Wednesday Around the UUWorld BBL

For the May 16 "Around the UUWorld" BBL (Brown-Bag Lunch)

The four short articles for May 16 chat-n-chew are:
1. "NASA Fellowship named for UU Astronomer"
2. "Wandering in the Wilderness"
3. "Nautilus"
4. "Community Minister Helps 'One Child at a Time'"

1.

The first article is about Dr. Nancy Grace Roman, b. 1925. She's a longtime member of the River Road Unitarian Universalist Congregation  in Bethesda, MD. She has been NASA's chief astronomer, and is known as "the mother of the Hubble telescope."

Nancy's minister said, "her recent honor from NASA seems like an honor for all of us. She has opened our eyes and our minds to the beauty and mystery of space and to the remarkable vitality and wisdom of a tiny-grey-hared woman who every day lives out her Unitarian Universalist values and faith."

What does it mean to you that this great astronomer is UU? (Clyde Tombaugh, the discoverer of Pluto, was also Unitarian.) Do you, as her minister does, feel some pride in this UU astronomer's accomplishment? What, if anything, does it say about our faith -- or about astronomy -- that some great astronomers have been UU? Does it matter?

2.

The second article, "Wandering in the Wilderness" is about the experience of "wilderness" in our spiritual path. Author Leaf Seligman writes:

It helped immensely to view myself in relation to a larger story of ancient people wandering in an unfamiliar land not knowing why or what was to come.

How was it helpful to view himself in relation to that larger story?

Has your life included times of "wandering in the wilderness" -- and, if so, did you learn

"the usefulness of time in the wilderness,; the way it tests us, . . . so that we refasten ourselves to what matters, reconnect ourselves to what sustains us, and re-member ourselves to the universe that always holds us"?

3.

The third article is a note from the UU art world. "Nautilus" relates UU artist Nancy Norton's adventure with stained glass and, in particular, the work that depicts a seashell in a way that shows the mathematical ratios of the seashell spiral. The spiral winds outward through a series of "golden rectangles".

A "golden rectangle" is a rectangle with proportions such that, if you cut off a square, then the rectangle that remains has the same proportions as the original rectangle. In other words, if the short side of a rectangle is "a", and the long side is "a + b", then the rectangle is a "golden rectangle" if the ratio of "a" to "a + b" is equal to the ratio of "b" to "a". The "golden ratio" turns out to be, like pi, an irrational number. If the the short side is 1, then the long side of a golden rectangle is 1.618....

In "Nautilus" mathematics and nature and art are brought together. What does this do for you?

4.

The last article for this week profiles UU minister Rev. Donald Robinson, who founded Beacon house 20 years ago to help children.

Does Gainesville need a Beacon house? What would it take for us to create one?