THE WOODFORDS BEACON
March 2018
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OUR JOURNEY THROUGH LENT:
LEARNING TO LOVE AGAIN
The world is filled to the brim with people (7.6 billion people – but who’s counting?), real people – people just like you and me. All of us both ordinary and yet extraordinary. All of us unique, amazing and created in the image of God. Each of us, therefore – in spite of our human flaws – is a holy being, worthy of being loved, worthy of being treated with grace and value and dignity. And yet often that’s not the way we feel… we sometimes feel as if the world despises us, we sometimes feel as if we’re unworthy and too flawed to be loved. We see only our brokenness.
And yet God sees only possibility. God sees our goodness, our holiness. God loves us just as we are and finds us not only worthy but delightful and loveable. God comes to us in our broken places and – if we’re willing – binds us up and mends us and leads us back into the community where there is a place just for us. God longs for us to be whole because God longs to be in relationship with us. God loves us fiercely, intimately, extravagantly and lavishly.
May you meet God in this time of regrowth and renewal as the days become longer and the sun moves into its premier place in our northern hemisphere – bringing warmth and light and tender shoots that punctuate our senses with new possibilities.
You, too, are always a “new possibility,” one of God’s tender shoots in the process of becoming all that God dreams you to be. So let God meet you just where you are and God will nurture you and feed you and tend you and restore your beauty and your spirit.
May this be a blessing for you and on you as you continue your journey through Lent.
Rev. Carolyn
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HOLY WEEK SERVICES
PALM SUNDAY
10:00 am Service
Sanctuary
MAUNDY THURSDAY
7:00 pm Service
Sanctuary
GOOD FRIDAY
12:30 pm Service
Chapel
EASTER SUNDAY SERVICES
6:00 am Sunrise Service
Southern Maine Community College "The Bunker"
*9:00 am Early Service
Sanctuary
*11:00 am Late Service
Sanctuary
*9 & 11 am services are identical and will feature choral, handbell and brass music.
Below: The Resurrection, Perugino. Metropolitan Museum of Art
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Calling All Crafters, Seamstresses,
and People-Who-Are-Just-Okay-
with-a Pair-of-Scissors
Each year our Christmas Eve Pageant helps to usher in the holiday, not only for Woodfords families, but for folks in the community-at-large. This year one of these guests (whose family was in the midst of a tough year) remarked that the pageant had "finally made it feel like Christmas." What a lovely gift to share with our neighbors!
But while the spirit was strong, we noticed some of the costumes were badly fraying at the hems. With this in mind, on March 11th after worship, we would like to invite you to join us for a special afternoon we are calling:
Sew and Sandwiches.
We will provide the sandwich fixings, the costume patterns and the fabric, we just need your willing hands to help us turn out some tunics for future pageants.
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WELCOME TO OUR NEW MEMBERS
Woodfords is blessed to have welcomed seven new members
to our congregation this winter.
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SUSAN BASSI-BROWN
I grew up in Southborough, Mass, a sweet New England town of 2000 people, with all the small town traditions of so many towns.
In my senior year, my dad was promoted with the requirement that we move to Cleveland. I had already picked my college, and I could not bear to give it up, so I went just the same to Colby College. My family moved to the Midwest and I stayed in New England. They still all live there, Mom, two sisters, nieces and nephews and their babies. I go to visit as often as I can.
After graduating from Colby with a degree in English, I tried to find something I could do that I liked. When I took a beginning accounting course, yes this was almost on a bet, I found I really enjoyed it. From then on my career path was working for small businesses, mostly ad agencies, in multiple roles, and eventually got my MBA at the ripe old age of 57!
I moved to Portland in 1986 and met the love of my life – we just celebrated 25 years! Second for both of us, but that makes it that much more precious. I have two lovely step-children, a girl, Kate, 31, who lives in Boston and a boy Kyle, now 37 living in San Francisco.
Although I retired 3 years ago, I continue to work part time for my husband who has a tax practice in Portland.
My volunteer work included over 14 years at United Way in the Community Investment area, including Chair of the Education Team. I also volunteered at local schools and the Chamber of Commerce for more than 10 years. I’m currently a volunteer at Score where I mentor emerging entrepreneurs and folks who want to start their own business.
I grew up as a Catholic, but I feel as if I’ve really found a home at Woodfords. I’m very excited about starting this new journey, spiritual and with a deepening involvement with our community, Portland, Maine, and the world.
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MOLLIE K HERON
I was born in Warren Ohio where I was baptized and active in Central Christian Church, a Disciples of Christ Church. When I married my childhood sweetheart, a Presbyterian, in 1963, that became my faith, until now. My activities in the Presbyterian Churches in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, and Lexington, (KY) centered around Peacemaking, the Women’s Association, and as an Elder.
I am a widow of 15 years, mother of 3, and grandmother of 9, ranging in age from 8-25. These families live in Austin, TX, Lexington, KY, and Freeport, ME so when I am not at OceanView at Falmouth in the winter or Alamoosook Lake in Orland in the summer, I may be visiting family or other friends.
I am an avid gardener, quilter, and knitter, and I am driving for ITN in Portland, which I did in Lexington for 5 years before moving. Many of my quilts are for charity, another form of giving back to the community.
I am excited to join a church which lives according to Matthew 25.
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Gloriose Ndayishimiye, Patrick and Alex Nduwimana (aka Nick)
Gloriose and Patrick met for the first time in 2000. Gloriose had some friends who were journalists, two of them were working with Patrick in the same media. Gloriose, as a friend of Patrick's colleagues, became a friend to Patrick and their friendship turned little by little into a love story. Gloriose worked in UNDP (United Nations Development Program) as a telecom operator. Her job was similar to that of Patrick.
In 2003, they decided to become wife and husband. They married in a very difficult moment, because two weeks before their wedding, Bujumbura city where they lived was under the noise of gunfire, mortar bombs and rocket shelling.
But that unsafe situation did not stop their commitment. The couple lived in an unstable country for years. To our knowledge (writes Gloriose), Burundi has never had lasting peace, it has just enjoyed a relative calm. The regime which ruled the country since 2005 never tolerated the work of journalists and other human rights defenders or critical opponents. Patrick has always been in the front line to denounce the harassment, persecution and imprisonment of journalists and to defend the freedom of expression and rule of law in his country. And Gloriose has always worried about the safety of her husband; she had a feeling that one day, something terrible would happen to Patrick, then hurt them as a couple.
And this is what happened. Gloriose was physically attacked while going back home from work, by a gang which in fact had a mission to eliminate her husband. The sad incident affected Gloriose psychologically, and in 2014, she decided to leave Burundi. Intuition told Gloriose to come to the United States, specifically to Portland, Maine, to seek asylum for herself and for her family. While Gloriose was struggling alone in Portland, the situation continued to worsen in Burundi.
In May 2015, Patrick fled to neighboring Rwanda with their two sons, Alex and Kim Michel, after political chaos was followed by massive killings. The regime which survived from a military coup was targeting opponents, journalists, civil society activists: men and women who protested against the change of the constitution by the current president.
While Patrick and the children were living in Rwanda as refugees, Gloriose continued to fight for the family reunion. It wasn't an easy task, but God helped her; she met a nice and very kind lawyer who defended her case; she met beautiful and lovely people at Woodfords Congregational Church, who supported her in their everyday prayers, so that the family reunion would succeed.
Praise goes to the Lord, for today Patrick and Alex are here in Portland. They joined Gloriose on the eve of Christmas; this is something meaningful. The file of the other son who is still in Rwanda was approved three days after Christmas. Kim Michel should arrive at any moment to join his parents.
It has been a blessing at the end of the year for Patrick and Gloriose. They thank God, and they thank all Woodfords church members for their support and prayers. God bless you all.
(Patrick has recently taken a job with the Voice of America and is based in Washington, D.C. Alex is a senior at Deering High School and looking forward to attending college. Gloriose continues to hold the family together through love, hard work, prayer and the support of the people of WCC.)
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TAMARA TORRES MCGOVERN
Massage therapist, personal chef, kick boxing instructor, cafeteria lunch lady, folk singer, coffee barista AND UCC minister... what do these professions have in common? They have all, at one time or another, been held by Rev. Tamara Torres McGovern. What some might call a short attention span, she would prefer to describe as an insatiable curiosity and hunger for life's new adventures. Born in Venezuela and reared between Virginia and Spain, Tamara was raised with a multicultural perspective. But, she will tell you she didn't really feel "at home" for the first time until a snowy day in February of 2002 when she visited a friend in Portland, Maine. Despite the freezing air howling down the Congress St. wind tunnel, Tamara was charmed and decided to make this place her home. And as fate would have it, she had the good fortune of marrying a true-blue-Mainer and can now claim family roots in this lovely state. Tamara, Piper, their young daughter, Tovi, and their quirky Puerto Rican street dog, Caper, live in North Deering. Tamara is thrilled to become a member of Woodfords.
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BRENDA TURNER
Woodfords was my Church in the 50's, 60's and the early 70's. I was married in 1975 and since my husband was a member of St. Joseph's Church, we continued there and raised our 2 girls there. Our oldest, Tatum, lives in Connecticut with her husband and 4 children. When I'm not at church on Sunday, I'm probably in CT, or in warmer weather, I'll be kayaking. Our youngest, Tristin, is in Portland with her husband and 2 daughters. I worked at the Telephone Company for 21 years and for Portland Schools at Deering High School in Special Education for 23 years. I still substitute teach a few times a month. My husband passed away in 2015 and I wanted to find another church. My friend Linda and I went to many churches for about 18 months to find the perfect one. I told Carolyn I am where I should be without a doubt. She and Jim have been so welcoming and wonderful to me. I've met so many friendly and kind people who make me feel so comfortable. I'm looking forward to getting to know more people and to getting involved in more aspects of the Woodfords community.
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Woodfords Women’s Retreat 2018: May 4-6
Marie Joseph Spiritual Center, Biddeford Pool
In our harried and over-scheduled lives, we often ignore the need to feed our spirits and our souls. We take care of family, business, meals, exercise, community responsibilities – all important – but we seldom have time (or take the time) to truly nurture our inner spirits. Each year, our Women’s Retreat is an opportunity to embrace and feed our souls.
There will be time to relax, read, reflect, listen, participate, enjoy the silence or just seek an encounter with the Holy as you walk along the shore. Further plans for the weekend are in the works and will be detailed in upcoming Announcements and in the April Beacon. The cost this year will be $225 for two nights and 5 meals. There will be some scholarship help available.
Please plan to join us. The “time away” is an important part of our search for meaning and wholeness in our lives. It’s a great time to seek both solitude and be nurtured in community. And, especially for those who might be new to Woodfords, it’s a GREAT opportunity to get to know your sister sojourners! Feel free to “corner” me and ask me more!!
Blessings,
Rev. Carolyn
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COUNCIL NOTES
The Council spent a Saturday morning on 2/3 discussing John Dorhauer’s book
Beyond Resistance
as we look at WCC and the future. We are continuing our work on this important issue. Many of you have had a chance to read Dr. Dorhauer’s book and we will be coming together to have more discussions in the near future. I am trying to circulate books so everyone who would like to read it gets a chance. Speak to Robin if you want the next available book so you can see what we are discussing. Your input is important to our work.
Finances: Our Pledge revenue ytd is at 68% vs. 58%, great; our Plate & Other Receipts is at 51% vs 58%, a bit low, and our total expenses are at 54% vs. 58%. We are 4% below budget with expenses and about break even with income. We expect that the two big revenue areas (rents and pledges) will come in on target. We also expect we will be below budget on plate offerings and a few other smaller areas of revenue by about $15k by year’s end.
Signage and the re-do of the kitchen/bathroom are all in process and we will let you know when we have some solid dates & info.
The start of the elevator project is expected in about 10 weeks. Won’t a reliable elevator be great?
The Choir’s new chairs are here – take a look at the choir loft. They are lovely.
Our Job Fair is under way and we are looking for areas you may want to serve/help – please let us know your interests and join us. It is a lot of fun to be part of our work.
I hear the Directories will be shipped out from Lifetouch on 3/7.
Dates and teams for Budget & Stewardship committees are underway. You will be hearing from us soon.
Just a reminder, you are always welcome to join the Council for its monthly meeting – the third Tuesday of each month at 6:30.
Robin Carter,
Moderator
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GRATITUDE SPOTLIGHT...
Amy Segal
If you attended this year's Heifer Fair, you know it was a resounding success, not just as a fundraiser but also as a community builder! Our kids were energized and empowered as they sold their handmade wares. Adults enjoyed fellowship with friends while munching on a cupcake for a cause. And the event raised more than $1200 for Heifer International-- in short EVERYBODY WON!
Amidst the noise and hubbub it may have been easy to overlook someone who was constantly in motion, but drawing little attention to herself:
Amy Segal
. In addition to the everyday rigors of being a working parent, Amy also volunteers as the coordinator of the Heifer Fair. Back in 2017, while many of us were wrapped up planning the holidays, Amy was already hard at work searching for kid-friendly projects to present to our youth. After inviting the kids to vote for the crafts they most wanted to create, she gathered the supplies, rallied volunteers, juggled weekly craft-a-thons, and planned the fair from tables to food. But perhaps the MOST impressive part of Amy's leadership style was the way that she made participating feel so GOOD for everyone she invited to take part in the Heifer project.
And so this month, Woodfords would like to thank this extraordinary member/volunteer/disciple. Thank you Amy Segal for all you bring to our community!
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We’re "Pulling out all the Stops!"
Special After Worship Event - Sunday March 4
A Look inside the Pipe Organ 11:30-12:15 pm
(in the Music Room)
Rebecca and Paul will share a program of their experiences with the King of Instruments. They will show pictures and share information about our Wicks organ, and how the pipe organ works!
For those who want a hands on experience, you’ll have an opportunity to play a beautiful positive organ designed and hand built by Nick Wallace of Gorham, Maine, which is temporarily being stored in the Woodfords Music Room.
Coffee and refreshments will be served.
COME JOIN US!
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Submitting an article for the April Beacon?
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GRANT FUND - MARCH OFFERINGS
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March 2:
Grant Fund Team Meeting: 11:30 am (Woodfords Room)
Games and Goodies: 1:00-4:00 pm (Memorial Hall)
Are you a card shark? A chess champ? the King of Candyland? Join friends for a late winter afternoon of fun. Bring a deck of cards or your favorite game and a snack to share.
March 30:
Good Friday Lunch 11:00am
(Memorial Hall)
Sandwiched between the chaos of the Palms and the joy of the resurrection is this opportunity for self-reflection. Join us for a catered lunch followed by a contemplative service. Please RSVP.
Please RSVP for all Grant Fund events by contacting Rev.Tamara
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Matter of Balance: Weds. March 7 - April 25 from 1-3 pm, Lounge
A Matter of Balance is a nationally recognized program designed to reduce the fear of falling and encourage physical activity. The workshop is conducted over eight sessions, meeting weekly for two hours per session. Meetings are led by trained leaders.
**Preregistration is required**
Please call Southern Maine Agency on Aging: 207-396-6578 or 1-800-427-7411 as soon as possible, to sign up.
Gentle Yoga
This therapeutic class will help keep your body limber and spirit buoyant! Join Stephanie Abrams on
Thursdays from 10:15-11:15 in the Lounge. Jean Koster can take payment.
Book Group
Led by Suzanne D'Bourget, this group meets the
first Wednesday of every month at 12:15 pm in the Parlor. The book chosen for the March meeting is:
The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy: A Novel
by Rachel Joyce.
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Sunday School
As we navigate our way through Lent and toward Easter, we will be exploring using the
Deep Blue Kid's Bible.
This new inclusive, progressive curriculum is designed to encourage kids to adventure through biblical stories in an embodied way. Some weeks we may create a news broadcast of the story, other weeks we might make art, and other weeks we might build instruments and dance our way into the story. Whatever the modality, our goal is to bring the stories to life in ways that are memorable and meaningful. Join us this spring as we make our way toward the resurrection of new life and new hope!
March 4:
Mary Honors Jesus (We will gather downstairs for kid's communion)
March 11:
Bartimaeus Shouts to Jesus (Start in the sanctuary)
March 18:
Jesus Breaks the Bread (Start in the sanctuary)
March 25:
Palm Sunday Procession of the Palms (Start in the sanctuary)
April 1: Easter Sunday!
Services at 9:00/11:00 am, Easter Egg Hunt between services.
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PORTLAND STRING QUARTET SUNDAY, March 18
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March 18, 10 am Worship
Faith in our Journey
The Woodfords Chancel Choir and the Portland String Quartet will present selected choruses from Mendelssohn’s oratorio “Elijah” along with music by Beethoven and Brahms.
Felix Mendelssohn was born in 1809 in Hamburg, Germany, the son of a wealthy and influential banker and the grandson of the prominent Jewish philosopher and scholar Moses Mendelssohn. The family converted to the Lutheran faith when Felix was a young boy, adopting the additional surname Bartholdy, which was the name of a dairy owned by the family.
In the 1840’s Felix Mendelssohn was the most celebrated musician in Europe, equally in demand as a composer, conductor and pianist, but he was a particular favorite in Birmingham, England where he had recently triumphed with his oratorio, St. Paul. His great fame in Victorian England caused Queen Victoria and Prince Albert to dub him “The Second Elijah.”
Like Mozart before him, Mendelssohn was a precocious talent who dazzled audiences with his virtuosity, phenomenal memory, amazing sight-reading ability and skill at improvisation. As a composer, he came into his mature style at a very early age, producing masterpieces as the Octet for Strings and the Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream while still in his teens. His father’s influence may have opened many doors for him, but it was Mendelssohn’s incredible talent which kept them open.
Mendelssohn’s musical training occurred when he met Carl Friedrich Zelter, director of the Berlin Singakademie. The Singakademie was unique at the time in that it had been founded to promote the choral music of the Baroque period, especially that of J. S. Bach. While Bach’s keyboard and orchestral music was still played, his choral music had largely been forgotten. Zelter also taught Mendelssohn composition and theory, drilling him in counterpoint, fugues and canons after the style of Bach. Bach’s music profoundly influenced Mendelssohn’s compositional style, and he developed a life-long affinity for choral music as well.
When he was 17, Mendelssohn received a manuscript copy of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion from his grandmother. This monumental work had not been performed since Bach’s time a century earlier, and Mendelssohn proposed reviving the work with the Singakademie. On March 11, 1829, the twenty-year old Mendelssohn led the landmark performance from the piano, playing continuo with his left hand and giving entrances with his right, and conducting the massive work entirely from memory as someone had placed the wrong score on the piano! The performance was a great success and had to be repeated twice more. It not only established Mendelssohn as a conductor but it sparked a revival of interest in Bach’s choral music which has endured to this day.
About Elijah
Mendelssohn had long been attracted to the story of the prophet Elijah as material for an oratorio. The story itself contains some of the most dramatic moments in the Old Testament – Elijah’s epic confrontation with the priests of Baal, his raising of the widow’s son from the dead and his ascent into heaven in a whirlwind, borne on a fiery chariot. But Elijah is also one of the most fully developed Biblical characters. He is seen not only as the stern prophet, but also as a man who experiences grief, compassion, weariness and despair. Mendelssohn responded with an oratorio which is almost operatic in its scope and construction. It was an immediate success and still stands as one of the greatest works in the choral repertoire.
Mendelssohn turned to Julius Schubring to prepare the libretto for Elijah. Mendelssohn was worried that Europe was in a state of moral decay. He wrote to Schubring, “I imagined Elijah as a grand and mighty prophet, of the kind we could really do with today – strong, zealous, and yes, even bad-tempered, angry, and brooding – in contrast to the riff-raff, whether of the court or of the people, and indeed in contrast to almost the whole world – and yet borne aloft as if on the wings of angels.”
But Mendelssohn and Schubring clashed over Elijah. Schubring, a fundamentalist Lutheran pastor, wanted to superimpose New Testament beliefs on the Old Testament story. To him, an oratorio should be a kind of sermon in music, and drama and scene-painting were inappropriate. One of Schubring’s plans was to have Christ appear at the end of the oratorio as a sign of the fulfillment of Elijah’s prophecies. Mendelssohn rejected the idea, but eventually they were able to work out their differences and Elijah was completed in August, 1846.
He engaged his friend William Bartholomew to prepare the English translation, and worked closely with him, fine tuning the exact wording and adjusting the music to conform to the English text.
Sadly, Elijah was to be the composer’s last large-scale work. Exhausted by an extremely rigorous concert schedule and the demands of preparing the Elijah score for publication, and disconsolate over the death of his sister earlier that year, Mendelssohn suffered a series of strokes and died on November 4, 1847 at the age of thirty-eight.
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HAPPY MARCH BIRTHDAY TO...
Richard Dudley 03/01
Marilyn Spencer 03/01
Thomas Newman 03/02
Ellen Smith-Erb 03/04
Marion Amatangelo 03/05
Nathaniel Rhinehardt 03/06
Glenn Dunne 03/08
William Doughty III 03/10
Mollie Heron 03/13
Carolyn Lambert 03/13
Suzanne D'Bourget 03/13
Brent Wooten 03/14/
Allen Bingham 03/15
David Humphrey 03/16
Mitchell Rosengarten 03/16
Roberta Barker 03/17
Hannah Frey 03/18
Benjamin Vire 03/19
Adelyn Desrochers 03/20
Robert Bencks 03/20
Carl Beyer 03/21
Ben Walter 03/22
Emily Sprague 03/24
Lucille Clark 03/26
Roy Koster 03/28
Susan Bassi-Brown 03/28
Elaine Nadzo 03/30
Devashree Thomson 03/31
Alan Nye 03/31
HAPPY MARCH ANNIVERSARY TO...
Cheryl Honer-Hickey & Terrance Hickey 03/21
Bob & Laura Carten 03/30
Lorraine & Bruce Canterbury 03/28
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EASTER EGG HUNT
April 1, 10 am
I’m going to hide lots of eggs around the church now that the snow has melted. Children — please come on Easter Sunday ready to help me find them!
There will be a fantastic Easter Egg Hunt at 10:00 am on Easter Day, April 1. After worship has ended, children should meet Pam Barrows in the Lounge and the hunt will begin!
Parents: Please come help fill and hide the eggs! We will fill the eggs on Saturday morning, March 31 at 10 am in the Woodfords Room. We’ll hide them during the first service (9:00am) on Easter morning, April 1. Please contact Pam Barrows at 892-4391 or pbarrows207@gmail.com if you can help!
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CONFIRMATION 2018-2019
Yes!! It’s coming…
This year, once again, young people in grades 7 and above will have the opportunity to be “pilgrims,” on a Confirmation journey. Our last journey – with the young people from HopeGateWay Methodist Church - was
exceptional
, and this year, not only will we have the opportunity to engage with young people from HopeGateWay, we’ll also be journeying with young people from Trinity Episcopal Church. I am SO excited and I hope you will be as well!
In May, we’ll be inviting young people and parents to join with Reverend Allen Ewing-Merrill, Reverend Larry Weeks and me to hear about our upcoming Confirmation journey. I hope you’ll plan to join us for our informational gathering and for the new Confirmation journey. For now, be thinking about this new journey and the questions you might have for us when we get together in the spring!
Almost-Spring blessings to all of you!
Rev. Carolyn
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THANK YOU! and a big round of applause
for
James Fletcher, Nathan Fletcher, and Hayden Bachman who provided music during worship on February 11. For those of you who missed it, these boys really rocked with their renditions of “Wade in the Water" and “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Then they ushered us out of worship accompanying the congregation singing
“This Little Light of Mine.”
We look forward to hearing more from this group in the future.
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SAVE THE DATE --- PILGRIM LODGE 2018 - SEPTEMBER 7-9
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WOODFORDS CHURCH OFFICE HOURS
Tuesday - Friday, 9 am - 3 pm
207.774.8243
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