New UUCE Church Blessing

The Unitarian Universalist Church of Eugene has a new home!
The UUCE has outgrown its current home on 40th and Donald, and so a new building is needed. With that in mind, the UUCE finalized the purchase of the Scottish Rite Temple on 13th and Chambers in Eugene in late March, with the intention of making our new church home.

It was decided that the old energy from the previous occupants needed to be cleared out, and the Spirit of UUCE invited into the new building.  With that in mind, CUUPs, as well as a couple of other groups from the UUCE, had a meeting and put together a cleansing and blessing ceremony.  Everyone was invited to attend.

We had about 15 in attendance for the clearing, with 35 in attendance for the blessing ceremony.  To start off, we went through every room of the new building, opening all the doors and cupboards, repeating a banishing chant in each room, while ringing bells, shaking rattles, and beating drums, to drive out the old energy.  Even the loft and the area under the stage were not left out.  Then, once everyone else had shown up at the appointed time, it was time to cast the circle, and do the water blessing.

One of our CUUPs members marked the circle with a very large sword.  She also drew the invoking pentacle once each quarter was called at the appropriate areas outside of the building.  While she was marking the circle, the rest of us followed behind her, beating drums, shaking rattles, and ringing bells to raise energy. 

Once the circle was cast, we all went back into the entryway of the building, and sat in a circle around the alter.  One of our UUCE members started the water blessing ceremony by pouring a small amount of water that she had brought into a large bowl, while saying what she wished for the new building.  Then she took a small amount of salt from a dish on the alter and dropped it into the large bowl with the water, to purify the water.  Then we were all invited to come up and do the same with water that we had either brought with us from home, or with the blessed water that the UUCE had provided for the occasion.  Things wished included Joy, Learning, Reason, Love, Respect, Laughter, Fun, and Tolerance.  It was a very laughter-filled ceremony. 

Once that was done, the water was ladled out into smaller dishes, which were passed out to attendees, along with sprigs of lavender and rosemary.  The instructions were given to go into every room in the building and sprinkle water around, while closing doors, cupboards and drawers that had been left open.  Each water bearer had others with them making joyful noise to welcome the Spirit of UUCE into the building.

 When the whole building had been covered, we gathered in one of the largest rooms, and closed the ceremony with a song and a chant, followed by fellowship over some refreshments.