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- Written by: Tina Huesing, USA, ICUUW President
Dear members and friends,
We are looking back on 2024, a year with lots of highlights for ICUUWomen.
Karen Kortsch, who had served on the board for six years and as our Board President for the last four years, stepped down from her post due to term limits. The Board elected me as the incoming President, and the first thing I did was ask Karen to continue to serve our organization as immediate past-president. Karen is now serving in this role and attending Board meetings. I hope to make this a permanent Bylaw change. It is so important to have continuity.
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- Written by: Renee Hills, Australia
Colourful Hungarian traditional costumes; pride in handicrafts and cultural roots; deepening understanding of Unitarian history in Transylvania (a part of Romania that was Hungarian before WWI); radical Hungarian hospitality; greeting Unitarian friends from distant countries; meeting people I’d only ever seen on Zoom; finding sisters in unexpected places; sharing stories; soaking up the wisdom of so many impressive women – these were just a few of the inspiring moments at the 4th International Convocation of Unitarian Universalist Women held in Cluj-Napoca (Kolozsvár in Hungarian) in Romania 5th-8th September, 2024.
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- Written by: Karen Kortsch, Illinois, USA
This was my second trip to Transylvania. My first trip for the ICUUW convocation in 2012 was very enlightening as I was a "newbie" to ICUUW and did not know what to expect at the time. This time I had a much better understanding of our organization and was eager to learn more about what could be done to link women of the different Unitarian and UU faith traditions.
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- Written by: Outreach Committee Co-Chairs Denise Tracy and Julie Steinbach
As the saying goes, ICUUW is “one of the best kept secrets” in the UUA. With the closing of the UU-UN Office and the dissolution of the UU Partner Church Council and International Council of Unitarians and Universalists (ICUU), ICUUW is currently the only international U/U organization engaging in international programs and working actively at the UN - and yet many UUs don't know we exist. We have maintained a consistent membership of about 100 members from 16 countries (Australia, Bolivia, Burundi, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Japan, Kenya, Philippines, Poland, Romania, Uganda, and the United States). Outreach is tasked with the responsibility of getting the word out about who we are and what we do.
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- Written by: Vicki Roberts-Gassler
Many of our local congregations have women’s groups with social justice goals. All our members are invited to share ideas from their groups in our ICUUW newsletter. I’ll start…
Around 15 years ago, at EUUC in Edmonds, Washington, just north of Seattle, a group of members read and discussed the book Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. This journalist couple wrote about several major types of oppression of women and girls, particularly in Africa and Asia, for example sex trafficking, neglect of health, and exclusion from education. They outlined some effective solutions and suggested ways people could raise money to help.