Flower service???

[misstreebc]

I'm relatively new to UU, and I just found out that our congregation is have a flower service later this month. I've heard it mentioned a bit before, so it seems to be kind of a bit of a big deal. I'm wondering if it's something that's just done in our congregation, or is it a fairly common UU practice

Comments

[lostvirtue]

We do the flower communion here. (Madison, WI) I like it a lot.

I don't think I'd torture my cats by making them come to a service. They'll just have to be blessed in spirit. ;)

[sertcake]

Our church in corpus kind of intermittently does those kinds of services. We've done the blessing of the animals and the flower service. One on-going tradition we used to have (I haven't been in a while and we have a new minister so I'm not sure if they're still current) was people would bring water back from all over the world on their trips. Tap water, river water, whatever. Then put them all into one vase that we would have up with the chalice, etc. I liked the idea of bringing back the water from all over the world together in one place.

history of

[lauradi7]

http://www.uua.org/documents/zottolireginald/flowercommunion.pdf

The wikipedia article isn't bad, either.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_Communion

[gatsby9]

Probably the majority of UU churches do flower communion. Ours was this morning (UU church of Kent, Ohio). The story of how they started is beautiful. Wish I had paid more attention so I could retell it! You will not only make a bouquet but take a flower home from it, that you did not bring. The bouquet is a metaphor for the different kinds of people in the congregation =0)

[lostinfebruary]

our flower communion is early in the year, on accounta we are in Phoenix, and well, everything is pretty much dead or dried out by now, lol... and my church in Detroit did it too - always love the flower communion and the story behind how it started. And we do Blessing of the Animals every February, often in conjunction with a pet adoption fair we help sponsor on our campus!

As part of our ingathering service each fall, we do a water communion, as mentioned above. Folks are encouraged to bring water back from their summer travels (or use symbolic water) and everyone stands up and says something short and sweet (ok, not always so short or sweet, but a girl can hope) and pours their water into a large urn with everyone else's water and then we traipse out to our special memorial garden and pour our water into our fountain there...

I love UU traditions...