December 22, 2011
Christmas Eve Services:
~4:00 pm Christmas Family Service St. Dunstan's Church~
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~10:30 pm Christmas Eve Service at the Highlands Chapel~
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Christmas Day Services:
~8 am Highlands Chapel;10:00 am St. Dunstan's Church~
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In This Issue
Next Sunday's Readings
The Christmas story is so important to the Christian experience. All our hymns and carols, prayers and pageants come from those Christmas stories found in scripture. This week, consider reading these stories through on your own. Look for details that you remember and treasure, and let yourself be surprised by details you find or notice anew. Reading and meditating on these scriptures will prepare you to enter into the Christmas worship, and to be transported to that holy space that God made possible for us with the birth of a baby, in a stable, all those years ago. Last Sunday's Sermon: Deacon Jerry’s Final Sermon at St. Dunstan’sSunday Deacon Jerry gave us his final sermon as the deacon assigned to St. Dunstan’s Church. Christmas Day will be Jerry’s last Sunday with us before he moves on to his next assignment. This sermon is Jerry’s reflections on the Annunciation, his visit to the Holy Land, and his faith in God. Click Here to Listen to this sermon. A Glorious ChristmasDear Friends, It was wonderful to walk into St. Dunstan’s last Sunday and see the lovely decorations. This is a favorite time of year for many of us and the work of the Altar Guild and its helpers is so appreciated. I want to thank all of you who spent part of your Saturday decorating our church. As always, you did a beautiful job and we will all enjoy your efforts over this Christmas season. I also want to thank all of you who contributed to Deacon Jerry’s festive reception following the worship service on Sunday. It was great fun for all of us, especially Jerry and Sherry. Deacon Jerry and Sherry have been a blessing to all of us and they will be missed over this next year. There is great comfort in knowing that they will be back with us following is assignment at another church.
This coming weekend will be filled with beautiful music and worship services. We are blessed with lovely worship services and music here at St. Dunstan’s, and even though we enjoy them throughout the year, they are extra special at this time of year. Please join us and take part in the celebration of the birth of Christ. God gave His son to us so that we may have eternal life. Let us be grateful for that priceless gift and let our love of Jesus be reflected in our everyday words, thought, and deeds. May we share His transforming message with each other, and with a world that is in desperate need of His peace. My family wishes all of you and your families, a very Merry Christmas. We hope that you enjoy these days with your loved ones as you share God’s love and blessings. Blessings, Mary E. Pacher
You can now follow my postings on our web site and respond with your thoughts, inspiration and comments. Youth NewsWe invite each and every one of you to the CHRISTMAS PAGEANT on Christmas Eve at 4:00. Written by the two of us, "The Tale of the Friendly Beasts", tells the story of Christ's birth through the eyes of the animals. We guarantee you will like it!****Youth Group, Sunday School, and Choir members that are involved in the Christmas Pageant ~ a reminder that we will practice on Christmas Eve at 3:00p.m.***** On Christmas Day and New Years Day, there will NOT be Sunday School or Youth Group. Please come to church on those two Sunday's to be in the congregation. We will resume our regular Sunday schedules on January 8th. We wish each and every one of you a BLESSED and PEACEFUL Christmas and New Years! Ann-Patrice and Sandy A thank you to every one who contributed to the "Sock it to the Homelessness" sock drive. We received a wonderful thank you note from Rev. Rick Reynolds, the director. The day we dropped off the socks, they served 170 homeless men and women, providing food, shelter and our SOCKS! THANKS to you, our congregation, we helped the less fortunate! THANKS from the YOUTH GROUP SAINTS ARE US During this time of Christmas Celebration the Church has us celebrate the lives of some very special men and women. Dec. 19 - Lillian Trasher, American Missionary in Egypt, 1887-1961 Lillian and her sister Jenny built an orphanage in the Nile area caring for nearly 25,000 children. Even through the Nazi invasion and violence of WWII their work continued. She is known as the "Mother of the Nile", the orphanage is still in service. Dec. 21 - St. Thomas the Apostle, accounts of him can be found in the Gospel of John, Chapters 11, 14, and 20. His honest questioning has given many Christians courage over the years. In India, the missionary work attributed to him resulted in the establishment of the Mar Thoma Church, a major and ancient community of Christians. Dec. 22 - Henry Budd, Anglican Priest, 1812-1875 He was the first of First Nations Ancestry to ordained in North America, in 1850. He is remembered as an eloquent speaker and writer, in both Cree and English. He was truly an apostle to his people, translating Scripture and the Book of Common Prayer into the Cree language. He is buried in The Pas, Manitoba. Dec. 26 - St. Stephen, Deacon and First Martyr for the Faith He was one of the first seven deacons of the Church, (Acts 6:3). His stoning to death for his Faith in Jesus Christ was witnessed by Paul, and was a major factor in Paul's conversion, Stephen is the Patron Saint of Deacons and has many sacred places named in his honor through out the Christian world. Dec. 27 - St. John, Apostle and Evangelist He was one of the three, inner group of Disciples of Jesus. He is known as the Beloved Disciple of Jesus, the fourth Gospel and the Book of Revelation are attributed to him. Jesus entrusted the care of His mother, Mary to John. It is believed he died of old age at Ephesus, being the only one of The Twelve not to be martyred. In Christian tradition the symbol of John in the Eagle. Dec. 28 - The Holy Innocents Herod the Great was the ruler of the Jews, appointed by the Romans in 40, B.C.E. His rule was ruthless and barbaric. Tradition has it that when the Wise Men reported the birth of a King of the Jews, (Matthew 2), it caused him fear and anger. He ordered the slaughter of all male children under two years of age, in Bethlehem and the surrounding region. The Church has always honored these early martyrs during the Christmas Season. Next week we will continue with the Holy Days of Christmas, December 29th through January 8th. Have a Blessed and Holy Christmas. Br. John, O.C.P. |
The Exquisite Tradition of Christmas The garlands and wreaths are up, the choir is rehearsing, and the bulletins are printing, because soon Christmas will be here! I hope your Christmas preparations are going well. This is such a busy time for many of us as we prepare for family gatherings, buy those last few gifts, and get last of the Christmas decorations up. At the Marshall house we waited until our youngest daughter, Helen, returned home from college to get our tree. We trekked through the Christmas tree lot searching for the perfect specimen, with just the right shape, spacing, and size. We like the Spruce for its strong branches and spacing to hold all the ornaments we have collected through the years.I hope you are feeling that buzz of excitement as the big day approaches. We have beautiful services planned. Saturday afternoon at 4:00 PM our early Christmas Eve service will have a pageant featuring children from our Sunday School, members of our youth group, some very game adults, and a giant papier-mâchécow. Over the last month our youth group took the elephant from pageants past and turned it into a cow! This service will be fun and joyful, with plenty of your favorite Christmas carols, and should be done in an hour. The late Christmas Eve Service at the Henry Chapel starts at 10:30 PM. We have arranged extra lighting for the parking and walkways for this beautiful service. This is, without a doubt, the most beautiful service of the year. The stunning Henry Chapel, the musical gifts of our Choir and music director, the fabulous organ, and the exquisite traditional Christmas hymns, readings and prayers will transport you and inspire you. For many, the highlight will be singing, Silent Night, by candlelight. This service is all about the story and tradition of Christmas. You won’t just hear the story; you will be a part of the story. Christmas day falls on Sunday this year and we will hold our normal Sunday schedule. If you can’t make one of the Christmas Eve services, this is a great option. These services will have more of our favorite Christmas hymns, a guaranteed-fresh sermon, and a lot of good cheer. We would love to see you on both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Some of our members are traveling this year, and I wish them a blessed Christmas wherever they are. Yours in Christ, Fr. David Click here to respond to this post at Fr. David’s Blog. Stewardship CampaignI want to give everyone an update on the 2012 Stewardship campaign. Last year, we had a total of 102 pledges for a total of $220,760, which was an average of $2,164 per pledge. So far this year, we have had 70 pledges for a total of $181,381, an average of $2591 per pledge. We had 4 new pledges this year, 8 pledges that were lower than last year and 34 that were increased from last. Four pledges were removed from the listing because they had either moved or passed away, and three did not renew their pledge for 2012.First of all, thank you to all of you who have pledged for 2012 and also for the many of you who were able to increase your pledge over last year. As pointed out by Fr. David, the congregation at St. Dunstan's has done wonderful things this past year and your support allows them to continue. At this time, we still have 22 pledging units that we have not heard from, although some of these have told us they will be able to finalize their plans soon. This is a busy time of year and I understand many people need to see where their finances are at the end of the year in order to determine their pledge. If you haven't sent in your pledge yet, please feel free to contact myself or Mary Pacher if you have any questions. Thank you all and have a Happy Christmas! Tom Paulson Treasurer Community EngagementVOLUNTEERS for Sunday School. There will be a note coming out for VOLUNTEERS in the SUNDAY SCHOOL for the months of Jan., Feb and March. It will be sent to our current list of volunteers, but if there is anyone out there that we have not asked, and you are interested in stepping in to volunteer for a couple of Sunday's over these next three months, please let one of us know! THANKS in ADVANCE! Sandy Lamb and Ann-Patrice RiccardoPrayer Shawl Ministry- Calling all knitters and crocheters. Do you desire to help those in need of comfort but don't know how? Here is an opportunity to use your needlework talent to make a prayer shawl for our ministry. See Susan Vanek for details or email susanv@aceweb.com. Upcoming EventsInvite your friends, family & neighbors to St Dunstan’s Christmas Services. Celebrations will start on Christmas Eve with a 4:00 pm family service that will have a beautiful Christmas Pageant. There will be a 10:30 pm Christmas Eve service at the Highland’s Chapel. Our Christmas Day service next Sunday will be held at the regular hours and locations of our normal Sunday services.Stewardship Campaign: if you have not turned in your pledge for 2012, please do so as soon as possible. The vestry will be drafting the budget for next year this December. Vestry CornerIt is hard to believe that Christmas will be here this week. Each year I seem to have a harder time getting started on my holiday preparations. This year, in particular I seem to have gotten an even later start than usual. For our family, having the Christmas tree is one of the most important parts of our holiday traditions. We always keep it, until Jan. 7 as this is the tradition Josef grew up with in Germany. Sunday night, I finally got our tree decorated. It had been sitting in my living room since Wednesday evening last week. Normally once the tree comes inside, I get it set up at least by the next day. This year getting the tree set up seemed light the task that would never be completed. I had trouble finding the ornament boxes in the rearranged garage, and it took me 3 tries to get the lights on it.We still like to get a real tree, and have a favorite Christmas tree lot. We go to Rosie's Trees on 15th and 145th, and the owner, Willie recognizes us each year and always asks how our year has been. We have a tree stand exchange, where if you bring back the stand from the tree the previous year, you can take the tree already set up in the stand. We put the tree on the back of the truck, so getting it home is pretty simple. It is rearranging all the furniture before bringing the tree home that takes some time. Once the tree was in place I looked for our lights and discovered only about 20% of our existing lights actually still worked. I should have tested them all before starting to put them on the tree, but was trying to just get it done, and did not discover this until I had only the bottom 1/3 of the tree lit. I finally got a chance to go to the store and bought a couple more strings of lights and thought I was all set to finish my tree. I discovered one of the strings of lights I had just purchased had white wires instead of green. I had to go all the way back to the store, and finally exchanged the last string of lights Sunday evening, a full 5 days after we had first put the tree up. Once the lights were on the tree decorating it did not take long, and it really does look beautiful, and was well worth the effort and the wait. I think, part of the enjoyment now in looking at our tree this year, is appreciating that it took a bit of effort and time. It is satisfying to look at, and I am glad I got the last string of lights instead of just spacing out the ones I had. I enjoy that I have decorations on it that go back to our first apartment, 26 years ago, many that are from my mother in law and grandmother, and many we picked out with our son each year as he grew up. Getting ready for Christmas is a process, and the holiday when it comes would not seem anywhere near as special to me if I had not had to go through all the steps to get ready for it. There are plenty of other things I will do to get ready for Christmas, including cooking, baking, shopping, and going to different holiday events. Each have their place in making the holiday more magical, and each of these processes are important to me because Christmas is coming and I want to be ready. I am sure you are all busy getting ready for Christmas too. Hopefully you are enjoying this special time of year as much as we are. Have a Merry and Blessed Christmas! Liz The Old Cedar Bench In our lovely area by the columbarium, stands the statue of Spokane Garry. Next to that statue is an old cedar bench that is deteriorating. It is quite rotten and no longer safe to sit on. Jon Pacher is working on his Eagle Scout project and will be installing new benches between the columbarium and the labyrinth. These benches will provide a wonderful resting place for all of us. He has also offered to replace the old rotting cedar bench by Spokane Gary, but wants to be very sensitive about the bench. Do any of you know if it is a memorial to someone? If you have information that it is, will you please let Jon or Fr. David know. If it is a memorial, it will be left alone and let nature take its’ course. However, if it is not, a new bench will be installed Thank you. Our Gates. Recently our Jr. Warden, Lyn Donivan, suggested that we leave our gates open during the day and early evening for the Christmas season. The idea was that we want to be an inviting place for people to visit during this holy time and this is one of the ways that we can do that. Your vestry discussed this suggestion and agreed to follow through with the idea. Through the Christmas season, the gates are being deliberately left open from the morning, until early evening. Our Jr. Warden lives close by church and will swing by and close them shortly after dark each day. We will consider continuing this practice after the holidays depending on our experiences this month. VESTRY RECAP December 18, 2011 JUNIOR WARDEN
COMMITTEES:
SENIOR WARDEN
formal vote taken at meeting
RECTORS REPORT
1. Need photographic inventory – Lyn Donivan, Paul Holt, and Diana Rall will work on project.
TREASURER’S REPORT
Next Vestry meeting will be January 22, 2012. |
