EYC Board applications are live!

The Episcopal Youth Community (EYC) Board is seeking applicants for the 2020-2021 school year.  Serving on the EYC Board is an exciting opportunity to be a leader in the diocese. The Board is comprised of up to nine youth members, preferably one youth representative who will be going into 10th, 11th, or 12th grade in the fall from each of the nine convocations in the diocese. The Board's mission is to help youth in the diocese grow in their spiritual journey and understanding of the Episcopal Church. The Board works closely with the Youth Missioner and other adult leaders to implement events like Spring and Fall Weekends, represent the youth voice at Annual Council, help connect youth with national Episcopal events like the Episcopal Youth Event and Province III gatherings (Middle Atlantic region of Episcopal churches), and are encouraged to explore new ways for youth in the Diocese to grow in community. We are looking for youth from across the Diocese and ask your help in finding youth who might be a good fight. The application deadline is May 31, 2020. Click here for the application.  

 

ECW video update; Autism Awareness Month

Dr. Rene Escoffery-Torres, Vice President of the ECW of Southern Virginia, provides a brief report and offers resources for the ECW's current focus, Unmasking the Mystery of Autism Spectrum Disorder. April is Autism Awareness Month, and the ECW is hoping to provide resources and connect the greater church community with good information they can use during this COVID-19 epidemic. Click here or on the video below to watch.  

 

 

Employment opportunity

Director, Children and Youth Christian Faith Formation Program

Grace Church, Yorktown, is seeking a Director of Faith Formation for Children and Youth to lead a vibrant ministry with and for the children and youth of Grace. Responsibilities include inspiring youth to a life of faith; nurturing a community of mutual support; developing and overseeing Christian Formation programs for children and youth; recruiting and training volunteers; and collaborating with church leadership. Click here for more information and how to apply. 

Bishop Vaché Scholarship applications now being accepted

The Bishop Vaché Scholarships provide funds to assist both low-income and minority undergraduate college students in the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia. First-year students as well as returning college students are welcome to apply. Scholarship awards range from $500-$2500 per academic year.

 

Complete application packets for 2020 must be postmarked by July 1, 2020. Notifications will go out by July 29, 2020 and awards will be mailed by August 17, 2020. Click here for an application packet.

Cool Congregations Webinar April 30

We have all seen a glimpse of cleaner air due to the constraints on human activity required by the COVID-19 pandemic. But a more lasting way to clear the air and protect our climate is to measure and reduce our carbon footprints. While you're inside flattening the curve, what better time to gather up your data and measure your carbon footprint?  Join Interfaith Power & Light for a webinar on April 30 at 3 p.m. to demonstrate the NEW Cool Congregations calculator for your congregational facilities -- and for your home too.

Click here to register.  

 

Across the country, people of faith are making changes in their homes and places of worship to prevent global warming through our Cool Congregations program. IPL's unique stewardship program helps congregations reduce the carbon footprint of their facilities and engages their members in reducing their carbon footprint at home. The program educates, inspires, and saves money too!  

 

The calculators measure the energy to heat and cool and power your buildings, transportation, food, and procurement or dollars spent on goods and services.

Check out the calculators here.

New book by the Rev. Nigel Mumford available now

The Rev. Nigel Mumford, priest associate of prayer ministry at Galilee, Virginia Beach, has written a new book, "This is Where Your Healing Begins," that is now available on Amazon.  

 

The myriad of human need for healing and the peculiar personal histories surrounding them are as numerous as all people who ever lived on the planet, and involve physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, generational, identity, relational, financial, historical, locational, racial, inter-denominational, intellectual, and other global issues of healing. Spanning nearly thirty years, this book addresses what Mumford has identified as the core issues of everyday life: disease, diagnosis, distress, pain, fear, doubt, shame, guilt and all other manner of human concern.  

 

"My prayer is that hope, in the Person of the Lord Jesus, will flow through these pages and saturate your souls with what I have learnt--as I listened, loved, and prayed healing over thousands of people," says Mumford.

 

Virtual Easter Vigil a collaboration of nine Episcopal and Lutheran churches

By Kim Lenz, Acting Communications Coordinator, Grace, Yorktown 

 

The Holy Saturday Easter Vigil, held each year on the York River shoreline, will go virtual this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

 

Seven Episcopal congregations along with two Lutheran congregations have been working to turn what's been an eight-year tradition of drumming, fire, processions and baptisms into a virtual Vigil for participants to experience at home. Recreating what's been a highly participatory experience of a couple hundred folks has been no small feat, but all churches involved have done their best to bring this ninth annual vigil to the people.

 

Music Director Suzanne Daniel at Grace, Yorktown, has led the technology charge to record - safely and individually - this year's participants for a YouTube broadcast that will begin at 7 p.m. this Saturday, April 11. The Rev. Thomas Haynes of Christ the King, Tabb, will give the homily. The Rev. Sven vanBaars, rector of Abingdon Church in White Marsh, and this year's lead clergy, says the decision to produce a virtual Vigil is partly to mark the resurrection as the defining moment of Christian faith, but also the opportunity to have a fuller expression of the meaning of this event. The opening prayer "reminds us that the church is dispersed around the world. Maybe in this time of social isolation, in this time of being dispersed rather than gathered together as we typically are, we can hear and experience the words of this ancient liturgy with fresh ears and hearts."

 

The Vigil on the York River has historically been a collaboration recognizing Easter as a celebration of the whole church, not just individual parishes. "With the safe distancing guidelines in place we knew that we could not do the Vigil as we had, but we also knew that it was perhaps more important to make a statement of our faith in Christ's resurrection," says vanBaars. "Luckily, our Creator has made us very creative and we used our creative spirits to bring this event together in a virtual context."

 

A bulletin for this service, which also has a link to Grace's YouTube channel where it will be broadcast, is available now on the Grace Church homepage. For those who have not been to the waterfront Vigil, click here for a video created to promote last year's event.

 

This year's participating congregations are: Grace Episcopal in Yorktown; Abingdon Episcopal in White Marsh; Ware Episcopal in Gloucester; Apostles Lutheran in Gloucester; St. George's Episcopal in Newport News; Reformation Lutheran in Newport News; Kingston Parish Episcopal in Mathews; St. John's Episcopal in West Point; and Christ the King Episcopal in Tabb.