We had 12 hearty souls for the 7pm Epiphany service. The service began in darkness as the Magi approached the manger with a selection from the beginning of the Isaiah 60 reading, followed by words from the priest imploring God to “enfold us with the radiance of this light” so the Holy Spirit would “shine into our hearts.” The candles were lit and another reading mentioning the “leading of a star you manifested your only Son to the peoples of the earth.”
Photos
Events that made a difference – 2019
One of the threads that runs through 2019 is extending our reach and activities through the Port Royal Community and beyond.
You can see it in the Spanish Bible Study that started in Lent and continued through the year. Like most ministries there are mutual benefits. It allows the people in the congregation who speak or learning the language to converse with native Spanish speakers in a common language – scripture.
The children’s summer program was a multi-week program in the summer bringing children together from Port Royal and those from St. Peter’s to the Parish House for cooking, fellowship and Bible study. This was an extension of the one day program on Maundy Thursday which we have done for several years and also this year “Cooking with the Kids” in March.
We also walked with Shiloh Baptist in the MS Walk in May continuing the work done in 2018 to promote participation with our neighboring churches. The path took us around Port Royal twice and then around the village square – 3+ miles. It is a good cause which made over $880. There were 30-40 walkers including 7 from St. Peter’s.
We reached out to other churches with the Way of Beauty Retreat. To find what gives you harmony in your life, the moral condition of good, the things that are harmonious, blessed, good and satisfying are all part of living the way of beauty. The mindset of The Way of Beauty gave the Navajo people the strength to persevere and to survive the ordeal in the forced walk to Ft. Sumner in Arizona.
We created a “Blue Christmas Service” held on Dec. 22 for those not in Christmas spirit feeling sad, lonely, or depressed. We partnered with Connexion, choir from Colonial Beach to bring light in our midst with their music. They sang “Lully, Lulla, Lullay” and the “Seal Lullaby” while candles were lit on the altar.
We continued our relationship with Essex and the Baptist Church with “Hunters for the Hungry” which we have done for 5 years. The program is coordinated through the Baptist churches in Essex County. Hunters store the deer in a truck with Champlain. Johnny and Cookie Davis filled Caroline’s social service empty freezer with packaged meat and ground meat for burgers.
It is easy to forget the events we do monthly/weekly in this connection. We celebrated 5 years of the Village Harvest, our food ministry and continued the Village Dinners on the second Wednesday of the month as well as weekly Ecumenical Bible Study. Through funds collected through the Village Dinners and other events, the ECW was able to distribute $2,750 to charities at the end of the year.
We also furthered our relationship with the environment with the Season of Creation during September and the purchase of a new composter. The season focuses on the role of God as Creator and Jesus dwelling in nature as one of us to bring us abundant life. We had a procession of parishioners bringing up a part of nature to the altar. Catherine led Christian Ed during September to places in the world with a spiritual emphasis. Several sermons has the Season of Creation as their main focus.
Memorial Day, 2022, May 30
From the National Cathedral service, 2017
Although the exact origins of Memorial Day are disputed, the first observance of Memorial Day is thought to have taken place in April 1865, when a group of former slaves gathered at a Charleston, SC horse track turned Confederate prison where more than 250 Union soldiers had died. The bodies of soldiers buried in a mass grave were reinterred in individual graves on the site. On May 1, 1865, some 10,000 black Charleston residents, white missionaries, teachers, schoolchildren and Union troops marched around the Planters’ Race Course, singing and carrying armfuls of roses.
Jamaica team in Jamaica
The St Peters mission team shown here—Ken Pogue, Johnny and Cookie Davis, Laura Carey, Jan Saylor and not pictured, Andrea Pogue and Catherine Hicks, along with members of Andrea’s family, spent Friday unpacking supplies and getting the bookbags stuffed and ready for the distribution. This photograph was taken in one of the classrooms for the older children.
Lessons and Carols, Dec. 30, 2018
Lessons and Carols is traditionally presented on the Sunday after Christmas. Where the Christmas lessons are specific on the birth of Jesus, Lessons and Carols puts the event in perspective covering the earlier Old Testament as well as the New Testament events leading up to Christ’s birth.
The service, first held after World War I in 1918, was planned by Eric Milner-White, who at the age of thirty-four had just been appointed Dean of King’s College. His experience as an army chaplain had convinced him that the Church of England needed more imaginative worship.
Christmas Eve, Dec. 24, 2018
This year there was expanded music before the service. We had Marilyn and a student playing the harp, Mary Peterman and Denise Gregory on flute and piano, the Choir, the Choir and violin (Helmut), the Choir and flute and in the gallery Thom Guthrie was a second organist. Selections of these works are the videos page.
Christmas Play, 2018
Advent 4 is traditionally the Christmas Play. Here is a review of the past plays. It is kept fresh with each play written for that year though you can expect to see the usual characters – angels, shepherds and sheep. There seems to be a part for everyone which makes this play unique. The bulletin is here. We had 58 in attendance on a beautiful sunny Sunday, with moderate temperatures, for a change.
This year the play is not inserted in a separate service but was almost the entire service. We did light the 4th Advent candle and drew the winner of 3 water colors with the proceeds going to the Heifer Project. (The paintings were graciously donated by Mary Peterman). $200 was raised.
The Diverse Sunday, Nov. 11, 2018
A diverse Sunday – A remembrance at the end of World War I, a baptism, the beginning of the Heifer Project. And a beautiful fall day with a bite in the air and leaves crunching under your feet. We had 49 on hand for this Sunday.
We tolled our Meneely Bell bell and sang “God of our Fathers” at the beginning of the service as the war ended at 11am, on Nov 1918 exactly a 100 years earlier. The belfry was restored in 2010.
The sermon was unique. “And today is all about being all in. So, with the help of your imaginations, I want to check in with several people who are all in.” During the sermon Catherine used props and dressed as the widow of Zarephath, scribes 2,000 year ago, the Widows Mite, her grandfather William Delbridge a veteran of World War I, and Don West founder of the Heifer Project.
Evening Eucharist for Children, Oct. 28, 2018
We had 23 in the Service at 4:30pm that was entitled an Evening Eucharist for children. It was both a service and snack supper. The service blended in Halloween themes and All Saints occurring this week. The children were dressed in costumes ranging from a princess, a pineapple, Dr. Who and even a skunk! The messages were All Saints.
The service began in the front of the church talking about All Saints, who are the saints and then taking candles in jars to some of the graves. Then the service resumed in the church with a youth acolyte. The youth also read the Prayers of the People.
The scriptures were well known – Psalm 23 and Matthew’s Gospel of Jesus walking on the water.
After communion and the final prayers, there was a snack supper. Major help was provided by Elizabeth Heimbach (mouse cookies, macaroni), Brad (cakes), Eunice (pumpkins) and Catherine (jello treats, salad). Becky provided a game of scooping up marshmallows that was a hit!