery

L05

17

0

x

17

0



289

14

12

10

Classroom

L06

21

0

x

13

0



273

14

11

9

Classroom

Rm201

20

6

x

13

4



273

14

11

9

Classroom (L-shaped area not included)

Rm202

19

0

x

24

0



456

23

18

15

Classroom

Rm203

19

0

x

17

0



323

16

13

11

Classroom

Rm204

24

6

x

21

6

37

490

24

20

16

Classroom













Totals

3500

175

140

117



Note: The following rooms have dividers such that two large rooms are available

L03 & L04

40

0

x

18

0



720

36

29

24

Combined w/ allowance for divider

Rm202 & Rm203

19

0

x

41

0



779

39

31

26

Classroom


Appendix D. What Happens Elsewhere?


D.1 Congregations with Two Sunday Services

For each congregation identified in the table below, we drew the following information from their Web site: times of services, the choir model (e.g., choir at both services, choir only at one service, multiple choirs; this was often not indicated), whether a Forum or Lyceum is held and if so, at what time; the number of members in the congregation (and the church school enrollment)

 These numbers are taken from the 2009 UUA Directory. As noted in Appendix B, our numbers are 360 (120).; whether the congregation has a Worship Associates program; and what the RE model is.

Congregation

Service Times

Size

WA?

RE

FP Concord, MA

9 & 11; multiple choirs; Forum at 10:10

776 (358)

No

both services

FP Framingham, MA

9:15 & 11

441 (175)

No

both services

1st Church in Belmont, MA

9 & 11

365 (232)

No

both services

1st UU Society of Burlington, VT

9 & 11

610 (213)

No

both services

All Souls New London, CT

9 & 11:15

231 (75)

Yes

preK-6th at 9, 7-9 & 10-12 from 10-11:10

UU Congregation of Danbury, CT

9 & 11

145 (69)

No

both services

UU Fellowship of Briarcliff, Croton & Ossining, NY

9 & 11

130 (68)

No

RE at 11, childcare at 9

All Souls NYC, NY

10 & 11:15 + Sundown 1st Sundays at 6 + 3rd Thursdays at 7

1380 (330)

No

full program for 1st service; workshops (like Way Cool Sunday School) during 2nd

Sunnyhill UU Church of the South Hills, PA

9 & 11:30

225 (71)

No

both services

UU Church of Lancaster, PA

9 & 11

538 (208)

No

preK-6th at 9, all ages at 11

1st Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh, PA

9:30 & 11 (Forum concurrent with 9:30 service)

420 (170)

No

11 only

All Souls Unitarian, Washington DC

9:30 & 11:15

750 (225)

Yes

both services

UU Church of Arlington, VA

9:15 & 11:15

927 (415)

No

both services

Thomas Jefferson Memorial UU of Charlottesville, VA

9:15 & 11:15

477 (230)

No

?

Williamsburg UUs, VA

9:15 & 11:15 (choir only at 11:15)

256 (75)

Yes

11:15 only

Cedar Lane UU, Bethesda, MD

9 & 11, Forum at 10:10

858 (284)

No

both services; Senior High Seminar only at 11

UU Congregation of

Frederick, MD

9 & 11

194 (99)

No

RE at 11, childcare at 9

Sugarloaf Congregation of UUs, Germantown, MD

9:15 & 11:15

92 (45)

No

both services

UU Church of Silver Spring, MD

9:15 & 11:15

375 (130)

No

?

UU Church of Ashville, NC

9:15 & 11:15

551 (207)

Yes

preK-5th at 9:15, all ages at 11:15

UU Church of Charlotte, NC (year-round)

9:15 & 11:15 (choir only at 11:15)

123 (77)

No

preK-5th at 9:15, all ages at 11:15

UU Fellowship of Willmington, NC

9:30 & 11

209 (104)

No

?

UU Church of Kent, OH

9:30 & 11:15

205 (56)

No

preK-5th at 9:35, 6th-12th at 11:15

1st UU Church of Columbus, OH

9 & 11

688 (175)

No

3 combined-age classes at 9, single grades at 11

Unity Temple, Oak Park, IL

9:30 & 11:15

490 (225)

No

both services

UU Church of Urbana, IL

9:30 & 11:15

249 (117)

No

both services

UU Society of Geneva, IL

9 & 11 and 5 p.m. Saturday

335 (160)

No

preK-6th at 9, all ages at 11, childcare only on Sat.

UU Congregation of Grand Traverse, MI

9:30 & 11

259 (50)

No

RE at 11

Olympia Brown UU Church, Racine, WI

9 & 11

329 (143)

No

both services

First Unitarian Society of Milwaukee, WI

8:45, 11, and 5; Forum at 10

734 (229)

No

all services, with different age groupings

Unity Church – Unitarian, St. Paul, MN

9, 11, and 4:30; short intergenerational service Weds. evenings

832 (412)

Yes

all 3 services

UU Fellowship of Ames, IA

9 & 11

304 (146)

No

both services

All Souls Church, Tulsa, OK

10 & 11:30 + Children’s Chapel at 11 + Soulful Sundown first Fridays at 7

1645 (496)

No

both services

All Souls UU, Kansas City, MO

8:45 & 11:15; UU Forum at 10

568 (130)

No

activities at 8:45 & 10; RE at 11:15

Tennessee Valley UU Church, Knoxville, TN

9 & 11:15, forum at 10:05

504 (167)

No

K-4th at 9, all ages at 11:15

Unitarian Church of Baton Rouge, LA

9:30 & 11:15

355 (125)

No

youth at 9:30, kids at 11:15

River of Grass UU Congregation, FL

9:15 & 11

129 (48)

No

RE at 11

Palomar UU Fellowship, Vista, CA

9 & 10:30

161 (81)

No



First Unitarian Church of Oakland, CA

9:30 & 11:30 + Children’s Chapel at 10:45

400 (180)

Yes

K-4 9:30 & 11:30; Club UU for 5th -6th

UU Church of Palo Alto, CA

9:30 & 11

311 (105)

Yes

both services; middle school at 9:30, high school at 11

UU Congregation, Santa Rosa, CA

Contemplation & discussion service at 9, full service at 11

300 (37)

Yes

childcare at 9, full program at 11

First Unitarian Church of San Jose, CA

9:30 (Spanish) & 11

278 (135)

Yes

both services

Unitarian Society of Santa Barbara, CA

9:30 & 11:30

450 (75)

No

RE at 9:30, childcare at 11:30

UU Community Church of Sacramento, CA

9:30 & 11 (1st service is contemplative)

82 (21)

No

activities and games at 9:30, RE at 11

UUs of San Mateo, CA

9 & 11:15 (choir at both)

226 (110)

No

RE at 10

1st Unitarian Church of Salt Lake City, UT

9 & 11; Jazz Vespers Sunday evenings in the fall

348 (165)

No

both services

Boulder Valley UU Fellowship, CO

9 & 11

251 (175)

No

preK-5th at both services; junior high at 11; 9th-12th at 12:15

Boise UU Fellowship, ID

9 & 11 (1st Sunday one service, with choir, at 10 followed by potluck)

242 (115)

No

preK-5th at both services; junior & senior high at 11

University Unitarian Church, Seattle, WA

9:30 & 11:15

772 (345)

No

both services

Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship, WA

9:15 & 11:15

305 (100)

No

both services

Edmonds UU Church, WA

9:15 & 11

342 (103)

Yes

both services

Quimper UU Fellowship, Port Townsend, WA

9:15 and 11:15

256 (100)

No

both services

Michael Servetus UU Fellowship, Vancouver, WA

9:30 & 11:15 (talkback after 11:15)

239 (93)

No

9:30 has two classes; 11:30 has multiple

UU Fellowship of Corvallis, OR

9:30 & 11

288 (180)

Yes

toddler-6th at both services

UU Church in Eugene, OR

9 & 11; same music at both

386 (177)

Yes

both services; YRUU at 11

First Unitarian Church of Portland, OR

9:15 & 11:15

1114 (542)

No

both services





D.2 Congregations with a Sunday Forum

Congregation

Forum Time

Service Time or Times

FP Concord, MA

10:10

9 & 11

All Souls UU, Kansas City, MO

10 in Briggs Auditorium (where services are held)

8:45 & 11:15

Cedar Lane UU, Bethesda, MD

10:10 in hall separate from sanctuary

9 & 11

First Unitarian Society of Milwaukee, WI

10 in hall separate from sanctuary

8:45, 11, and 5

Tennessee Valley UU Church, Knoxville, TN

10:05

9 & 11:15

1st Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh, PA

9:30 (Forum concurrent with 9:30 service)

9:30 & 11