Grace Church continues Memorial Day tradition online

For more than 20 years, the Grace Church, Yorktown, has held a Memorial Day service, honoring those who lost their lives in service to our country. This year that tradition continued in a very moving virtual version of the service. You can watch the service here and see WAVY TV coverage of the gathering here.  

Resources for Pentecost, Virtual VBS

Pentecost Resource from CE-Net

Looking for Pentecost at Home suggestions or resources to send to families? The Norfolk formation group recently met and suggested ideas for families to celebrate Pentecost during COVID-19 and who parenting, working and teaching from home. The resources list provides easily done at home ideas with whatever materials you have are on hand. Click here to get the document.

 

Christian formation colleague groups 

Would you be interested in forming a colleague group in your area of the Diocese? The Norfolk Formation Colleague Group has been a much-needed thing during this time. We are a group who supports one another 100% and shares our challenges and love of ministry. If you would be interested in forming a group, contact CE-NET Co-Chairs, Vicky Koch, vkoch@stpaulsnorfolk.org or Gizelle Moran, gizelle@trinity-portsmouth.org and we'll help you get started.

 

Virtual Vacation Bible School from CE-Net

Wondering what you're going to do for Vacation Bible School (VBS) this summer. Have you thought about a Virtual VBS? CE-Net is working on a Virtual Vacation Bible School program that will be offered to all churches in the Diocese at no cost. This program will allow you to adapt it to meet your specific needs. The Virtual VBS program will focus on themes of Faith, Hope, and Love and will include Bible stories, crafts and activities as well as a suggested mission focus for each day. We plan on sharing this resource on the CE-NET diocesan web site by mid-June. For more information, contact CE-Net Co-Chairs Vicky Koch, vkoch@stpaulsnorfolk.org or Gizelle Moran, gizelle@trinity-portsmouth.org or Canon Lynn Farlin, lfarlin@diosova.org.

"Counting the Days" in isolation

"Counting the Days" is a 50-day video series created by the Rev. Jacqueline Soltys of Grace Church, Yorktown. Soltys was inspired to create the series during this period of isolation. "I wanted a way to connect with the parish during this time of separation, a way to mark our time apart, and to create a shared experience," she explains.

 

Creating a daily video for 50 days is a significant commitment. "I think of the videos as a spiritual discipline --a form of focused prayer and discernment for me. They require me to face this time honestly and intentionally, to be awake and present to the ups and downs of each day," Soltys said. "They are also a pledge to the people I serve. I want to be in conversation with them every day, to show them that I'm here and with them, going through this experience, too."

 

Each video includes a psalm, a domestic reflection on the day and a blessing. Why the psalms? "They are an easy way to count, since they are numbered.  If I were musically trained, maybe I would have chosen a hymn to sing every day, and I would have sung my way through the hymnal," Soltys explained. "The psalms are an important touchpoint for me personally.  I had a profound mystical experience of God's presence through praying the psalms every day many years ago.  It is one of the experiences that led me to the priesthood.  It just felt right to pick them up again now as a place to find God and as a way to ride this roller coaster of emotions that we are all on."

 

While Counting the Days series has ended (you can watch them all here), Soltys now has a new project, Pause: An Invitation to Stillness. These are weekly videos she's making in collaboration with Grace Church parishioners. Each weekly video is made up of prayers, Scripture, poetry, music, and simple images. It's not just for Episcopalians; it could be helpful to anyone looking for a few minutes of peace and refuge. You can view those on the Grace Church YouTube channel.

Rogation Sunday celebration honors Eastern Shore's COVID-19 victims

Submitted by Betsy Seyboldt - Holy Trinity, Onancock

 

	The Very Rev. Rick Willis at the dedication of a tree   in memory of those on the Eastern Shore   who died in the COVID-19 pandemic.

As a sign of our continuing commitment to Creation Care at Holy Trinity, Onancock, we celebrated a contemporary Rogation Sunday on May 17. We walked in procession around the parish boundaries with eight parishioners and the Very Rev. Rick Willis, and then dedicated the planting of a Japanese maple in memory of those on the Eastern Shore who have died in the COVID-19 pandemic. Videos of the service (Sixth Sunday of Easter, parts 1 and 2) can be found on Holy Trinity's YouTube channel.  

 

Rogation Days are an ancient custom observed since the 5th century. The word Rogation comes from the Latin verb rogare , meaning "to ask" and applied to the rogation days means to ask God's blessing of the harvest, earth and sea, reminding ourselves that we are the stewards of Creation. The Sixth Sunday of Easter is Rogation Sunday with the so-called minor rogations are held on Monday to Wednesday preceding Ascension Thursday, this week on May 21. An ancient custom was beating the bounds: a procession walked out the boundary lines of the village and marked the bounds with stakes. Sticks of willow and birch were used to strike the stakes; hence the name, beating the bounds. Subsequently the custom became incorporated into the Rogation Day celebration and was observed by walking the boundaries of the parish and acknowledging our tangible stewardship of God's creation.

 

Our dedication of the COVID-19 Memorial Tree is our way of saying each person matters, that life is precious and those who die are worth remembering. The parishioners of Holy Trinity want the friends and families affected by the virus to know that there is a place on the Shore where your loved one can be remembered; there is a safe, quiet spot where you can come and sit and pray and reflect on the good memories of your loved one.

Celebrating Graduation resources available from The Episcopal Church

The Episcopal Church Faith Formation Department's Office of Youth Ministry and Office of Young Adult and Campus Ministries have been collaborating with youth ministers, campus chaplains, and young adult ministers around the church to curate resources, ideas, and liturgies to help celebrate those who are graduating from high school and college.

 

Available Celebrating Graduation resources include prayers and blessings, service videos and virtual choirs, worship bulletins and scripture, as well as a collection of resources and ideas for celebrating 2020 graduates during this pandemic. There is also a special message from Presiding Bishop Michael Curry. Click here for more information.  

Resources for processing grief and lament

Finding Brave Space is a series of new videos with Dr. Catherine Meeks from the Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing. There is also a new episode on the A Brave Space podcast on  Lament in the Midst of COVID-19. In the coming weeks Dr. Meeks will facilitate three webinars on lament.   

Grief and Graduation and Ideas & Resources For Lament & Thanksgiving *Especially Appropriate For Those Working With Youth are posts by Sharon Ely Pearson. They can be helpful in processing loss and grief with youth and young adults, including ideas for celebrating important moments the best way we can right now.   

 

Processing Grief And Death With Picture Books by Anna V. Ostenso Moore lists great books for helping children process grief. Sesame Street's Caring for Each Other Hub also has great resources for how to have conversation with children about COVID-19, anxiousness, and more.   

 

Weekly Webinars are being provided by Episcopal Relief and Development. Especially helpful is the "Addressing Isolation and Quarantine" webinar that discusses the "Emotional Lifecycle of Disaster", both Original and Elongated, in understanding what we are experiencing emotionally in this season.  

Online conversation about faith formation with EfM's Executive Director Karen Meridith

St. Martin's, Williamsburg, Wednesday webinar series, Bread for the Journey, continues this Wednesday, May 20, at 7 p.m. with Karen M. Meridith, Executive Director of Education for Ministry, the University of the South's flagship four-year program for lay theological education.

The conversation will survey how and why faith formation (and how we think about it) has changed over the years: from Sunday School in the Industrial Revolution through its rise (and fall?) in the 20th century. Our aim is to arrive at not just today's church, but to look at tomorrow and the future of faith formation. What opportunities and challenges are we facing, and who is God calling us to become? While the conversation is a theoretical one, it has important personal ramifications for each Christian. Who is God calling me to be, and how committed am I?

 

To prepare for the webinar, Karen suggests reading a five-part blog series, on how we do (and might do) formation in a changing church. Each short article is written by Sharon Pearson, longtime leader of Christian formation in the Episcopal Church. The webinar is free, but registration is required. Register here.