Transcript
November 16, 2016
New Diocesan Website Opens for Beta Testing Site features Diocesan Convention Videos & Content As part of our effort to increase both internal communications and our ministry of evangelism, the Episcopal Church in Vermont has been engaged in a project to redesign the diocesan website. The desktop version of the new site, which features a vibrant color palette and intuitive design, has now gone into beta testing. (Beta is a live trial conducted during the final stages of development to gather feedback on the site’s major components.) Most importantly, the beta site is the location for all videos, downloads and other takeaways from the 2016 Diocesan Convention! How will the transition work? During the beta test, which is expected to last two weeks, both the OLD and NEW websites will be online. The old website will remain accessible through its current address, http://diovermont.org. It will contain a direct link to the new site. At the completion of the beta test phase, the old site will be taken offline, and the new site, in its completed state, will replace the old site and will assume the http://diovermont.org address. During the beta, you are encouraged to submit feedback to
[email protected] Can I go directly to the NEW site? Yes! The new site is directly accessible through the temporary address, http://diovermont.org/diodev5BTV/
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Diocesan Convention Highlights can be found here: http://diovermont.org/diodev5BTV/diocesan-convention.php One final note… During the beta test, the new site will only be viewable from desktop and laptop computers. Tablet and mobile functionality will be enabled at the completion of the test. A special thanks to parish communicators, clergy and lay leaders who submitted photos and content for the new site. (As a reminder, your submissions are always welcome.) And special thanks to the diocesan ministry support team for their engagement during the planning and design.
Local Mission Approaches Make Meaningful Progress Dramatic Presentation Demonstrates God’s Process at Work Local Mission Approach has been described as “God’s Process at Work,” “the Jesus Movement in Vermont,” and “a documented process of discernment, planning, acting and reflecting,” but the question for many Vermont congregations seeking to identity and articulate their own Approach is, “What does it look like?” In an effort to provide examples and to highlight the progress being made across the diocese, several parishes participated in a dramatic presentation at Diocesan Convention. The skit, written by the Rev. Susan Taylor and led by the diocese’s Local Mission Approach team, demonstrated how the four theological aspects of Local Mission— seeing, sending, transforming, and returning—have taken different forms in response to each parish’s local context. The Convention participants shared the following testimonials: St. Paul’s Episcopal Church-White River Junction. Our eyes were opened after the South Carolina church shooting. We saw that it was more than a ‘church’ problem; it impacts the whole community. Our conversations moved to a public library study of TaNehisi Coates’ book, Between the World and Me. Our mission was not to provide or solicit answers or prescriptions nor were judgments rendered, but rather each of us was asked to become more deeply aware of personal practices and presuppositions around race. And in this ‘awakening’ to our own racism, community members seemed to draw church members along. St. Mary’s Episcopal Church-Northfield. We saw a letter to the editor that described a need for supplies that were not being met through the resources at the time: food, clothing and even a ‘pet shelf’. We were sent in that the parish committed itself to creating a ‘Living Supply Closet’ for our neighbors in the Dog River Valley. The realization that transforming takes place not just in the distribution of products, but also in building community, led to opening-up a neighborly communal lunch at the time of distribution. The returning is a continuing cycle since 2014 as we see new faces nearly
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every month. And with the Spirit’s guidance, the cycle goes on. A Letter on Behalf of Community Priest the Rev. Susan Ohlidal-St. Johnsbury. The townspeople of St. Johnsbury saw the need to improve housing and caring for people without homes. The collar she wears identifies her as a faith leader within the community. A glimpse into her day reveals her joining in the conversation, continuing later in the day at the smoker’s table, and her day closes out after the evening facilitating Pub Theology. It is both seeing and being seen, being available as sentness, gathering and connecting as the Holy Spirit permeates our transforming experience, the returning as the continuing unfolding. Christ Episcopal Church-Montpelier. We, too, saw the plight of those without housing in our area and joined in the area-wide commitment to end homelessness in central Vermont by 2020. We were sent to embark on an ambitious program—to develop housing on our property to serve individuals with low incomes. Our transforming journey of faith has impelled collaboration and mutual ministry within our congregation and in returning, a strengthening and expanding of ministry teams focusing on specific areas, issues and concerns. Church of the Good Shepherd-Barre. We were invited to write on a white board what we saw or felt while doing local mission and to give concrete examples. Here are brushstrokes from one week: • Voted early and paid my water bill. Voting felt better! • Noticed how the people at City Hall are always friendly and nice. • Transported a wounded grouse 50 miles to the Vermont Institute of Natural Science. • Rejoiced to find so many young people ministering to wild creatures. • Brought a homeless man to lunch. It felt really good to help someone else. • Felt joy and love sharing Fall flowers & the garden’s bounty with neighbors. • Loving my neighbor has given me utmost joy. Amen. • Visited a sick friend in the hospital, felt very good. St. John’s Episcopal Church-Randolph. We saw that efforts to meet people’s food needs within our community was ample but that shelter—in varying degrees—is severely needed. Recently, Randolph reached out to address short-term, transitional housing through collaboration with the Haven and Capstone (formerly Community Action). And since 1991, our ecumenical organization Randolph Emergency Committee on Housing (REECH), which represents seven parishes, has worked to bridge the gap for those who may not qualify for assistance, but REECH is relatively unknown. As we’ve heard in other local mission stories, transformative experience is relational, thus our “sent-ness” this year involved collaborating on the first annual Celebrate REECH day. St. John’s also hopes to partner ecumenically and communally to find a way to provide emergency shelter, a resource that currently exists only in our vision. Cathedral Church of St. Paul-Burlington. There is a lot to see here: an unjust prison
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system and racism, also a hunger for quiet and beauty. We are sent to work with Vermont Interfaith Action to offer an evening program called “Working for a Second Chance” —bringing together panels of ex-offenders and potential employers to share their personal stories of looking for work and of hiring workers. We partnered with Christ Church Presbyterian with whom we already have relationship in their use of our parish hall for worship on Sunday afternoons—encouraging discussion about our prison system and racism initiated through study of Bryan Stephenson’s book Just Mercy. Working with artists, our Cathedral space is transformed through painting exhibits, colorful vestments and furnishings, and free concert series, in an effort to provide spiritual refuge amid a noisy world. Transformation and returning are a continual cycle of ebbing and flowing. We have four components that we’ve identified in Local Mission Approach: God’s Process in Work • Seeing • Sending • Transforming • Returning In the skit, the Rev. Taylor reminds that there are two powerful methods for identifying Local Mission and propelling it forward. Additional information on both Asset Based Community Development and Appreciative Inquiry can be found on the Local Mission Approach page of the NEW diocesan website, which can be found at the following link: http://diovermont.org/diodev5BTV/missional-church.php
Christ Church Discovers Local Mission through Centers of Creativity
Discernment process unites church and community In the past five-plus years at Christ Church-Montpelier, discernment has been at the heart of all major decisions, and it’s a discernment process that revolves around what the Rev. Paul Habersang calls Centers for Creativity. He defines Centers of Creativity as a discipline that invites different people from various perspectives to focus on a specific challenge through prayer, conversation and dialog both within the church and the surrounding community. It is through Centers of Creativity that Christ Church has identified and begun work on a powerful local mission, in cooperation with Vermont Interfaith Action and the City of Montpelier, to end homelessness by 2020. According to the Vermont Coalition to End Homelessness, the Point-In-Time Count on Jaunary 26, 2016, showed an overall decrease in homelessness by 28% compared to the 2015. That’s good news for the state overall, but in downtown Montpelier, an area with a lengthening list of retirees waiting as long as five years for housing to become
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available, the risk is simply too great to reduce the urgency. That’s why Christ Church has begun discussing a strategy to create 150 new housing units locally. In a recent interview, Habersang discussed the origins of Centers of Creativity, offered some practical guidance for congregations in discernment, and explained how diocesan funds set aside for local missions can be used to fuel the local discernment process. He said, “One of the first things that we engaged in as a community, when I first came to Christ Church in 2011, was to develop a discernment team that studied the book Changing the Conversation by Anthony Robinson. It’s an excellent book. Robinson gets the fact that we’re in a post-Christendom era where churches have to change if we’re going to be relevant, thriving and more missional in our communities.” As the book study group wrestled with Robinson’s theme, it helped them to examine how they were engaging within the church walls as well as the outside world. During the 2011-2012 timeframe, Christ Church was presented with an opportunity to partner with the City of Montpelier and the State of Vermont in Montpelier District Heat, an alternative-fuel heating project designed to reduce petroleum consumption in the local area. The first Center for Creativity—a term coined by a former senior warden—was convened to look at the scope of the project, related costs and potential return on investment. The Center for Creativity process—specifically, the inclusion of community voices in the process—inspired an anonymous donation of $40,000, making the otherwise impossible project possible. Habersang continued, “As a result of that first Center for Creativity, we’ve opened our doors and welcomed people in. It’s been through that discernment process, through those Centers for Creativity, that new thinking has challenged us in ways that are leading us to a rebirth at Christ Church.” Part of this rebirth could likely entail creating affordable housing units on Christ Church property, a serious commitment indeed. “As we move forward with this housing project, there will be a feasibility study that will have to be undertaken that looks both at the environmental impact and the economic implications,” Habersang added. There is a cost associated with the in-depth feasibility study. Local Mission Approach grant monies, which are available to all congregations in the diocese, will empower Christ Church to engage the architects, engineers and environmental experts necessary to complete the research.
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Reflection: What Does It Mean To Be a Brother or Sister? By Thom Rock Thom Rock of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church-Newport, shares a reflection on the 2016 Diocesan Convention of the Episcopal Church in Vermont: “Love Heals” There was a profound presence at this year’s convention. There was courageous testimony given. And as that truth was witnessed, one could feel something sacred and holy settle over us in the cathedral. I felt it deeply. Our special guests were four women from Thistle Farms, a community of women healing from domestic and sexual violence, prostitution, trafficking, and addiction. Joining them were representatives from several Vermont networks and agencies, including: Give Way to Freedom, the Committee on Vermont Human Trafficking, The Vermont Network Against Domestic Violence, DIVAS (Discussing Intimate Partner Violence and Accessing Support), and Lund (the agency formerly and variously known across the state as the Lund Family Center, the Lund Home, the Elizabeth Lund Home for Unwed Mothers, and originally—tellingly—as the Home for Friendless Women). Lund, in fact, holds a special place in my heart, for it is where I came into this world. Before open adoption ever became the norm, before Roe v. Wade, before the pains of shame and secrecy and labor and relinquishment, a young woman I now know was named Rosalie walked up the stairs of the old Victorian mansion on Shelburne Avenue where “the girls who went away” went when they were in her position: alone, abandoned, and pregnant. Eventually, Ray and Edith, a loving couple who had already adopted a little girl from Lund, walked up those same stairs . . . and carried me out into what would become my family. I loved my adoptive parents very much; they are both with God now. Where Rosalie is I do not know. I did petition the court, as an adult, to unseal the documents related to my adoption, but that process is fraught with omissions and redactions and hardly satisfactory. But in the process I did discover that I have two half-sisters. That’s all I know. And while I dearly love my sister with whom I grew up, I now know there are other sisters of mine somewhere out there. All of this self-reflection is to say that the word that has been sitting on my heart all during our convention and ever since is just that: Sister. And how, after spending two brief days with Becca, Susan, Phyllis, and Rachel, our guests from Thistle Farms, I would be honored and humbled to call any one of them sister. They broke my heart. And made it larger. I was reminded again of sisterhood on Saturday morning as we began our Eucharist. As a long line of clergywomen, each in her vestments, processed down the aisle in commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the ordination of women as priests in the Episcopal Church—well, it was a stunningly moving moment of sisterhood. And of how, as our new friends from Thistle Farms insist, “In the end, love is the most powerful force
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for change in the world.” Standing there singing Alleluia with my husband, I was overcome with gratitude for this Episcopal family we’ve become a part of and that has adopted us, as it were. I was deeply reminded that we were not only a diocese gathered at convention—a parliamentary body—but also a reunited family of brothers and sisters in Christ—the loving, living, life-giving body of Christ in the world. And that with that precious heritage comes certain responsibilities. Our brother Paul wrote long ago, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). Except too many of us still live as if those dividing and divisive distinctions define us. I am not denying that there surely exists gender inequality and its very real and costly ramifications. Rather I am entertaining the idea that maybe Christian sisterhood and brotherhood supersedes gender. And not only gender, but also race, creed, nationality, and religion. Indeed, perhaps even species. Our sisterhood and brotherhood in Christ is not determined by our family of origin. We aren’t only brothers and sisters among these Green Mountains we all hold dear and call home; we are, as Bishop Ely and Presiding Bishop Curry remind, the Vermont Branch of a much larger family tree whose roots travel all the way back to Jesus of Nazareth. Neither do those branches compose an exclusively Episcopalian tree; our brotherhood and sisterhood extends, as the Right Reverend Christopher Coyne, Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Burlington, reminded us on Friday afternoon: Christ is a relationship not a religion. In fact, the roots of our family tree are even deeper still: Just as we are brothers and sisters in Christ, we are, with our Jewish and Muslim siblings, sisters and brothers in Abraham. The reflective questions remaining with me since convention are: what kind of brother have I been? And going forward, what kind of brother will I be?
Please Complete the Asset Map Survey When communities are in need, what resources are available within the diocese to assist? Over the past year, that question has gotten a lot easier to answer thanks to the Episcopal Asset Map. The project, which began as a grassroots effort of Episcopal Relief & Development, has succeeded in surveying a growing percentage of Episcopal parishes worldwide to create an online map of each location and the ministries and gifts offered there. The Episcopal Church in Vermont encourages all parishes within the diocese to participate in the Asset Map. To complete the survey, please follow these steps: • •
Identify an individual or group within your parish who will complete the survey Visit http://edvt.episcopalassetmap.org/
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Find your parish on the map, and click on the name Click on the red “Take the Survey!” button Your submission will be reviewed by an administrator and will appear on the map within a few days.
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If you have any questions, or would prefer to submit your survey on paper, please contact John Hartman,
[email protected].
Here is a short video explaining how the map works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6i0Mck-83g0&feature=youtu.be
Applications Accepted for Grants Focused on Climate Change and Creation Applications are now accepted for grants that focus on local faith-based projects for mitigating climate change and safeguarding the integrity of creation. The Episcopal Church Advisory Council for the Stewardship of Creation, enabled by Resolution A030,Create Task Force On Climate Change, approved at General Convention 2015, will make recommendations for grants up to $10,000 Application information is available here. Deadline for applications is December 31. “At General Convention in 2015, the Episcopal Church allocated funds to enable local faith-based projects for mitigating climate change and safeguarding the integrity of Creation,” commented the Rev. Stephanie Johnson, Council Co-Chair. “The purpose of the funds is to support Episcopalians in reconciling with all God’s creation as faithful disciples of Jesus Christ,” added co-chair Bishop Marc Andrus. Episcopal Church congregations, seminaries, schools, monastic communities, nonprofits, dioceses, provinces, etc. are encouraged to develop projects which find and establish connections between eco- and social justice, engaging the local community as partners and participants. The projects should seek to foster cooperation between communities of faith, civic, scientific and educational organizations. Projects should have specific outcomes which create lasting impact, enhance faith formation and social understanding and serve groups and/or regions that are vulnerable and/or underrepresented in the church. Projects including intergenerational engagement, demonstrating innovation and creativity, and promoting churchwide learning, understanding and practical application are welcomed. The Advisory Council for the Stewardship of Creation will make recommendations to the Episcopal Church Executive Council for its February 2017 meeting, and final grant decisions will be made at that time. The second round of grant opportunities will open in in February 2017.
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For further information and details please contact Chris Sikkema, Mission Associate for Justice and Advocacy Ministries, at
[email protected]. Members Members of the Advisory Council for the Stewardship of Creation are: • Bishop Marc Andrus, Co-Chair, Diocese of California • The Rev. Stephanie Johnson, Co-Chair, Diocese of Connecticut • Paul Anton, Diocese of Minnesota • The Rev. Jerry Cappel, Diocese of Kentucky • The Rev. Patrick Funston, Diocese of Kansas • The Rev. Esther Georges, Diocese of the Virgin Islands • Perry Hodgkins Jones, Diocese of Atlanta • The Rev. Martha Kirkpatrick, Diocese of Delaware • The Rev. Nurya Love Parish, Diocese of Western Michigan • Kelly Phelan, Diocese of Olympia • Peter Sergienko, Diocese of Oregon • Dr. Andrew Thompson, Diocese of East Tennessee • Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, Ex Officio • President of the House of Deputies the Rev. Gay Clark Jennings, Ex Officio • Jayce Hafner, staff liaison Ballard Farm Stand Shares Bountiful Harvest This year, Partners' Pantry at Rock Point preserved and donated 463 pounds of fresh, local food to the ChiVenden Emergency Food Shelf. A significant portion of that blessing—roughly 200 pounds of it—was made possible by a generous donation from Ballard Farm Stand. In fact, Jim and Linda have made many gifts from their family farm, helping to express their local mission by feeding the community. Ballard Farm Stand through Tuberville has donated a total of 5038 pounds of vegetables to the Burlington Emergency Food Shelf, St. Albans Food Shelf, and Colchester Food Shelves. Additionally, they’ve provided 420 pounds to the Milton Schools,150 pounds to Martha's Kitchen in St. Albans, 210 pounds to the Milton Recreation department and another, as yet uncalculated amount to the Milton Community Center. But wait, there’s more… They expect to give away another 600 pounds of squash in the weeks to come.
10 In Case You Missed It
Members of St. Michael's Episcopal Church raised awareness in Brattleboro, Vermont about injustice in Standing Rock, North Dakota.
Bishop’s Visitation Schedule Here's a look at the Bishop's upcoming visits. Please contact the church directly to confirm the service times: Sunday, November 20 St. Peter's - Lyndonville, Vt. Wednesday, November 30 Gethsemane - Proctorsville, Vt. Sunday, December 4 Jerusalem Gathering – Bristol, Vt. Sunday, December 11 St. Mary’s, Northfield
11 Upcoming Events, Reminders and Announcements View upcoming parish and diocesan events in the full calendar.
Hopkins Bookshop Grand Re-Opening, Thursday, December 1 at noon The Hopkins Bookshop is moving! Trinity Church in Shelburne will be the new owner and the new location will open on Thursday December 1st at noon. Regular store hours will be Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays from 12 to 4pm. Store manager will be Jenny Ogelby, longtime member of the bookshop staff. The Ground of the Heart: 2016 Advent Retreat at Rock Point, December 2 & 3 The Rock Point 2016 Advent Retreat, which will be a silent retreat, will take place on Friday and Saturday, December 2 and 3, at the Bishop Booth Conference Center. The leader will be Fr. Justin Lanier, rector of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church in Bennington. Register today: http://diovermont.org/PDFs/rock-point/Registration_Form_Advent_2016.pdf
The Mountain is sent twice monthly. If you have questions, would like your news or event to be included in the next issue, or have a change of e-mail address or phone number, email us. The next two editions of The Mountain will publish on or around Dec. 1 and 15 Please submit content at least 48 hours in advance.
