Central Union Windward UCC

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Shop is closed on the 4th of July Saturday. >
We have wide selection of housewares, bedding, toys, DVDs, Books and much more. Cash or personal check only please.
Open Wednesdays and Saturdays 9:00 am to 1:00 pm * Address : 38 Kaneohe Bay Drive, Kailua (Across from Aikahi Park Shopping Center)
Donations of clean and reusable items are welcome. Please drop donation items off in shop during business hours.
****** For furniture and bulk items donation; pickup upon request; please contact 808-398-2691, ******

We invite you to join us for a very special Father's Day celebration this Sunday featuring E Ho'onani i ke Akua me ka hula halau (Glorifying God Through Dance) along with our own Chancel Singers accompanied by Kaimalino Serenaders Jan Wakamatsu and Virginia Kawauchi on ukuleles.

The service begins at 10am with Refreshments afterwards in The Gazebo.
All are welcome and celebrated!

The Greek language is rich in diversity. In Greek there are
seven different ways of saying “Love.”

The Greek word “Agape” is used by Jesus in John 21: 15-17. Jesus says to Peter, “Do you ‘Agape’ me?”
“Agape” means inclusive, selfless, all encompassing love.
Peter, in response, uses a different word for love - “Philios" friendship, personal affection as in a one-on-one encounter.
Jesus says, “Feed the Lambs.”

A second time Jesus says to Peter, “Do you ‘Agape’ me?” Tend my Sheep.”

A third time Jesus says, “I know you have affection for me. Now - feed my sheep.”

All meaning of love from Jesus’ mouth is to take care of the other - not the self. Peter seems to have difficulty comprehending that. The challenge given to Peter is to reformulate his thinking.

God’s love, which Jesus proclaims, is a focus on expressing
and living from heart felt experience. Jesus is not asking for
reciprocity. [The love He is proclaiming] is not friendship. It is love as service in awareness of the consequences of all forms of indifference, exclusion and self-serving.

“Agape” love is not common human experience. It is “Love” in the context of greater understanding of being inclusive, sensitive, and selfless. Jesus has given Peter three pointers of true love: Care for the newbies, tend the flock, and feed the world with Agape.

To love from the place of “Agape” as Jesus calls Peter to do, is the beginning of daily reflection, in prayer and contemplation, of
practicing the ministry as modeled by Jesus.

To love from “Agape” is an act of surrender and trust which ventures into uncharted waters. We are to be to others what God has been to us, all giving, all inclusive, all compassion.

To LIVE “Agape” is an act of remembering, of attempting to see and hear, from the internal presence of God within each of us. God’s perspective of totality and constant renewal of love is a universal calling into the ministry of Jesus. While not an easy venture, God stands with us, in us, and for us, and acts though us.
My sisters and brothers, “Feed My Sheep.”

Kahu Richard Walenta
Excerpt from the sermon entitled, "Love Is Letting Go Of Fear" Central Union Windward United Church of Christ
May 1, 2026

"Each and every thing we do to extend compassion, to blaze a path toward justice, to stem hatred and make blessedly real our love of neighbor is a crucial building block of peacemaking in our time."

-Rev. Shari Prestemon
Associate General Minister, Love of Neighbor & Co-Executive of Global Ministries

👉🏾 Read the full Witness for Justice message: https://ow.ly/2jif50Z3f3K

“Woman Acts As God’s Dynamic Word”

In our Gospel lesson for today (Luke 8:19-21), Jesus is not denying the value of his relationship to our birth mothers. He is stating that the status of woman is more than just her birthing act. Here Jesus says that womanhood is a gateway into the ‘Kingdom of Heaven.’

Every woman’s womb is the enactment of the day of creation.
Every woman is Jesus’ mother when she sees and hears the
presence of God in everyone. Those who do are Jesus’ ‘Spirit
Mother.’ It is a bold act by Jesus to expand the meaning of
motherhood as a fulfillment of the pulse of all creation. The eyes of Jesus saw beyond our biological motherhood to profound
inclusive rhythms of divine feminine mystery…

In the time of Jesus the idea of God was male, women obeyed.
Jesus is bold in his assertion that we move away from our comfort zone of knowing. He calls for an expansion of consciousness by looking beyond the held belief to include an essential property of women. He does not challenge the fatherhood of God, but he sees the power and authority of woman as vital for entrance into the coming New Age.

Theologically, In the last hundred years there has been great
and exciting new views of women in authority. Starting with women’s suffrage, the Protestant elevation of woman to full ordination status, the brilliance of woman theologians, the election in both houses of Congress and the initiation of Title Nine (which prohibits s*x discrimination in federally funded education) by our own Senator Patsy Mink.

No longer can we view inequality as inherent.

Yet today we must face the fact that Title Nine has not been
ratified. Rather, we are facing a new form of radical, racist white
male fascism in “Christian Nationalism.” The leaders of the
Protestant evangelical posture have accused woman’s liberation
of home breaking, family violating, godless, gay assaults on
traditional values.

What if we were to envision creation from the womb not the
word? What if creation was told from the power and pain of the
birthing womb, rather than the often endless, mindless,
meandering of male dominance? How different would the universal creation story influence the foundation for personal identity choices and species survival.

I think for this Mother’s Day it would be a wonderful challenge to envision what theology would be like if we were to say, “In the beginning “SHE” created the heavens and the earth.” What would the creation story be like if we looked with modern eyes at creation gestating, risking, bearing pain, nurturing, revealing as true creation rather than a dominance of authority?

A few years ago my daughter-in-law gave me a book, "Matrix"
by Lauren Groff. The story is that of a nunnery evolving to be an intentional community. The focus was on developing consistent respect for the women there. As the women met external male challenges, it became clear that the systems of male dominance only enhances the poverty of spirit in us all. The woman ‘stood’ to the challenge.

The most powerful moment for me came at a time when the
Mother Superior had a vision of a different story concerning
creation at the beginning of the world. I will read it with some
paraphrasing. I ask you for a moment now to listen fully without opinion and to look deep into the spirit resources of your heart to envision creation anew.

“In the beginning there was the immensity of Mother God
brooding over the dark face of the waters like a great Hen.

From her brooding there fell the shining eggs of creation. The
eggs cracked open, spilling in order of their manifestation what
they held inside.

On the first day, a great gift from out of her womb came upon the void, God’s light splitting into night and day.

The second egg billowed into the making of the skies.

The third day, the nectar of her effluence bathed all around, creating the ground of impact, the seas, and the fruits of life.

The fourth day, yoking the sky came forth the sun, the moon and
the stars.

The fifth day all the beast of the air and water emerged from the
effluence of her grace.

On the sixth the earth became abundant bearing forth all the
beasts of the land and our first parents. But the bodies of the first
humans lay still upon the ground as though dolls made of mud.

Then the great Mother God stirred up a wind that blew over the
whole new land, sea and forest. The great spirit wind breathed life into the bodies. They stirred, sat and looked at all the beauty of creation. For this was the Holy Spirit, which like a midwife, kisses the birth from babies mouth and frees us into life.

On the seventh day the earth Mother, nearly exhausted by her
labors, held the harmonized earth, sky and seas in her hand
and said, ‘This is the goal of creation! It is beautiful, complete,
inclusive, balanced for all I create. It is the Gospel, the Good
News.”

This is a Gospel story for today.
And so it is.

Kahu Richard Walenta, Mother's Day, May 10, 2026
Central Union Windward United Church of Christ