Hancock UCC Weekly Messenger for May 24, 2026

As the Spirit was moving over the waters / Spirit come, move over us / Come rest on us, come rest on us

Fire and wind, come do it again! / Open up the gates, / Let heaven on in / Come rest on us! Come rest on us!

Choir rehearsals are on Sunday mornings at 9:10am. All are welcome.

Sunday, June 14 our Sabbatical Minister, Hannah Mondrach will join us. Please plan to stay after church for Coffee Hour. We will all have a chance to say hello to Hannah in the Fellowship Hall and start to get to know one another. Her first official Sunday with us is July 5^th!

The Meditation Group meets Friday mornings, at 9:00am in the Fellowship Hall. Reach out to Pastor TJ or Alison Boden with any questions. All are welcome!

(revtjmack@gmail.com, 207-323-6743 or aboden3321@gmail.com, 609-865-3236)

Our meetings are open to all. Please let Vicky know if you would like a link to attend via ZOOM. Upcoming April meetings:

Outreach will meet Thursday, May 21 at 4:30 pm

Memorial Day Breakfast and Observance in Hancock

The Union Congregational Church of Hancock will host Breakfast on the Green at the Town’s Memorial Day Ceremony at the Hancock Village Memorial Lot on Monday, May 25. The Lot is located at the intersection of Point Road and US Route 1. Breakfast sandwiches, breakfast burritos, muffins, coffee, water and juice boxes will be available for purchase beginning at 8:30 am prior to the start of the Ceremony.

The Memorial Day Observance activities will start at 9:20 am when the community parade contingents gather at the Hancock Women’s Club parking lot. The Hancock Grammar School Band, members and vehicles of the Hancock Volunteer Fire Department, and other community groups will proceed to the Memorial Lot at 9:30 am to begin the Observance Ceremony. Posting of the Colors by the Fire Department Honor Guard, music selections by the Grammar School Band, and remarks by Hancock Navy Veteran Christie Dyer will follow.

Information supplied by: David Wildes, dwildes001@roadrunner.com; 422-3739

Your Returnable Bottles and Cans Provide Easy Help for Hungry Students -

Although the school year is coming to an end, the Backpack Food Program at the Hancock Grammar School will continue to provide assistance to food insecure families throughout the summer and into the coming school year. Deposit bottles and cans collected by church members and friends have provided a steady stream of income to help support this program. A check for $150 was delivered this week representing donations collected since January.

Please continue to save your cans and bottles so we can continue this easy support of this critical food assistance program. Call David Wildes (422-3739) if you would like a bottle pickup or just bring them to the church whenever you can. A few 5 cent and 15 cent cans and bottles can add up to a significant donation to support this very worthy cause. Thank you for your participation.

Save the Dates

●     Sunday, May 31st will be an opportunity to hear our Conference Minister, Rev. Dr. Marisa Laviola preach in our congregation. A great morning to be in the pews or online and then stay for Fellowship Time and conversation!

●     It is time to start planning our retreat to Pilgrim Lodge for Lighten Up Loosen Up (LULU) camp for adults, June 17-20.

We always have a wonderful time. Stay all three nights or only one or two. Join Pastor TJ and others for the schedule that works best for you. Let’s spend time with old and new friends at PL!

 On Friday, June 5, at 7:00 pm the Historical Society and Hancock Women’s Club will present a program about the two cabarets held in the 70’s and 80’s. A film of the later group will be shown. Participants from both cabarets will be present. Myrna Coffin will lead the panel discussion. You do not want to miss this!

 Remaining May Birthdays

24: Erva Pinkham  26: Vicky Espling  27: Andrea Bernard  29: *Sally Knapp

Please keep the following people in your prayers this week:

Prayers for all God’s creation, that peace may prevail here and around the world. Our prayers remain with Aaron & Ashley, Lincoln & Debbie, Alex & Savannah, Andrew & Tamara, Tyler Crabtree and all of their families. We pray for all those who live and work at Golden Acres. Prayers for BJ and the Raymonds. Prayers for Tracey Arsenault and Joe MacKay as they both await test results. We pray for all those who are saddled with grief, ancient or new; and for Charlotte and others struggling with depression. We pray for Sonny & Gerry; Sarina’s dad James, Scott; Dean; David; Don; Dexter B.; Cynthia W.; Judith C.; Hollis & Debbie; Ira & Ginny; Bruce’s sister Lynn; Kirk; Ruth & Peter; Patrice’s step-sister Patricia; Herbie Lounder; Sandy Phippen; David Mack; Sue Davies; Sue Davenport; and James B. Prayers for all in Hospice Care and for all caregivers. Prayers for all that are unsafe, unhoused, hungry & in need of care & compassion. Prayers for individuals and families affected by addictions. Prayers for those who are experiencing family conflict; and prayers for all that is in your heart…

The Vital Nature of Camp

A Message from Liz Charles McGough, Pilgrim Lodge Director

At Pilgrim Lodge, we’ve been open now for about a month. It has been a whirlwind as we’ve already hosted our volunteer Jump Start Work Days, our Kick-Off Retreat for our summer volunteers to get oriented for the season, a church retreat and three non-profit organizations for their retreats (if I have been slow to respond to an email you’ve sent me, this is why!). At the same time (when I do sit down behind my computer), I get to see the campers popping into our registration system as they get signed up for camp. Right now, our registrations are trending 25% ahead of this point last year. Each year that we have been open since the two summers of pandemic closure, we have seen a growth in camper engagement to the point that we are serving as many campers now as in the pre-pandemic era. When I consider all that I am witnessing in an uptick in campers, more rental groups bringing their programs to camp and people volunteering to be part of this energizing experience, I see a yearning among people to be together. As I get the honor of watching people return to camp and witness their interactions with each other in the natural environment that surrounds us, the word that resonates for me is “vitality.”

   vitality (noun): 1590s, "the exhibiting of the capacities of animation or life," from

   Latin vitalitatem (nominative vitalitas) "vital force, life," from vitalis "pertaining to life"

The word “vital” (adj: "of or pertaining to the animating principle; manifesting life") appears in our camp philosophy: “We believe that intentional periods of living together, seeing the divine in one another and sharing in appreciation of the beauty of the earth, gives our spirits a chance to open to life in a real and vital manner. We believe in providing space to slow down the rapid pace of modern life in order to tend to community.” In other words, we believe that camp is life-giving.

Woven throughout all our programming this summer, we seek to bring vitality into the experience that we offer our campers. Through our Character at Camp program, we’ve been clarifying our goals to create a restorative culture at camp. More important than any specific strategy is the restorative mindset: how we choose to be with one another. We draw on “Seven Core Assumptions” from the work of Carolyn Boyes-Watson and Kay Pranis as derived from and built on Indigenous teachings and other wisdom traditions. They ground our restorative practice:

   1. The true self in everyone is good, wise, and powerful.

   2. The world is profoundly interconnected.

   3. All human beings have a deep desire to be in a good relationship.

   4. All human beings have gifts, and everyone is needed for what they bring.

   5. Everything we need to make positive change is already here.

   6. Human beings are holistic.

   7. We need practices to build habits of living from the core self.

Through circle practice and activities that develop leadership with empathy at its core, we’ll invite campers into relationships that reflect these assumptions. We hope that the outcome of inviting campers into a community that honors the authenticity of each divine individual is a life-giving experience for each camper.

Our Outreach Programming this summer invites our campers to reflect on their relationship to the sacred space of Pilgrim Lodge, the natural world, and how we can be in relationship with our Wabanaki neighbors, the original stewards of these woods and waters. We’ll invite campers to explore the stories that we find in the natural world with a framing from Robin Wall Kimmerer’s book, “Gathering Moss.” She shares,

“We learn each other’s stories by looking, by watching each other’s way of living. I want to tell the mosses’ story, since their voices are little heard and we have much to learn from them. They have messages of consequence that need to be heard, the perspectives of species other than our own…In indigenous ways of knowing, we say that a thing cannot be understood until it is known by all four aspects of our being: mind, body, emotion, and spirit.”

Through time of exploration in the natural environment around camp, we seek to invite reflection on our shared relationship with the more-than-human life in the world around us. As we enliven a sense of wonder, we hope to simultaneously foster a sense of responsibility to care for the natural world, nurturing a vital relationship with Mother Earth.

Finally, we hope that our campers will carry the vitality that they find at camp into the world beyond when they depart. In our curriculum this summer, “It Only Takes a Spark,” camp will end on the sending out scripture of John 21:1-12 as Jesus speaks to the disciples, “Feed my sheep.” So to, we will invite campers to reflect on what, of the life-giving nature of camp, they will carry into the world as we encourage them to “Pass it On” beyond Pilgrim Lodge.

I enjoy the gift of seeing vitality every day at camp. I feel the energy that results when people come together for time of intention, exploration and connection. The upswing in engagement represents, to me, the satisfaction of our yearning to be together, to be in nature, to connect to the world in a life-giving way. May it be so.

Register for Camp   

Pilgrim Lodge volunteers nurture the life-force of camp.

Volunteer Deans, Counselors, Chaplains and Outdoor Ministry Team members came together with staff to prepare for the season on May 9, 2026.