Would you like your creative expression to appear in Quest?
All CLF members (incarcerated and free world members) are welcome to submit reflections on upcoming Quest themes, original poetry and artwork. Read more →
Quest July/August 2022
July/August 2022
“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” —Mother Teresa
Articles
No Saviors
One of the many reasons I choose Unitarian Universalism as my faith is that I don’t believe in saviors. Read more »
Compassion & Healing
For me, growing up in the nightmare of my childhood and the abuses I suffered, compassion was an unknown word and concept. Read more »
Voices of Compassion
In October of 2020, I suffered a week of torment within which I was repeatedly beaten, extorted of property and medication, and sexually abused by a cellmate. Read more »
A Compassionate Life
Religious scholar Karen Armstrong has studied the teachings of religions large and small all around the world. And she has, as we all have, witnessed the strife in our world: the pain, the isolation, the injustice, the inequality. Read more »
Updates from the CLF’s 2022 Annual Meeting
The CLF held its Annual Congregational Meeting on Sunday June 5, 2022. Anyone who could not attend the meeting was invited to vote by mail ahead of the meeting. Read more »
Would you like your creative expression to appear in Quest?
All CLF members (incarcerated and free world members) are welcome to submit reflections on upcoming Quest themes, original poetry and artwork. Read more »
Quest June 2022
June 2022
Be faithful to that which exists within yourself. —Andre Gide
Articles
Thoughts About Integrity and Our National Character
Integrity is not a trait that can exist on its own. Read more »
The Unknown
They wouldn’t show me the path in which to walk… Only the roads sidelined, with bodies in chalk… Read more »
From Membership to Stewardship
When Aisha, Michael, and I were called as your Lead Ministry Team in 2020 we were excited to learn all the behind-the-scenes workings of CLF. Read more »
Integrity
What does integrity mean to you?
Teaching Love
Love.
Just four letters. Read more →
LOVE
What does love look/feel/sound like to you?
Interminable Affinity
(an intermission of love’s omissions)
Chase Cole
CLF member, incarcerated in MA
this memory unfolds
spilling over my shoulder
with Hyacinth coolness
shades of hair
spiral downward
rose and sweet a meadow’s breath
—lingering—
tickles my tongue
tingling red wine kisses
little sips of you
pale fingers caress shadows
cinders spear lambent gazes
never wandering eyes
tease my vibe
you are the bee
who robs my hive
unfolding myself beside you
will this last?
you ask
shivering autumnal sun
folded legs tucked under mine
petals of fallen white
holding me
shaping your outline
a nimbus of startling height
passes above us
our love
falls before us
we are a tangle of consciousness
steep and wild
merging rivers crashing together
hidden in veils of light
small wild fruit grows upon your
banks
stop and speak
to me
your silk-blue eyes
purple crescent skies
plum blossoms inhale you
I steal your smiles
cup them inside my heart
trap them inside your warmth
hold me lovely tell me I’m yours
you will come dazzling beside me
risen from jelly shaking your soul
I calm your tremors
kissing you lightly on night’s wind
this world hints of you
your rise and fall
inhaling a life we built together
exhaling empires we destroyed
forever promises eternity
love demands it
—we rise mountains
smooth summits—
sail thermals
energy
Quest April 2022
April 2022
One lives in the hope of becoming a memory. —Antonio Porchia
Articles
What is Memory?
I am terrible at remembering names. I have tried all of the tricks to be able to do that, but nope, not for me. Thank goodness for name tags! Read more »
Notice of the CLF Annual Meeting
Per Article VII, Sections 1 and 2, of the Church of the Larger Fellowship (CLF) Bylaws, the 49th Annual Meeting will be held via video/telephone conference call and screen sharing on Sunday, June 5, 2021 at 7:00PM EDT. Read more »
The Shape of Memory
A phrase landed in me during the week that my mother was dying, as I grasped at any words I could find to make sense of the enormous shift in front of me. Read more »
