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Winter, 2005 Update for Members and Volunteers

Contents

UPDATE

For Members and Volunteers

Winter, 2005

 

The printed packet contains:

 

√ 2004-2005 Master Catalog and Winter 2005 Supplement. Our spring Resource Guide will arrive in March. To receiving Lenten materials before Ash Wednesday (Feb. 9), order soon.

 

√ End-of-year appeal (on the front of the Winter Supplement). Please send your pledge or donation promptly. A Pledge Card is enclosed for your convenience. Consider gift memberships or gift certificates.

 

√ 2004 Stakeholder Survey. Alternatives is an interactive organization. We need your opinions. We're even willing to tempt you with a $5 gift certificate. To make Alternatives even more interactive, we're planning a series of "focus group" conference calls in 2005. We hope you'll be willing to serve if asked.

 

√ Ballot for At-Large Members of the Board of Directors. Voting is a member benefit. If you are not yet a dues-paying member or if your membership has lapsed, send your check or pledge with your ballot.

 

√ Winter Update newsletter and reply form.

 

In summary, please return:

  1. Your ballot
  2. Your Stakeholder Survey
  3. Your end-of-year financial support
  4. Your order of resources
  5. Your member/volunteer reply form

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Putting the "W" in SLOW Down

Frankly, our SLOW Down volunteers have been underutilized. We have received fewer requests for their help than we had hoped.

So we're expanding their duties to accomplish part of the NEW Alternatives.

We're putting the "W" in SLOW" - project Workers, especially "local media contacts."

In 2004, we issued a new version of Whose Birthday, our Advent family booklet. Called "Less Is More at Christmas," it's designed for newsstands, bookstores and the general public.

Likewise, we issued a series of radio programs based on the booklet, and volunteers helped contact their local radio stations to seek broadcast.

We activated  volunteers from the SLOW Down Network to help.Thanks!

We plan to continue the radio series.

We are issuing an upgrade of "Simple Living 101," the volunteers handbook, or, as we say, the Activist's Toolbook, to include a new chapter on "W."

We hope you'll want to be a Project Worker too.

 

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Progress Report

To conserve natural resources and to utilize North Americans' changing learning styles, we are producing CDs and DVDs but no more audio or video tape. Also, we have begun web-based audio services and resources with brief messages.

New Resources for 2005:

 

Also, we plan to issue new editions of our annuals:

New Resources for 2006:

 

These very promising resources need sponsors. Can you help?

 

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Time for 2005 Submissions

Contribute to our most widely-read, family-oriented booklet, "Whose Birthday Is It, Anyway?" Send ideas and items before January 15, 2005. Prepare something during the holiday season when it's really on your mind. An item may be new or not, original or not. If it's by someone else, include a complete description of the source.

We print over 100,000 copies and reach many more through our website. We translate much of it into Spanish.

To read past editions 1) order the Whose Birthday Sampler ($10), 2) order "Simply the Best: Over 30 Years of Alternatives" CD-ROM ($15) or visit SimpleLivingWorks.org >> Archives >> Who's Birthday

 

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Alternatives must increase its income and reduce its expenses to stay alive.

Here's what we're doing and how you can help.

  1. Membership renewals will be processed twice a year - winter and summer -- instead of monthly so we can use bulk rate postage instead of first class. Please pay promptly to save us the expense  (and you the annoyance) of multiple reminders.
  2. Full time staff members will work four days a week for at least six months of the year and receive a 20% reduction in salary during those six months.
  3. Appeals will be mailing with the winter and spring Resource Guides, rather than separately.
  4. We are implementing 25 other ideas. We are determined that these cost-saving measures will not interfere with customer service.

 

 

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Audio Work

Angela Iversen (left) and Gabriella Preciado rehearse their lines in Alternatives simple recording booth at The Earth Dome. (Yes, it's a shower.) They are part of the new audio CD "Alternative Christmas Trilogy" (the new "Let's Get off the Christmas Roller Coaster," as well as the vintage programs "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and "The Celebration Revolution of Alexander Scrooge"). Also now on CD is "What Does JESUS Want for Christmas?" These new CDs are $10 each or free for donations of $100 or more.

We plan to reissue the classic "Let Jesus Come, Let Santa Go" featuring Milo Thornberry in 2005, as an audio component of our upgraded "Simple Living 101: Toolbook for Activists Shy or Bold."

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Mostly for Members

Election of At-Large Board Members

Please snip the ballot on the back of this page. Return it in the enclosed business reply envelop to vote for two candidates for three year terms as At-large Members of the Alternatives' Board of Directors. You are welcome to write-in candidates. Write-in candidates will be contacted for future service on the board. You are welcome to nominate another member or yourself at any time. Only members of Alternatives can stand for election as an At-large Member and vote for At-large Members. At-large Members may serve two consecutive three year terms but must stand for election for each term.

 

March 1, 2005 - balloting closes (postmark)

April 11 - two elected members attend board meeting

 

NOMINEES

     Susan Phillips Davies is a bookseller, pastor and coffee shop barista.  She and her husband, David, own and operate a bookstore/coffee shop in Omaha's Old Market. Their mission is to provide hospitality and resources to promote and nourish spiritual life and alternative values.  They do book studies and retreats, resource churches and other groups, and promote fairly traded products.

Susan is a United Methodist pastor and has previously served over 20 years in parish ministry.  During those years she has been active in the areas of peace and social justice - serving in leadership positions, locally and nationally.

"Two great satisfactions for me in this new ministry setting are the direct connection with a wide variety of folk and their passions AND experiencing the creative tension of being a, hopefully successful, retailer amidst the attempt to live out our values of simplicity, justice, equity, respect and non-violence.  Held values are meant to be tested in real life."

 

     Dr. Bruce Forbes is a Professor of Religious Studies at Morningside College in Sioux City, Iowa, and an ordained United Methodist minister. He holds a BA from Morningside College, an MTh from Southern Methodist University, and a PhD from Princeton Theological Seminary. His formal academic training is in the history of Christianity, but he has also developed a special interest in the analysis of popular culture.  He is the co-editor of two books:  Religion and Popular Culture in America (2000) and Rapture, Revelation and the End Times: An Exploration of the Left Behind Series (2004). He is currently working on a history of Christmas, for general readers. In addition to his teaching, he is a frequent guest speaker at local churches and regional conferences.

 

     Greg Hanneman became interested in living simply when he realized that he didn't own his stuff, his stuff owned him. Resources from Alternatives for Simple Living have helped him become aware that a devotion to material possessions can negatively affect the environment as well. He firmly believes that simple living can improve the quality of everyone's life.

Greg has been a parish pastor for 27 years and is presently serving St. John Lutheran Church in Sioux City, Iowa. His wife, Janelle, is a former elementary and preschool teacher. They have a son, Silas, a recent graduate of Grand View College in Des Moines.

On their day off, the Hannemans enjoy reading, walking together, and visiting the staff at Alternatives.

 

Ballot  for At-Large Members of Alternatives' Board of Directors

Members, vote for no more than two (including write-in candidates). Please use the paper ballot you were mailed.

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Double Help

Wouldn't You Like
to Help Alternatives
AND Lower Your Taxes?

 

The Alternatives Endowment is receiving donations. You have many other options while you're still living both to help Alternatives stay healthy and to reduce your tax burden. Be in touch for more information.

 

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Call for Sermons

on Justice & Simple Living

 

"Simple Living: What Christianity Looks Like"

"Simple Living and Justice: The Way of Jesus"

 

Alternatives plans to publish some 20 sermons in "Worship Alternatives" Vol. 2, in 2006.

Don't let this chance pass to share a sermon you have (or someone else has) already written or one that you desperately want to write expressing the strong need for justice and how to accomplish that with the joy of simple living.>

We offer rewards. Submissions are due May 1, 2005. Call for guidelines or visit http://www.simpleliving.org/main/SermonGuidelines.html>

 

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