Pastor Letter 
Rev. Rob Mark, Pastor
May the peace of Christ be with you all this September!
As many of us are asking, "wait, where did the summer go?" I encourage us to pause, and think back for a moment or two through the eyes of faith upon these past two+ months of summer. Where did you glimpse God? Where did the Spirit sneak in between the cracks of life? As Barbara Darling recently prayed in worship, let us remember the "aching beauty" of the moments that stand out from this past summer, and give thanks.
Friends, I am deeply grateful that there is much that lies before us as a community of faith as summer soon will give way to fall. With a brand new transitional Associate Pastor Adam Isbitsky among us (see below), and so much more afoot, I encourage us to tune in to and prioritize the various opportunities we have to "be church" from weekly worship to all church retreats, to book and Bible discussions, to activism, organizing and getting to know and love each other.
Rocks New Beginnings:
This current season of our life together began with us grieving and celebrating the life of our beloved sibling in faith, Elsa Abele. I am writing this the day after the memorial service we hosted in our sanctuary to honor Elsa. When I led the gathered community in the closing "rock benediction," in my own emotion, I failed to mention an important point, that I want to lift up here:
For those of you who were not able to be with us in person, we handed out a rock to everyone in the sanctuary, to honor the deep love of rock-collecting and closeness to the earth that in part defined Elsa. Inviting people to receive this rock as a gift to remember Elsa, and to strive to similarly live close to the earth, remembering God our rock (Psalm 18), I then mentioned how I had given Elsa  a rock (2.9 billion year old Lewisian Gneiss) from the Isle of Iona, Scotland on the day I first saw her in her hospital room post brain cancer diagnosis. Over this past year, Elsa's children told me she has kept that rock close to her - a reminder of God her rock, accompanying her as she courageously faced this challenging new reality. The point I failed to mention yesterday in my benediction was that when I first gave it to Elsa, I shared that I had picked it up during my Sabbatical while on pilgrimage on Iona from the Bay of New Beginnings. In that sacred bay where St. Columba first landed, pilgrims are invited to take a rock for themselves and for loved ones as a reminder that every day, we begin again. Every day, every moment is part of an unfolding, sacred journey where the Spirit is accompanying us. A sacred journey that nothing--not even cancer--can interrupt. So friends, may this fall, as we continue to remember, miss and give thanks for saint Elsa Abele, may we cling to the rocks we find along the way that remind us of the sacred journey of faith, life and hope we are all taking in the Spirit.
Every day, always, we begin again,
Rob 
Rob recently offered an invocation before Boston City Council. Watch minutes 1:40-6:50
at this link.
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Introducing Covenant's New
Transitional Associate Pastor
Adam Isbitsky
By Barbara Darling on behalf of Council
Church of the Covenant welcomes our new half-time Transitional Associate Pastor, Adam Isbitsky, who begins his ministry with us on August 27 for a 6-month period. The Pastoral Transition Team (PTT) crafted a position description and it was approved by Council and by the Presbytery's Committee on Ministry. Then the PTT received a number of resumes, conducted phone interviews, narrowed the field down to two in-person interviews, and unanimously selected Adam! Council officially approved the calling of Adam for this position. His primary responsibilities will be with the 20s and 30s group, Children and Youth CE, and worship leadership. Below are his photo and a brief biographical sketch. Adam will be commissioned on Sunday, Sept. 1, as we welcome him!
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Adam Isbitsky (he/him/his) is blessed to serve as Transitional Associate Pastor at Church of the Covenant. He is a Massachusetts native and was an active member of his home church, First Congregational Church of Stoughton, United Church of Christ. Adam completed a Master of Divinity program with Certificate in Interfaith Leadership at Andover Newton Theological School and a unit of Clinical Pastoral Education at Saint Vincent Hospital at Worcester Medical Center.
Prior to attending seminary, Adam trained in music and education, and you can often find him singing or playing keyboard instruments here and there when he gets the chance. He co-founded and managed a local nonprofit children's theater company throughout its eight years of producing fun, educational productions.
Adam enjoys crafting and participating in good worship and always finds ways to blend humor with a deep love for God and the earth. He is passionate about the value of church as a caring community: a group--yes, even an institution (gasp! a dirty word)--that cares for its own members and friends and reaches out in caring to others in need. He looks to Jesus as an example of what that means, especially taking to heart his prayed words "on earth as it is heaven."
Prior to serving Church of the Covenant, Adam served UCC churches in Wellesley Hills, East Weymouth, North Middleboro, and Holliston in similar short-term roles in both pastoral and music ministry positions. He looks forward to serving with Church of the Covenant during this time of transition and discernment.
go to
In This Issue
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New GBIO Healthcare Initiative
By Holly Humphreys, GBIO Healthcare Captain for Covenant
and
Tim Groves, Healthcare Co-captain
The focus this year for the Greater Boston Interfaith Organization (GBIO) has three major emphases:
1. Achieve mental health parity so that mental health and substance use disorders are covered equally with physical health issues
2. Establish prescription drug price controls
3. Eliminate or minimize unexpected bills
GBIO is powered by all our member congregations throughout the city and suburbs. When people are touched personally or the people they care about are affected, they are energized and can make powerful efforts for change. Our power is our people showing up, telling their stories, talking to their friends and getting people to lobby their elected officials.
We had two well-attended GBIO style house meetings after church on July 28 and August 18. Thank you to those who shared their personal stories of challenges with healthcare access and costs.
Covenant's Healthcare team invites you to attend two meetings coming up soon. There will be a
TEACH-IN Thursday, Sept 5, at 7 PM at Grant AME Church, 1906 Washington St., Boston. This will be a great opportunity to strategize for this major initiative with members of other GBIO congregations. Please let Holly or Tim know if you can attend.
Stay tuned for details about the second meeting, a large gathering of about 1,000 people. The date and location will be determined in order to have the maximum influence on the Governor and House and Senate leadership who will be there. When the meeting is announced, we may have little lead time so
get psyched to come on short notice.
Health care, even in MA, leaves many people out and with major access challenges. Please join us in GBIO to find solutions for all !!
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The Usher Team Needs You!
By Denice Thornhill
The Usher Coordinators invite everyone to sign up to usher. The need is great but the task is easy--greet people entering church, hand them a bulletin, and later in the service help collect the offering. Maybe a total of 30 minutes. If you can share 30 minutes of your church time once a month, it would be really appreciated.
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Bible Study reading "Inspired" by Rachel Held Evans
By Nancy Ammerman
The Sunday Morning Bible Study group would like to invite you to join us--starting September 15, at 9:15--in reading Rachel Held Evans' book
Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again. She writes about years of tangling with the Bible and expecting to continue to do so. Not unlike what we do every Sunday morning. She also writes about rediscovering the mysterious life-giving breath that is "inspiration." She says, "The Bible is both inspired and inspiring. Our job is to ready the sails and gather the embers, to discuss and debate, and like the biblical character Jacob, to wrestle with the mystery until God gives us a blessing." If you are curious, come join the debate. We'll have copies of the book for you.
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We Are the Weather 
By Evelyn Kimber for Consumption & Justice Group
We Are the Weather, Jonathan Safran Foer's new book, "explores the central global dilemma of our time... The task of saving the planet will involve a great reckoning with ourselves--with our all-too-human reluctance to sacrifice immediate comfort for the sake of the future. We have, he reveals, turned our planet into a farm for growing animal products, and the consequences are catastrophic. Only collective action will save our home and way of life. And it all starts with what we eat--and don't eat--for breakfast."
Recent headlines underscore the urgency of this message. In August, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in a special report commissioned by the United Nations, "describes plant-based diets as a major opportunity for mitigating and adapting to climate change--and includes a policy recommendation to reduce meat consumption." Researchers warn, "Efforts to curb greenhouse-gas emissions and the impacts of global warming will fall significantly short without drastic changes in global land use, agriculture and human diets."
The Amazon is on fire-the lungs of our planet, home to indigenous peoples, habitat for animal species. Burning at an unprecedented rate, fires are being set by ranchers clearing land for grazing cattle and raising the corn and soy to feed them. This, to satisfy our taste (not need) for abundant meat.
Jonathan Safran Foer, in conversation with environmental advocate
Frances Moore Lappé (Diet for a Small Planet,) will be discussing We Are the Weather in Cambridge on
Wednesday, September 18, 2019 at 7:00 p.m.
Ticket info here.
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News from the Pews 
Compiled by Evelyn Kimber
Austin Burns has accepted a job as the music director at Pilgrim United Church of Christ in New Bedford. It is a small local church (with a Tiffany window!) and Austin will be playing the hymns and working with the choir there. Here he is photographed outside the church and also a "family photo" with
Caitlin Vest and including
Clementine of course.
Caitlin is studying hard to take her LICSW (Independent social work license) exam in the coming months.
 
Linda Pursley had an amazing opportunity to reconnect with many friends she last saw 30 or 40 years ago on a recent trip to Norway. She attended the European Conference of the International Four-H Youth Exchange program, with which she worked in the late 70s-early 80s, joining participants from all over Europe. Before and after the conference she visited the homes of eight former program participants, with activities ranging from visiting Viking historical sites, to collecting cloudberries and chanterelle mushrooms
 .
Sonya Winterberg
, a former member and field ed student at COTC visited on Sunday, September 1 from Halifax, Nova Scotia. She had specifically wanted to attend Else Abele's memorial as she had fond memories of both Else and Reine during her time at Covenant. Sonya's adopted daughter Lea (who was baptized at Covenant in 2001) is already 19 years old and hopes to relocate to Boston next year. Lea is currently on a volunteer program for young adults in Germany. Since her time at Covenant, Sonya has lived in Finland and Germany. Since last month, Sonya, husband Yury, and their 13-year-old adopted son Antonio now make their home in Atlantic Canada.
On Sunday, August 18,
Denice Thornhill participated in the Annual Women's Skillet Throw at the Martha's Vineyard Agricultural Fair. The Skillet Throw (formerly Toss) is open to the world's women (who registered by 1 p.m. Sunday the 18th) divided into 4 lots--Lot 1 ages 18-29, Lot 2 ages 30-45, Lot 3 ages 46-64 and Lot 4 ages 65+. The lots participate in reverse order of age. Each participant throws a custom-made skillet weighing approximately 3 lbs 11 oz twice without practice throws. Goal is to throw the furthest straight down the line on the field, distance off-center is subtracted from distance thrown. Stepping on or over the foul line means that throw is disqualified and cannot be made up. The top six distances in each lot get ribbons and the first in each lot have a final champions throw off. Denice threw 17 ft 1 in and 9 ft 10 in this year, previous years have been better. Champion of Lot 3 threw a skillet 40+ ft. Denice threw fairly straight, just not far.
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Under the Mango Tree 
by Tim Groves
Note: This column will be a monthly sharing of stories from our sister church community, Dulce Nombre de Jesus, in northwest Nicaragua.
As reported in our August report, our most recent delegation from Covenant to Dulce Nombre was during the first half of July with Faith Perry, Mocky Day, Debbie Howland and me representing our church in the village. As with all of the delegation visits, both to Dulce Nombre and Boston, visits to each other's communities are very important to our relationship. This year, people in the village were especially glad to see us because they were not sure we would come back after the political upheaval in Nicaragua that took place from April 2018 into the summer of 2018, and the subsequent repression of civil and human rights.
What people in Dulce Nombre told us in our discussions is that they are strongly committed to supporting the current government of President Daniel Ortega. They are bewildered why there have been such large and passionate demonstrations against him. It is heart breaking for us delegates to know what severe divisions and conflicts have taken place in the society that we have admired and learned so much from. But the divisions clearly are deep and have threatened drastically the larger economy. Tourists and many other visitors inspired by the admirable progress of advancing the lives of the country's many poor people now view Nicaragua as an unstable society with all the evils and divisions that we know only too well from our own country and from other troubled countries around the globe.
In the face of such realities, we treasure our ongoing sister relationship with people we've known for 23 years, whose children we have seen grow up and become remarkable leaders. They too cherish those of us they have known for many years and are delighted to meet newer members of Covenant. And we continue to learn from and inspire each other.
In our second group Dialogue in the village, we agreed together to share an important question that both communities face, not just in our
hermanamiento, but also in the lives of our entire faith communities:
"How does each Community keep alive the
animo or vitality of our faith traditions and pass leadership to the next generation?"
Here is a specific idea we came up with:
Why not schedule face-to-face small group Skype or Zoom conversations to experience Community-to-Community sharing? Perhaps getting more people involved in such conversations can be a way for new and younger members to get excited about our hermanamiento.
Eduardo, a member of Entre Culturas, the group that facilitates our sister relationship, made these two proposals for both groups to consider:
1) Set a date for Entre Culturas to set up a video call (Zoom or Skype) between representatives of both communities.
2) WhatsApp Group: find three administrators, perhaps Mildren (Dulce Nombre), Mocky (Covenant) and Eduardo (Entre Culturas), to form and publicize such a group for informal communication for those who wanted to participate. As a group, we would need to protect each others' privacy.
Our group of Nicaragua Companions will follow up with these possibilities and propose times to promote direct communication with more Covenant members and friends. Please watch out for these opportunities and join in the richness that this relationship offers us all.
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Our
2019 All Church Retreat will be
Friday, October 18 and Saturday, October 19, at the Miramar Retreat Center in Duxbury, Mass. Details and registration will roll out soon.
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Council Report
By Phyllis Galt
From the UCC...
Barbara reported the Massachusetts conference endorses the Climate Justice general strike youth-led movement.
Young Adult Volunteer to join COTC
Rob shared how we have been invited to accompany Young Adult Volunteer (YAV) Mara Chamlee who we will welcome and commission in worship on September 8. Mara says,
"I am from upstate South Carolina. I attended Furman University in Greenville, SC and graduated with a Bachelor of Science in b
i
ology. I love learning about and experiencing the natural world and I feel a strong sense of responsibility to care for the Creation that we have graciously been blessed with. I am very interested in environmental justice and how challenges facing our environment affect different people locally and globally. I really enjoy hiking, triathlons, and a great book! I am so excited to be serving in Bo
s
ton to work with food justice
, grow in faith, and challenge myself daily!"
Clerk's Report
Council voted to accept the Pastoral Transition Team proposal that COTC offer Adam Isbitsky the Transitional Associate Pastor position as a half-time position of 6 months duration (August 27, 2019 through February 25, 2020).
Council voted to approve the compensation agreement with Adam Isbitsky as worked out between the Pastoral Transition Team and Personnel Committee
Report on Staff from Pastor Rob
Rob's Summer Sabbath--Rob expressed gratitude for this gift of time (and gift back to church operating budget of two weeks) He has been invited to give the invocation before Boston City Council on 8/21.
Rob challenged us to consider as a church making Climate Justice an overarching missional focus over these coming years, a theme that links us with the work of antiracism, housing and earth care all dee
p
ly inspired by our faith and following after Jesus who calls us to pay attention to lilies of the field and the birds of the air (Matthew 6:26)
Discussion on Associate Pastor Position
There was discussion and a vote to bring the Position Description for the Settled Associate Pastor to the congregation for a vote on Sunday, September 8, 2019, at a called congregational meeting. In this discu
s
sion, some felt the need to provide more information to the co
n
gregation about the settled position and how its scope and focus r
e
late to the survey and spring congregational meetings and input. I
n
volved in this will include presentations on possibilities and implic
a
tions for financially and missionally sustaining a full time position.
Motion to bring the settled Associate Pastor's position description as presented by the Pastoral Transition Team and with slight amen
d
ments to a Congregational Conversation on Sunday, September 8
,
following worship and for a vote at a Congregational meeting on Sunday, September 29
,
following worship. Council to provide food for the Congregational meeting on September 29
.
Upcoming Adult Education Dates/Topics
Sept 8 - Congregational Conversation on Settled Associate Pastor position
Sept 15 - Potluck/ One to Ones
Sept 22 - Fourth Sunday Meetings (Deacons/ CYCE)
Sept 29 - Congregational Meeting on Settled Associate Pastor position & ministry
Oct 6 - Nancy Hollomon on history of COTC
Oct 13 - M&A on Rethinking Mission with Doug Titlton
Oct 20 - Potluck / possible adult ed on conditions and ministry at the borders
Oct 27 - Fourth Sunday Meetings (Deacons/ CYCE)
Nov 3 - Possible Nica Companions
Nov 10 - COTC 101
Nov 17 - Potluck/ possible Nica Companions
Nov 24 - Fourth Sunday/ Thanksgiving Weekend
December Sundays are open at this point
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2 Joseph Jewett
5 Dorothy Frank
13 Evelyn Loving Azuma
19 Diane Lauber-Dougherty, Joan Tighe
22 Rachel Kirby
23 Barbara Darling
Note: If your September birthday does not appear on this list, please notify Hillary in the church office so we can include you next year!
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September  2019
Calendar
most up-to-date church calendar.
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About This Issue
September 2019 Covenant News
Editor and Graphics: Evelyn Kimber
Template: Harry Forsdick
Deadline for the October 2019 Covenant News is Tuesday, September 24. Please email your submissions to Evelyn Kimber at
[email protected]
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