Heat claims more climate crisis deaths than anything else. 645 people died from heat in Phoenix in 2023
alone. 47,000 people died in Europe. As heat waves become longer and more intense, even more will
die. Deaths from heat is also a top climate justice. It’s important that we realize that real people are
behind cold statistics about deaths.

We will watch the film Cooked – Survival by Zip Code, the story of a Chicago heat wave. We’ll discuss the
reactions of different people in the U.S. to this tragedy. We’ll of course have popcorn. Children will
watch a different movie at the same time, Seuss’s Lorax. Please join us.

Building the Beloved Community

With love and joy, we invite you to join the 2025 First UU Stewardship Campaign. Commitment Sunday is coming on Sunday, October 13th. This is the day that we will ask all members and friends to make their annual pledge to First UU. Making a pledge simply means declaring how much you expect to contribute to First UU during 2025.  

This year, we are striving to make pledging joyful by encouraging positive reasons to give, easy ways to make your pledge, and a church-wide celebration recognizing our congregation’s accomplishments and having some fun.

Join the hundreds of Austin families committed to the spiritual practice of supporting our progressive faith community by pledging on Sunday, October 13th. If you already pledge, we encourage you to increase your support of First UU in 2025. We will then celebrate our commitment to First UU with a party on Sunday, October 27 from 12 – 2 p.m. Learn more about pledging and the 2025 Pledge Drive on the Stewardship webpage.

Trans Hostile States/Safe States Training with
Transforming Hearts Collective and UUSC

On Sunday, September 15th from 12:30- 1:30 p.m., we will watch a Ted Talk by Katherine Hayhoe. We’ll briefly present the five barriers to thinking about the climate crisis, and how to talk about climate to breach them. We’ll present a few additional tips from Katherine Hayhoe’s latest book, Saving Us: A Climate Scientist’s Case for Hope and Healing in a Divided World. And we’ll talk about all of this.

We’ll have a light lunch. Join us.

Those of us who appreciate how vital solving our climate crisis is must talk about the climate, and talk about the climate in the right way. Katherine Hayhoe, climate scientist and communicator, argues that this is “the most important thing you can do for the climate is talk about it.”

Yale Climate Communications surveys show that fewer than 25% of Americans hear anything about climate change once a week or more. Psychologist Per Epsen Stoknes summarizes research into five barriers the brain builds up to avoid thinking about climate change, and how to overcome them. Although most people report that they know climate change is real and needs action, it is not in the top ten priorities of most people. This allows many politicians to feel they can continue to cater to their big donors in oil and gas and do little or nothing to stop the climate crisis we’re in.

During the long fight to pass the Inflation Reduction Act, the greatest climate action bill ever passed, the climate movement generated hundreds of thousands of messages to Congress. It barely passed, but pass it did, although it was declared totally dead three times.

So folks, talk more about the climate crisis. Out descendants will thank you

The Only Guaranteed Things in Life…are death and taxes.

We are honored to have church member Liz Nielsen, Founder of Nielsen Law and estate planning attorney, share wisdom and best practices around getting one’s affairs in order in advance, so that one’s wishes may be carried out as fully as possible. She will also discuss some tax efficient charitable giving techniques.

Please join us on Sunday, November 3, from 1:30 – 2:30 p.m. in Room 13A. Register here!

1st UU has really stepped up. We estimate that 1st UU members have written about 3,000 postcards and counting. 3,000! Utterly amazing.

This Citizens Climate Lobby Postcard Project is sending postcards to registered voters who do not regularly vote, who have a score indicating they care about the Climate Crisis, and who live in a district with a competitive U.S. House or Texas State Legislature race. We also have read studies with a control group which show that, to reach a large number of voters to go vote, postcard writing is the most effective method. Those same studies discovered what should go on the postcards and when to send them for the greatest effect. They tested dozens of different messages. We strongly feel that your time writing these postcards is well spent. We also think that voters who care about the climate will also care about other social justice causes and will vote for people more in accordance with UU values.

We’re holding a Postcard Writing Party from 1-2 p.m. at Howson Hall this Sunday, September 8th. We’ll have light lunch eats and music. We’ll ask writers to suggest one of their favorite songs, and play all we can during the party. If you prefer to pick up postcards and write them at home, the more power to you. But those of you who might enjoy writing in community, please come. And leave with a song in your heart.

Intersections, any social justice fight is a fight for climate justice

Climate change hurts us all. We all suffer from wildfires, hurricanes, droughts, etc. But generally, people who are oppressed or discriminated against suffer the most. They live in flood prone areas, next to fossil fuel plants that contaminate air and water, in houses that offer less protection. When disaster relief comes, it come first and most to higher income households. As you can see on our climate justice movie night on Tuesday, September 24th, people from poor neighborhoods die from heat waves in much, much larger numbers than those in middle- to upper-class neighborhoods.

One of the areas that cuts most clearly across areas of social justice is Democracy Justice/Voting. If we have more legislators who advocate for social justice, we clearly can get more done. That is why we’re holding a special Postcard Writing Party this week.

We also plan to do a social justice map with some of you. Many of us volunteer to help with many different causes in our fight for social justice. We’re want as many as are willing to place a small magnet on a chart under the type(s) of social justice you fight for. Also remember that many of us have a social justice issue we really fight for, but when needed, we should all be ready to sign a petition, write an email, or make a phone call for the other causes.

We’ll also provide an opportunity for you to sign up with any of the 1 st UU Social Action Committee Pillars: LBJT, Reproductive Justice, Democracy/UU the Vote, Anti-Racism, Immigration, and Climate (Green Sanctuary).

Presentation on “Status of Climate Crisis and What To Do About It

Presentation in Room 13 from 12:30 – 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, September 1st: “State of the Climate Crisis and What You Can Do About” It by Bob Hendricks.

Bob Hendricks is the top climate volunteer leader for the two largest grassroots climate organizations in Texas, chair of the state Sierra Club ExCom and state coordinator for Citizens Climate Lobby. He has given climate presentations at the national, regional, state, and local levels.

We will quickly note how the situation is worsening despite positive efforts to stop it. We’ll cover the challenge of tipping points which can accelerate global warming and cause irreversible damage. We’ll briefly cover the most important things we can do to stop it, most of which take little time or effort and do not involve significant lifestyle changes. Finally, I’ll summarize how we can help accelerate reducing U.S. carbon pollution through the Inflation Reduction Act, the most important climate legislation ever passed. The U.S. is the world’s worst carbon polluter over time and we must move faster to cut our carbon pollution.

We’ll provide sandwiches and drinks for those who come. See you there!

Write Get Out the Vote Postcards

The climate crisis continues to worsen. Catastrophic events will become more frequent. We need action now. First UU has many leaders in the climate movement and has supported Austin climate organizations well, dozens of 1st UUers have already written postcards for our TX Climate PostCard Project, and dozens more have taken action to lower their carbon footprints. But we need to do more.

During this month, Climate Justice September at 1st UU will provide information and opportunities to learn and act, actions that take little time but have a large impact when done with others. September 1 – 7 Theme for First Week: Personal Actions to Take Every Sunday: Citizens Climate Lobby Postcard Project. Since public policy depends so heavily on elected officials, one activity we’ll continue each week will be writing postcards to get out the vote. We write to folks who want climate action but don’t always vote. Kudos to dozens of 1st UU members who’ve already written hundreds of postcards.

Sunday, September 1st from 12:30 p.m. – 1:30 p.m. Presentation “Status of the Climate Crisis and What To Do About It” by Bob Hendricks, Chair of State Sierra Club ExCom and State Coordinator of Citizens Climate Lobby. Bob will highlight the worsening situation, the improving solutions picture, and what each of us can do.

Tuesday, September 3rd from 6:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. – Climate Justice September Art Share, folks share songs, art, stories, poems, etc., in Howson Hall with a mostly vegetarian potluck starting at 6:30 p.m.

Climate Justice September Art Share

Come kick off Climate Justice September by sharing climate feelings, music, art, stories, and more with food and fellowship. No judgment, just appreciation for those of us willing to reveal ourselves. Anything goes (well, almost anything).

On Tuesday, September 3, the First UU Green Sanctuary team and the Sierra Club Climate Crisis committee will join creative forces. We will start with a mostly vegetarian potluck at six thirty in Howson Hall, surrounded by visual art community members have brought to share. At 7 p.m, we will share essays, songs, (our own or beloved, inspirational pieces by others) with a theme of nature we love and want to save or our feelings about threats to that nature and to life on earth, human and nonhuman.  And of course, art about solutions is appreciated as are personal stories of moving or disturbing nature and
climate crisis experiences.

All, including young artists, are warmly invited to share or to attend and enjoy. So we can get displays and presentation order roughly set, please let me, Victoria, know if you have something to read, say, or show as soon as you can email seastarvsh@aol.com or text at 512-567-5985 (text preferred).

What: Climate Justice September Art Share
When: September 3, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m.
Where: Howson Hall in First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin at 4700 Grover Ave.
Why: To inspire and connect with one another and kick off Climate Justice September

Foster and Adoption in Austin

First UU Social Action Council is hosting an information session with Madison Pittman and Yaiika Fernandez, Foster Home Development Specialists from Austin’s SAFE Alliance (Stop Abuse for Everyone), on Sunday, October 20th at 12:30 p.m. in room 13.

Border trip registration + UU the Vote

This is the last week to register for the TXUUJM/Texas Impact border witness trip, coming August 18th – 21st, 2024. Continue here for more information and registration in the TXUUJM August newsletter. 

TXUUJM is also your source for Texas UU the Vote efforts this election year! We are thrilled to have a whopping 36 Texas UU congregations signed up for our TXUUJM Votes! efforts. We are more powerful together! 

NOTE: Action Hour is returning Thursday, August 15th.Thursday nights and the final Friday of each month — just in time for all the increased energy around the election. Sign up for TXUUJM emails, bookmark this page for events, and follow @txuujm on Facebook and Instagram.

Drive a Senior ATX

Building Relationships One Ride at a Time

Drive a Senior ATX enables older adults to live independently, avoid social isolation and age in place by providing free, volunteer-based transportation and other support services to senior adults in Austin since 1985, including

• Daily rides to medical appointments and errands,
• Weekly rides to HEB for groceries,
• Monthly rides for social outings and events,
• As needed handyman services, tech assistance, and social visits.

Our mission is transportation, but our impact is relationships. Our volunteer-based rides come with care, empathy, and inclusion. Our clients are treated like family and build meaningful relationships with our staff and volunteers.

First UU is a founding congregation of Drive a Senior, originally called North Central Caregivers. Our congregation formerly contributed annually to its work and has provided many volunteers since its inception in 1985.