Vestry liaisons help nurture parish ministries

At our June meeting, St. Andrew's vestry members chose "liaison areas" in order to help organize our life together in this busy, active parish.  John Whitley and Doug Vaughan will continue on as wardens, and all other vestry members will serve as a liaison to a particular ministry area to ensure that each parish team or activity has an advocate on the vestry, someone in touch with its successes and needs.  Activity/team leaders will be accountable to and supported by vestry liaisons.  Knowing what's going on in every area allows the vestry to make informed decisions; craft the calendar; and shape and nurture the life of the parish.

Vestry members and their liaison areas:

• Finance - Mary Gibson Waddill
• Outreach - Elise Wall
• Pastoral Care - Mary Wood
• Christian Formation - Dan Waddill
• Communications - Ann Turner
• Parish Life - Merrill Hemmert
• Worship - Dick Barnwell
• Evangelism - Jay Lambiotte
• Properties - Danny Switzer and Carter Ficklen

 Learn more about our Vestry members and how to contact them here.

Our Ramadan experience

If you didn’t take part in one of the visits to the Ramadan celebration at Peninsula Islamic Community Center, arranged by John Herbst, you missed a wonderful opportunity. We were warmly welcomed even before we made it inside the building. Everyone was genuinely happy that we were there – smiling faces greeted us, introducing themselves, anxious to make us feel welcome. Once inside, preparations for the evening meal were in full swing and the women happily accepted our offer to lend a hand in the kitchen.

During the month of Ramadan, Muslims fast every day from dawn to sunset. It is meant to be a time of spiritual discipline – sounds a lot like Lent, doesn’t it? But we learned that it's also a time of celebration and joy, to be spent with loved ones. This community, full of joy and love, gathers every evening during Ramadan to pray and break their fast. The celebration began once the call to prayer was made. The day’s fast was broken with a snack of dates and fruit and then the evening prayer was offered. Once the prayers were complete, dinner was served.

We talked with two delightful young women during dinner, both York County natives who, as one said, were “lucky to be born Muslim.” She had just graduated from high school and will be attending VCU in the fall, but she’s not sure of her major yet. She was a delightful dinner companion and generously answered all of our questions – everything from how she observes Ramadan, to whether she had ever been bullied because of her religion. Our other young host had just completed medical school and was headed to upstate New York for her internship. She told us that her family will be coming to New York at the end of Ramadan so they could all be together for the three-day celebration called Eid al-Fitr, or "the Festival of the Breaking of the Fast." It's a holiday for which everyone comes together for big meals with family and friends and exchanges gifts – sounds a lot like Christmas, doesn’t it?

We left after dinner, but the celebration and prayers continued into the evening. It was an unforgettable experience, not only because we learned so much, but because we made wonderful new friends. We are truly grateful to John and Anne+ for this opportunity. We encourage you, if there’s another chance to visit the Peninsula Islamic Community Center, not to miss it!

Mary Poole

Ann Turner

St. Andrew's youth elected to Diocesan EYC Board

Elections for the next diocesan Episcopal Youth Community Board were held during May Weekend at Chanco, May 19-21. Once again, St. Andrew's holds two of the seven seats. Congratulations Devin Alex Ellis and Vanessa Smock!  Pray for them and the rest of the EYC Board as they lead the youth of the Diocese of Southern Virginia.

Praying Aloud - on Pentecost and beyond...

Dear friends,

One of the greatest gifts that we can give is to pray for another person.  Many times in my life, I have been deeply touched by the knowledge that someone was praying for me by name, especially during a time of special need or hardship.  I hope you’ve had that same experience.

On Sunday mornings when we gather for worship, we always pray together.  We pray for the Universal Church, our nation, the world, those who suffer, and those who have died.  Most Sunday mornings we include in our prayers the names of people on our parish prayer chain list who are in special need.  The names we hear aloud on Sunday mornings are only a tiny portion of the total number of names on our list.  It would take too long to read off every name one at a time.

But that doesn’t mean it’s not possible to pray by name for each person on the prayer chain list every time we gather for Sunday worship.  In fact, it’s easy to do so if we work together, sharing the ministry and responsibility of lifting those names in prayer simultaneously when the leader invites our spoken prayers.  What happens then is that for a few moments, the church sounds like what I imagine the first Pentecost sounded like: a swell of voices raised together.

Incorporating individual names in this way has a number of advantages:  It makes the Prayers of the People more truly the prayers of the people, with parishioners’ voices raised in prayer all over the church.  It allows us to pray by name for each person on the prayer list every Sunday.  Congregation members become more active, vocal participants during the prayers, and the prayers become ever more inclusive, as worshipers begin to add other names and concerns.

So, you’re asking yourself, how exactly will this work?  It’s easy.  When you pick up your Sunday bulletin on the way into church, you will have the option of also picking up a short list of six or seven names for use during the prayers.  During the Prayers of the People, the leader will invite our prayers “for those whom we now name, silently or aloud...”  And then all of us who are holding names will read them aloud simultaneously. 

It makes sense for us to introduce this new way of prayer on Pentecost Sunday.  I hope you’ll take part in it.  More importantly, I hope that you and all those for whom we pray will experience the blessings of God’s Holy Spirit and abiding love.

Faithfully, Anne

The Modern Diaconate - Part three: The Deacon in Liturgy

Click here to read Part 2.

The deacon in the liturgy represents the bridge between the church and the world, acting as herald, servant, and one who bids and one who sends.  The deacon reads the gospel from the midst of the people, and bids the congregation to both the creed and the confession. It has been customary for the deacon to either introduce or pray the prayers of the people in most parishes. Alternately, the deacon bids the people to the prayers, a layperson reads the prayers, and the priest adds a concluding collect, and all three orders of ministry are heard. 

The deacon sets the table for the Eucharist, to the particular preference of whoever is celebrant, and makes sure that the altar book is open to the Eucharistic prayer form of the day, pointing to each line if necessary as the priest reads, and assists in the distribution of the sacrament, offering bread if there is only one priest, and wine otherwise. The deacon is sometimes referred to as the minister of the chalice. When all have received, the deacon either clears the table, or redresses the chalice and paten, depending on local tradition.

The deacon dismisses the people, sending them out into the world to make Christ’s love known in both word and action. 

Vestments seem strange to those unused to having a deacon serve in their parish. For the Offices, a deacon wears what a priest wears, cassock, surplice, and tippet. For Holy Eucharist, an alb is worn. The difference between orders is visually apparent in stole and dalmatic. The deacon’s stole is worn diagonally (from left shoulder to right hip), and as a servant was probably initially some kind of a towel. It has evolved to mean that one shoulder is kept “unyoked” to bear the burdens of the world. The dalmatic is essentially an apron for the one who waits on table. 

A deacon cannot pronounce absolution (unless using the pronoun “we” and “us” in the absence of a priest), bless anything or anyone, or consecrate the elements. A deacon can baptize, marry, anoint, bury, and officiate at any of the office liturgies. 

Deacons are licensed to preach, and you can expect their sermons to be some kind of a call to respond to the needs or to the pain, of the world, as  modeled by Jesus.

To be continued (Formation of Deacons) 

Katherine T. Gray

Chaplain, Riverside Hospice