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This past summer the Episcopal Church held its General Convention in Anaheim California. Sunday morning we'll hear a report about the actions at the convention from John Wood Goldsack, Chancellor for the Diocese of New Jersey and a deputy at eight prior conventions, and Dennis Wisnom, a member of St. Stephen's Schenectady who attended the Convention as a volunteer. Bring your coffee and come to the Gerber library after the 10 am service.

The Feast of All Saints is a time when we remember the many saints of the church. This Sunday we will be joined by several saints at the 10 a.m. service. We will also enjoy music played by the College of Saint Rose Brass Quintet. Come and learn more about those pious and holy people in heaven!

Saturday morning parish leaders are urged to attend the Fall conference where we will continue our discussions from our Leadership Conference last March. We'll be focusing on making concrete plans for next year and working with all our ministries to prepare the 2010 budget. The Finance Committee will introduce a new budget planning process which will help ministries in planning and presenting budget requests. Participation in the Leadership Conference by all parish leaders will help ensure that this new process gets a good start. The conference will begin at 9am and run until about 1 pm.

We are looking for additional funds for the Haiti mission trip. These funds will be used to purchase materials when in Haiti including school, medical and other supplies for the school, medical supplies for the school, a lunch for the children of the St. Jacques school (250 children), funds to supplement teacher's salaries for the next 6 months and donations to the parishes of St. Jacques- Lahoye and the Church of the Holy Spirit-Lascahobas. We are hoping to raise an additional $1,500. Thank you for your ongoing generosity - The St. Andrew's Haiti Mission Team, Edge Bagg, Rev. Mary White, Rob Lillpopp and Cindy Schmehl (of St. John's, Troy)

It's a Small World, part two

The unstoppable team of Pren and Frieda Carnell were on the road again recently and busy ferreting out old parish friends! They stopped in Salisbury, Maryland where they looked up the Reverend Frieda Malcolm, rector of St. Alban's. The Reverend Malcolm was a member of St. Andrew's in the late 1970's while she attended graduate school at SUNY Albany. Pren and Freida kindly shared a picture of Mother Malcolm.

Volunteers Needed

As winter approaches the situation for the homeless persons in Albany goes from serious to critical. The Capital City Rescue Mission does not have enough beds to shelter the city's growing homeless population each night. St. Peter's Episcopal Church in downtown Albany is planning to use their space as an overflow shelter this winter. Partners in Outreach, representing many of the Episcopal churches located in and around Albany, has offered to assist St. Peter's in staffing this new shelter. Volunteers are needed to spend a night once or twice this winter at the shelter. If you feel called to this very important ministry please contact Martha Iannacone to sign up and get more information.