St. Paul's 2021

  Reflection November 22 was the day my stepfather died. None of you would know that. He was the love of my mother’s life and for many years was a father figure to me. It was also of course the day that John Kennedy was killed in 1963, an event that many of us have etched in our memories. What many people don’t realize is that it was also the day that Clive Staples Lewis died. He was more commonly known as C.S. Lewis. I first encountered Lewis’s writings when I was in junior high. One of the priest chaplains at a church summer camp gave a talk on the novel  Perelandra . He described it as a metaphor for what human life might be like without sin, or at least with sin completely redeemed. It was perhaps the first time in my life that I became aware of a piece of fiction trying to communicate the most significant things about life. I subsequently read every piece of fiction that Lewis wrote and most of his nonfiction work. He became a key figure in my own conversion to Christian ...

  To the saints at St. Paul’s, Monroe, NC I said last Sunday that we would be scheduling Christmas this past week. It has been a busy week and it will end with a virtual diocesan convention. We did, however, map out the basic schedule of worship for Advent and Christmas. Date Note Advent 1: Nov. 28 Begin consecrated wine from individual cups Advent 3: Dec. 12 8 am Eucharist Advent 3 10 am Lessons & Carols   (with communion from Reserved Sacrament) Christmas Eve 4:30 pm Music Christmas Eve Eucharist 5:00 pm Beginning with Advent, you will also receive via email a series of “thought questions.” These are intended to allow the congregation to participate in our preparation for confirmation at the Bishop’s visit in January. You will receive self-reflective questions in 4 areas: Where is God in your life? Where is God already moving? Where are the forces holding back God’s grace? What truths do you embrace and desire to vow to God? Where is God calling you to proclaim and perfo...

  November Rector Report The Rev. Dale C. Hathaway The highlight of the last month was the baptism of the Colt's grandchildren. It was a satisfying experience for me and I think for others as well. Nicci and I have slowly begun to reintroduce regular office hours. As I have continued to spend some time at the church, I've had the opportunity to meet some of the people coming and going, particularly those involved with Loaves and Fishes . I'm one of those occasions I got to meet Michael Moore who is the head of Loaves and Fishes. I am eager to learn how the ministry fits into the larger ministry of the church. One of my general concerns with the office and administrative work of the church has to do with the way in which files and technical tools are located in personal accounts rather than in the Church's own accounts. From my perspective I note the following: Sharing files in Google drive seems to be a good way to make things available to others, e.g. the vestry, and t...

As I begin writing this essay, Halloween is one day away. We’re planning to help carve pumpkins this afternoon. But I also want to make it clear at the outset that this is not an expert who is doing the writing. I am not an expert. I'm not an expert on Halloween nor anything else. In fact most of my life I have thought less of myself because I was not an expert at anything. I was never at the top of the class at something or other. In seminary one of my teachers said to me many years ago, maybe you’re meant to be a generalist instead of a specialist. It took me a long time to accept that judgment, but I’m finally getting there. I write as a generalist, as someone who thinks about things, as someone who asks questions of things, and as someone who sometimes makes connections between things. That's what I'm trying to do here. In the last week, with Halloween approaching, I have seen many posters and decorations that leave me cold. Themes of death and spooky scenes. Skulls. ...

  Baptism We're scheduled to celebrate Holy Baptism on All Saints Sunday, Nov. 7. It seemed to me that it might be useful to reflect on "baptism" in general as we approach this watershed time in the lives of Bill and Melody's grandchildren, Anna Claire Powell and Reid William Taylor. One of the songs I love to sing on that day is "When the saints go marching in." It's not because I'm a New Orleans Saints fan. It is, perhaps, because in my teens I adored the music of Louis Armstrong. For me, the inclusion of Jazz music into the liturgy brings joy to my smile. Memorably the first verse includes: Oh, when the saints go marching in Oh Lord I want to be in that number We might associate that with a future time of deliverance. The original song no doubt did. But it has always been for me a song very much about the living. Dancing, processing, with vibrancy and passion. That's the tone that the service of baptism has for me. Baptism ritual As...

  Questions about healing. Even before we moved to Monroe, I began asking parishioners at St. Paul's, "How can I help?" This was modeled after a TV series that Mary Pat and I enjoy where the head of a hospital regularly responds to people who come to him with problems, "How can I help?" Again and again I would hear the response, "We need healing." Healing . I have long known that the word and concept of healing was not as simple as it sounds. I wonder to myself what does even the word mean? What does the person using the word mean? It means a myriad different things, depending on the person and the circumstance. Dictionary meanings include: cure, fix, mend, rehabilitate . One line of thought would have it that healing is essentially "transcending suffering." I have heard preachers and teachers over the years emphasize that healing and wholeness are related; so the word would mean "becoming whole." Healing and wholeness are bo...

  A Church That Looks and Acts Like Jesus COME AND SEE … We are becoming a new and  re -formed church,  the Episcopal branch of the Jesus Movement— individuals, small gathered communities and congregations whose way of life is the way of Jesus and his way of love,  no longer  centered on empire and establishment,  no longer  fixated on preserving institutions, no longer  shoring up white supremacy or anything else that hurts or harms any child of God. By God’s grace … … WE ARE BECOMING A CHURCH THAT LOOKS AND ACTS LIKE JESUS. What does this re -formation look like in practice? We’ll know we’re moving forward when we… Center on Jesus Christ . His teachings, his example, his Spirit, his way of love and his way of life are the key to having loving, liberating and life-giving relationships with God, our neighbors, all of creation, and ourselves. Practice the selfless, self-giving way of the cross . The way of “cruciform love”—Jesus’ act of unselfish, sacrificial, self...