News from Uniting Church SA
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Tuesday 16 September 2025
Introducing Rev Dr Karina Kreminski
Already well known to UCASA, Karina helps churches and leaders to start up missional initiatives, faith communities and alternative/fresh expressions of church.
Karina has facilitated The Happiness Lab at the Surry Hills Neighbourhood Centre, and is involved in a storytelling project called Surry Hills & Valleys in an inner city village in Sydney. She is on the leadership team at Newtown Mission in Sydney’s inner west.
Karina invests in the neighbourhood and having been an English teacher and journalist has written and blogged on life, spirituality, mission and theology including a book called Urban Spirituality: Embodying God’s Mission in the Neighbourhood.
Karina will deliver the keynote address entitled Growing edges: Signs of hope for the Uniting Church in Australia and facilitate the workshop Embodying God's mission in the neighbourhood.
Renew 2025 – 4 weeks to go!
Renew 2025 is now only 4 weeks away! A whole lot of work is going into ensuring it's an event not to be missed. Don't forget to register soon.
Renew Grant
Exclusive to attendees at Renew, Synod will be offering a new one-off grant for innovative projects flowing from the Renew event, thanks to the support of UC Invest.
Red Dove Café – Grant applications open
Each year, proceeds raised through the Red Dove Café at the Adelaide Royal Show go towards mission activities of the wider Church in South Australia.
One such avenue is through the Red Dove Grant, available to projects that respond to the needs of ‘the least of these’, which is so central to the mission of the Red Dove Café.
Applications for the 2025 Red Dove Grant are now open and close on October 31, 2025. To apply, please complete the form below.
Standing with our neighbours in West Papua – Working with nature against poverty
West Papua is home to some of the world’s richest ecosystems: ancient rainforests, sprawling mangrove swamps, and coral reefs teeming with life. For generations, Indigenous communities have depended on them for food, culture, and survival. But today, climate change is disrupting that balance. One in five children is malnourished, and West Papua remains the poorest province in Indonesia.
Our partner, the Evangelical Christian Church in the Land of Papua, is responding with a bold, faith-led plan: helping families grow food and earn an income in ways that also protect the lands and seas they call home. With support from UnitingWorld and the wider Uniting Church, their vision can impact whole communities for generations to come.
Please consider supporting this worthy cause.
It’s time to end the waiting!
As reported in last week's eNews, the Moderator of the Uniting Church in South Australia, Rev Peter Morel, has added his signature to a national open letter calling for an end to the prolonged waiting faced by refugees and asylum seekers
In 2023, the Synod of South Australia resolved to call all members of the Uniting Church to pray and work for justice for refugees and asylum seekers, and in their long wait for Resolution of Status (RoS) and partner/child visas. As stated in the Uniting Church's Our Vision for a Just Australia, we join with the wider Church in advocating for a fair, robust, and timely process for assessing the protection claims of those seeking asylum.
Over 100 days, from August to November, communities throughout the country are invited to hold a peaceful prayer vigil near MPs offices, praying for justice for people seeking asylum and calling to #EndTheWaiting for thousands of people who have sought safety on our shores but still remain in limbo, facing an uncertain future.
Click the button below to find out more about how you can join in prayer, including attending a prayer vigil in your electorate.
Together, through prayer and action, we can add our voices to the growing call for justice and dignity for those who have waited far too long. For campaign resources and information, visit www.endthewaiting.com.
Season of Creation
1 September – 4 October
Throughout September and into early October, millions of Christians across the world are marking the Season of Creation, an annual invitation to pray, reflect and act in care for the Earth. The Season of Creation website reminds us that:
“Creation is God’s sacred gift, entrusted to our care. Christians are called to protect and nurture Creation in peace, working in partnership with others and passing this responsibility on to future generations. Its deep interconnectedness makes peace both essential and fragile”.
“The world we have known, enjoyed and celebrated is changing rapidly. Biodiversity is being lost at a rate not seen since the last mass extinction. The hope of keeping average temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius is fading. The futures of young people are threatened by the cascading impacts of the loss of biodiversity and a changing climate. Industrialization, colonization and the extraction and consumption of resources have created great wealth, unequally distributed.”
“As an ecumenical family, we can engage in these actions and contribute to ensure that the web of life is preserved and cared for. Our prayers, sermons and liturgies must call for justice not only for humans but for all Creation.”
The UCA has a range of resources available for worship and reflection which can be found here: https://uniting.church/season-of-creation-2025-has-begun/
Events
CMLA visit to Iona information evening – Monday 22 September
The Centre for Music, Liturgy and the Arts (CMLA) is very excited to be taking a group to Iona in Scotland in September 2026. If this interests you, please come along to an Information Evening on Monday 22 September 2025 at 7 pm at Yarthu Apinthi/Uniting College, 312 Sir Donald Bradman Drive, Brooklyn Park.
If you cannot attend in person, we will have a Zoom link.
Please RSVP by 19th September 2025 to admin@cmla.org.au. Please send in any questions you have so we can answer them on the night.
Principles of church renewal
The Presbytery of Southern SA (POSSA) is hosting two sessions providing a unique theological overview of the process of congregational renewal, and principles and practical strategies on how a congregation can find a new future participating in the mission of God.
Guest speaker Tim Hein is the Minister at Malvern Uniting with his wife Priscilla. He recently concluded 14 years on the faculty at Uniting College of Leadership and Theology where he lectured on the subject of Church Revitalisation and Renewal. He is the author of Understanding Sexual Abuse: A Guide for Ministry Leaders & Survivors.
Part One: The Nature and Dynamic of Renewal
7 pm Thursday, 25 September 2025
Part Two: The Process of Renewal
7 pm Thursday, 20 November 2025
Location: Malvern Uniting Church, 44 Marlborough St, Malvern.
RSVP: Email: southern.secretary@sa.uca.org.au
Understanding the Israel and Palestine conflict – Rev Tim Costello
Malvern Uniting Church invites you to an evening with Rev Tim Costello AO on Saturday 11 October 2025, from 7 pm to 9 pm. The event, Understanding the Israel and Palestine Conflict: A Christian Response, will explore the complexities of the conflict and offer reflections from a faith perspective.
Cost is $10 per person, with tea and coffee provided.
Please register online and for more information, contact admin@malvernuc.com
The Polkinghorne Oration – 16 Oct 2025
The Polkinghorne Oration will be held on 16 October 2025 at Adelaide West Uniting Church, 312 Sir Donald Bradman Drive, Brooklyn Park. The event will begin at 7 pm, with doors opening at 6:15 pm.
This year’s guest speaker is Rev Tim Costello AO, who will address the theme, “The Challenge of Our Times: Climate Change in the Context of a Culture in Crisis”.
Tickets are $20 for adults and $15 for concession.
Multifaith Peace Vigil – Pilgrim Uniting Church
In this time of turmoil in the world, you are invited to gather for a time of prayer, candle lighting, and quiet contemplation. Between 4 pm and 6 pm on Friday 26 September at Pilgrim Uniting Church (12 Flinders Street, Adelaide), short prayers or reflections will be offered every half hour by a range of people.
This is a space for solidarity, compassion, and shared hope. All are welcome.
For more information, contact (08) 8212 3295 or email cmegaw@pilgrim.org.au.
Upcoming events
September
October
2 – Is liberal democracy necessary for freedom of faith to survive?
5 – Sunday evenings – Worship through discussion October
11 – Mitcham Village U/C community garden open day
11 – Connect women's conference
11 – Understanding the Israel and Palestine Conflict: A Christian response
12 – Celebrating 150 years of Maitland Uniting Church
12 – The Kym Purling Trio in concert
16 – Polkinghorne Oration with Rev Dr Tim Costello
17–18 – Renew synod resourcing event
News from the Assembly of the Uniting Church in Australia this week includes:
Reflection of the week
What Is Our Lens?
How do we learn to see and appreciate through eyes of love?
—Brian McLaren and Carmen Acevedo Butcher, Learning How to See.
Any of us who wear glasses know the experience of being in the optometrist’s office. You sit behind a machine where the optometrist gradually adjusts a series of lenses to help you get the right prescription to correct faulty vision. There’s a click and the doctor say, “Is that clearer now?” Click again. “Is that clearer or less clear?” Click again. “How about now?”
Some lenses help us see more clearly, others less clearly ...
Father Richard Rohr
Prayer for the week
For the Season of Creation
Creator God,
In this Season of Creation, we give thanks for the beauty and abundance of the earth –
for oceans teeming with life
for skies that proclaim Your glory,
for the land that sustains and nourishes all Your creatures.
Yet even as we rejoice in Your handiwork,
we remember those who wander without a home,
whose lives are caught in the wilderness of waiting –
refugees and asylum seekers,
made in your image,
longing for safety, dignity, and belonging.
Lord of justice and mercy,
you call us to Speak out
for those who cannot speak,
for the rights of all the destitute;
to defend the rights of the poor and needy.
We lift our voices now
for those who are made victims twice over by systems of delay and despair.
We pray for an end to prolonged detention; for policies shaped by compassion, not fear; and for leaders who will act with courage and conscience.
Stir in us the will to welcome,
to advocate, and to accompany those who seek refuge.
May your Church be a sanctuary of hope, and may your Spirit move through us to bring justice to all.
Through Jesus Christ, our liberator.
Amen.
Resources to help people worship and pray together as a gathered community or at home. These resources are generously prepared by Rev Cheryl Wilson.
Positions and placements
Administrative Services Coordinator – The Spire Community – Closes 17 September
Activity Facilitator – Beyond Limits Outdoor Education – Open now
Insurance Officer – Closes 22 September
Centre Manager, Adare – Victor Harbor – Closes 30 September
First Third of Life Ministry Leader – Keiraview Uniting Church, Wollongong, NSW – Closes 7 October
Centre Manager, Tarooki – Robe – Closes 12 October
UC eNews is the weekly email newsletter of the Uniting Church in Australia, Synod of South Australia. If you’d like to include content in UC eNews or on the Synod of South Australia website, please submit it by COB Mondays.
