Vestry News

Dear friends,

One of the many privileges of serving as your rector is the opportunity to work with the faithful vestry members you elect.  Year in and year out, you have wisely chosen leaders who care deeply about God, about St. Andrew’s, and about our community and who are committed to working collaboratively together.  This year’s vestry is no exception.
 
Our February vestry retreat consisted of a Friday night session at a local restaurant, where the recently retired class of vestry leadership joined current vestry members for dinner.  Retired members shared insights and advice, and afterward we did some team-building exercises.  Saturday morning we met in the sanctuary for  spiritual retreat time.  We read Bible passages telling of the ways God calls spiritual leaders, provides us with companions in our ministries, and equips us with spiritual gifts.  We talked about how those stories resonate in our lives and our work here at St. Andrew’s, and then we celebrated Holy Eucharist together.  On Saturday afternoon we conducted our annual Mutual Ministry Review, an assessment of how we are doing as the parish leadership team and where we can make improvements.  Based on the Mutual Ministry Review, we then set three specific goals for our work together in 2023.  Below, I’m sharing the three overarching vestry goals for 2023; and also three collects that members wrote together during our retreat. 
 
Please continue to hold each individual vestry member and our shared ministry in your prayers.  And please mark your calendars now for the next quarterly congregational meeting, on Sunday, March 12 immediately following the 10:30 service.  The agenda will include updates on our finances and our building, among other things. 
 
Please join me in giving thanks for our dedicated vestry members. 
 
Every blessing.  –Anne

Collects written by 2023 vestry

Holy and eternal God, we ask that you help us remain available to your presence so that we may manifest your goodness as we work to build your kingdom in our own hearts, in our church family, in our communities, and in our world. We pray this through Jesus Christ, the living son, Amen.
 
O God who IS, who led Moses out of Egypt, you call us and equip us with a variety of gifts.  May we use them for the common good to serve St. Andrew’s, our communities, the world, and you.  Through your empowering Spirit, we pray.  Amen. 
 
Father Almighty, we ask for your nurture and guidance so that we may lift the burden of others and further love, peace, and respect for all people.  Through Jesus’s teachings, we pray.  Amen.
 
2023 Vestry goals

1. Continue to nurture children and young families by creating/supporting ministries such as Vacation Bible School, Children’s Chapel, and Intergenerational Dinner Events
2. , including announcements, articles, quarterly parish meetings, and a ministries fair.enhanced/increased communicationDeepen parishioner awareness and understanding of parish ministries and vestry responsibilities through
3. Serve as wise and careful stewards by increasing vestry knowledge of and engagement with parish finances through careful monitoring of revenues/expenses, especially in our liaison areas; by actively monitoring the work of the Sacred Direction task force; and by making an informed decision about the best use of our building for the future of St. Andrew’s.

Lenten Springtime

As the editor of our local newspaper for more than forty years, my dad used to write an editorial each spring imploring people of the community to refrain from using mowers and other noisy power equipment on Sundays.  It never made a difference as far as I could tell, but that never deterred him from writing it.  Likewise, with some apparent futility I go to some lengths each year to try to point out that Lent is not and was never intended to be a time of gloomy deprivation.  In fact, the word “lent” actually comes from a word meaning “springtime,” as in new life.

Like Advent is a holy time of preparation for Christmas, Lent is not a season for its own sake, but is about preparing ourselves, heart, mind, strength and soul, for the new life we share in the greatest celebration the Church offers us in the resurrection of our Lord, Jesus Christ.  As such, Lent is not about giving up what is good or things we’ve been giving up since childhood, but giving up what is harmful and gets in the way of what we are preparing to celebrate: resentment, cynicism, being self-absorbed…  Lent is a time of holy preparation for Easter - coming through the shameful and agonizing death of the cross to the irrepressible hope for new and eternal life that the cross makes possible.  So take this Lenten time, not as a distasteful period of deprivation to slog through until the forty days are o’re, but as time for being better prepared to share in the Easter celebration of new life promised in our Lord’s resurrection.
 
-Marc

Random thoughts on call, light and what matters...

As the season of Epiphany dwindles down, and we begin to contemplate Lent, let us embrace our call to be light bearers for the dark and forgotten places and people of this wintry world. Never underestimate the power of the light you bear, and never hesitate to join it with the light of those who travel with you.

--Kathy
 
Light
by Steve Garnaas-Holmes

Every act of justice,
every act of compassion or mercy
is a light, a star in the night of this world.
You may think your efforts small and meaningless.
You may think they make no difference.
But go out and look up at the stars.
Which one should not have reached out in love?
Which one should never have bothered
to act in courage and compassion?
They all shine until they are swept up in the great light
of the One who dawns among us.
None of them rids night of its darkness.
Yet God walks out and looks at them all
and smiles.

When is... ?

When is Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Wednesday in Lent, Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter? 

Did you know there are “rules” for finding the date of Easter Day?  Easter Day is always the Sunday after the full moon that occurs on or after the spring equinox on March 21, a date which is fixed in accordance with an ancient ecclesiastical computation, and which does not always correspond to the astronomical equinox.  This full moon may happen on any date between March 21 and April 18 inclusive.  If the full moon falls on a Sunday, Easter Day is the Sunday following.  But, Easter Day cannot be earlier than March 22 (which will not occur until after 2089) or later than April 25 (the next year being 2038).   This year, Easter Day is April 9.  For more information about the rules, please refer to the Book of Common Prayer, pages 880-883.
 
So, then, what are the other dates?  Shrove Tuesday (or Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday) will be February 21 and Ash Wednesday will be February 22.   While we enjoy a pancake supper and a fun evening on Shrove Tuesday, there really isn’t any spiritual focus for this day other than some parishes burn palm branches left from the previous Palm Sunday to use on Ash Wednesday.  The name comes from the English word “shrive,” which has to do with obtaining absolution for sins.
 
Ash Wednesday begins the forty day period prior to Easter Day, during which Christians repent, ask for God’s forgiveness, and recognize that God’s forgiveness comes at a price – the death of Jesus Christ on the cross on our behalf.  On this day, the historic churches mark the beginning of this period with special services explaining the season, calling the people to repentance, signifying repentance with ashes, by which a cross is marked on the forehead of penitent Christians.
 
And thus the 40 days of Lent begin, excluding Sundays.  Sundays are not included because they commemorate Christ’s resurrection on “the Lord’s day.”  There are several significant meanings of the “forty” days of Lent: it rained for 40 days and nights during the Flood, for 40  years the Jewish people wandered in the desert after fleeing from Egypt , Moses was on Mt. Sinai for 40 days and night, for 40 days Jesus was tested by the devil in the desert, and there were 40 days between Jesus’ resurrection and ascension.  During this time we will have weekly Lenten services at 7:30 AM and 11:00 AM on March 1 and then only at 7:30 AM on March 8, 15, 22, and 29.
 
The final week of Lent is called Holy Week.  It begins with Palm Sunday (April 2) and includes Maundy Thursday (April 6) and Good Friday (April 7).
 
So now you know a little more about the ancient ecclesiastical computation as to when things happen this year!
 
Bill Wilds