It was just over five years ago when the pandemic came to my community. I was two years into serving as a religious educator in a UU congregation, and I had no road map for what to do next.

I remember seeing, first a few lone voices on social media, then in trusted news sources, that this new illness — this “pandemic,” a word that seemed to belong to the realms of history and science fiction — was about to affect the lives of everyone I knew. We were on a threshold. Very few of us knew exactly what would or should come next.

So, we paused. We shared information. We grounded in spiritual practices. And we learned.

What sticks in my mind five years later is that I had never personally lived through a world event that would require me to uproot my life and change how I related to everything around me. But I knew how to find out how to do so. I found myself reaching for the stories that my immigrant grandmother had told me about the weekend when her country was swallowed up by another. I recalled how she and her community moved through repression and violence, and I started making maps in my mind of courage, of risks large and small, of holding on to who you are, of change and loss.

I set aside the other things I was meant to be working on, and connected with the groups of people springing up online to share information. I learned about quality masks, doing worship outside, making calls for pastoral care, protecting the vulnerable. New congregational groups sprang up, figuring out permissions for online worship, learning new technology, taking on roles and new teams…and letting go of the roles we thought we were meant to play that year.

Now, in 2025, I know that our faith communities have access to a whole treasure trove of learnings about moving through times of crisis. We have all we learned and practiced in 2020. We have many people in our communities who carry their own stories of wisdom, passed down from communities who have had to protect one another as they laugh and dance and pray and resist, and survive.

And yet, in this moment, I find myself struggling, sometimes, to remember all the things we know how to do. Life in congregational systems is busy. Maybe we’re struggling to put dinner on the table, and it’s hard to reach out for support. Maybe the church has a yard sale coming up. Maybe folks I care for are sick again, or I have ten appointments in the next week, or we just have to get through all the things we had planned for the spring…

So I invite our communities to take some time, at some point, to get together and pause. To notice all that we already know how to do. Faith communities have an especial role to play here. In fact, your community may already be engaged in one or all of these:

• Convening gatherings. Offering a time and place — perhaps where folks are already used to gathering — where we can take stock of what is going on and how it is impacting us, and garner support from one another as we figure out how to do them together. See: Template: “DIY Gathering Guide: Community grounding in times of crisis.”
• Framing extraordinary times. Through naming our current reality to one another, we can be like the child in the wisdom tale who shouts “the emperor has no clothes!” — thus inviting a new kind of conversation. We can offer one another support in holding to truths that are being elided in public spaces. We can offer permission to one another to act as if we are in extraordinary times, to do what other people around us are not yet doing.
• Focusing collective attention. By slowing down and focusing on what is unique in this moment, we can offer one another permission to reassess what is really needed right now. In times of crisis and challenge, what is really essential to spend our time, attention, resources doing? What are some things we let fall, to make room for what is vital?
• Engaging in community care. Offering comfort, spiritual nourishment, respite, and material care to everyone affected in these times — and especially to those whose livelihoods, emotional safety, and dignity are being targeted.
• Grounding in spirituality for resilience. Helping our communities slow down, acknowledge all that is impacting us, be present to grief and change, and get grounded to sustain focused action.

Sometimes in crisis, we need someone else to help us pause all the busy things we were planning to do, and to gather together and ask ourselves instead: What is the moment we are in? What are the touchstones and relationships which can nourish our individual and communal response? And what songs do we need to sing together, what stories do we need to hear, what truths do we need to speak, to be able to move through this moment faithfully?

And then, to set aside enough time and space to sing those songs, and to tell those stories. And to move through the moment, together.

In February, the CER team led a community call helping us pause and be present to what we know how to do in times of crisis and challenge. If you wish to set aside time in your own community to do these things, I offer you this adaptable template for convening and facilitating your gathering. You may want to use it during your regular small-group ministry gatherings, on a Sunday morning, or on a special call. Template: “DIY Gathering Guide: Community grounding in times of crisis.” Don’t hesitate to reach out to your Primary Contact for consultation or to share how it goes.

And finally — you don’t have to do any of this alone. I recommend attending The Gathering monthly hosted by the UUA’s Side With Love — nourishment and guidance through these times.

PS — if you missed it, our CER team put together the following pastoral message to you and your community, with our love.

PPS — Don’t forget to check the UUA’s Community Resilience Hub for ongoing updates and resources.