WEEKLY UPDATE  
The Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost 
September 1, 2019 
 
PLEASE REMEMBER IN YOUR PRAYERS  
Bob & Donna Weber, Mickey Federico, Peter Federico, Yasso Herath, Peter Lubeck, Catherine Lubeck, John and Shirley Federico, Dr. John Finn, Bill Weber, Ian,  Jean, Al and Carol Lalli,  Peter Zakrepine, Phyllis Richey, Russell Fernando, Rislyn Joseph, Ria Meade, Cindy O'Gorman, Suzanne, Phyllis, Ann Shusterman, Dolores Lentz, Jim Craig, Thomas Wolfe, Peter Foley, Mary Riffle, Elaine MacPhee, Mary Serena Gwertzman, Allyison, The Reverend Art Rushlow, Kim Hewlett, Lia Wanamaker, The Rev. Debra Given, Sissi Loftin, Bill Clarke, Craig Gordon, Pat,  Veronica Lane-Walsh, Rosmarie Buri, Laura, Isaiah, Eleanor Devlin, Elliot Kloehn,Geraldine Riley, Ellie Hafstad, B.J. Close, Kate Scarmato and family, Vickie Frelow, David Corcoran, Audrey Washington   
 
Collect of the Day
Lord of all power and might, the author and giver of all good things: Graft in our hearts the love of your Name; increase in us true religion; nourish us with all goodness; and bring forth in us the fruit of good works; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever and ever. Amen.
 
Prayer for Prophetic Witness in Society  
Almighty God, whose prophets taught us righteousness in the care of your poor: By the guidance of your Holy Spirit, grant that we may do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly in your sight; through Jesus Christ, our Judge and Redeemer, who lives and reigns with you and the same Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Prayer for Social Justice
Almighty God, who created us in your own image: Grant us grace fearlessly to contend against evil and to make no peace with oppression; and, that we may reverently use our freedom, help us to employ it in the maintenance of justice in our communities and among the nations, to the glory of your holy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.    
 
God, our Creator, we are held in your everlasting arms,
Jesus, our Savior, we are healed by your wounded hands,
Holy Spirit, be present as we reach out to one another in love.

KEEPING UP WITH THE CHURCH
Episcopal News Service
Episcopal New Yorker
Episcopal Cafe
Sojourners
Bishops United Against Gun Violence
Everytown Again Gun Violence

Reflection
 
 
We are all infatuated with the splendor of space, with the grandeur of things of space. Thing is a category that lies heavy on our minds, tyrannizing all our thoughts. Our imagination tends to mold all concepts in its image. In our daily lives we attend primarily to that which the senses are spelling out for us: to what the eyes perceive, to what the fingers touch. Reality to us is thinghood, consisting of substances that occupy space; even God is conceived by most of us as a thing. The result of our thinginess is our blindness to all reality that fails to identify itself as a thing, as a matter of fact. This is obvious in our understanding of time, which, being thingless and insubstantial, appears to us as if it had no reality.

Indeed, we know what to do with space but do not know what to do about time, except to make it subservient to space. Most of us seem to labor for the sake of things of space. As a result we suffer from a deeply rooted dread of time and stand aghast when compelled to look into its face. Time to us is sarcasm, a slick treacherous monster with a jaw like a furnace incinerating every moment of our lives. Shrinking, therefore, from facing time, we escape for shelter to things of space. The intentions we are unable to carry out we deposit in space; possessions become the symbols of our repressions, jubilees of frustrations. But things of space are not fireproof; they only add fuel to the flames. Is the joy of possession an antidote to the terror of time which grows to be a dread of inevitable death? Things, when magnified, are forgeries of happiness, they are a threat to our very lives; we are more harassed than supported by the Frankensteins of spatial things.

It is impossible for man to shirk the problem of time. The more we think the more we realize: we cannot conquer time through space. We can only master time in time.

The higher goal of spiritual living is not to amass a wealth of information, but to face sacred moments. In a religious experience, for example, it is not a thing that imposes itself on man but a spiritual presence. What is retained in the soul is the moment of insight rather than the place where the act came to pass. A moment of insight is a fortune, transporting us beyond the confines of measured time. Spiritual life begins to decay when we fail to sense the grandeur of what is eternal in time.

Our intention here is not to deprecate the world of space. To disparage space and the blessing of things of space, is to disparage the works of creation, the works which God beheld and saw "it was good." The world cannot be seen exclusively sub specie temporis. Time and space are interrelated. To overlook either of them is to be partially blind. What we plead against is man's unconditional surrender to space, his enslavement to things. We must not forget that it is not a thing that lends significance to a moment; it is the moment that lends significance to things.
 
Abraham Joshua Heschel
 
This Week

Are you on the worship ministry schedule for this week?    CLICK HERE to find out.


SUMMER SERVICE SCHEDULE
CONTINUES THROUGH SEPTEMBER 8 
   
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 1 
8:00am Holy Eucharist, Rite I 
10:00am Holy Eucharist  (summer choir)
 
MONDAY, S EPTEMBER 2 - Grace Church Office is closed for the holiday 
 
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5 
7:00am Grace's Kitchen (Team 5) (Memorial Hall)
12:00pm Brown Bag and a Bible (Patterson Hall)    
 
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 7
10:00am -3:00pm Long River Tai Chi Closed Workshop (Memorial Hall)
3-7:00pm Reserved for private rental (Patterson Hall)  
 
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 8
8:00am Holy Eucharist, Rite I 
10:00am Holy Eucharist   
 
WE RETURN TO THREE SERVICES ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 15 
 
 
Announcements
 
THE HISTORIC JESUS OF NAZARETH - continues through September 
Parishioner Charles ("Pat") Reynolds, who leads the Sunday and Thursday Bible study groups at Grace, is leading a series on the historic Jesus through September.    

THE HISTORIC JESUS OF NAZARETH
Jesus of Nazareth was a first century Jewish apocalyptic prophet.
There is a day in history when he was born, he grew up, he had a ministry, and he was executed.
Using the methods of historical analysis, what can be discovered about this historic person? 
Five sessions of 1 ½ hour each
 
Thursdays August 29 - September 26 
12:00 - 1:30 p.m.  Patterson Hall, Grace Episcopal Church
No Registration Necessary
 
Tuesdays August 27 - September 24
1:45 - 3:15 p.m.  New City Jewish Center 
47 Old Schoolhouse Rd  New City, NY
Click on Registration - Register for  Session 1A  Period 3

FINAL SUMMER CHOIR  THIS WEEKEND 
Our Summer Choir is once again gathering every other week through August. If you love to sing...or are choral-curious...show up at 9:20am in the Choir Room and learn a simple and easy piece to be sung at the 10:00am service. No pressure. No commitment. No Vestments! Just music. Remaining Remaining Dates: August 18 and September 1.
 
COMING UP!
AMAZING GRACE CIRCUS  - Performances at Marydell!

 ANOTHER TASTY FUN(d)RAISER COMING IN SEPTEMBER



 
HELP US KEEP ON TRACK
IT'S EASY TO FORGET-ESPECIALLY OVER THE SUMMER
 
Our online credit card processing company is always available to process online transactions and make it easier for those who use credit or debit cards to pay their pledge or make one-time gifts to Grace. To go to the secure site: gecnyack.givingfire.com/ (or look for the "Make a Donation/Pay 2019 Pledge Here" box on the home page of our website (gracechurchnyack.org) or contact Sally Ann Mock, pledge secretary ( samock34@aol.com ). Thank you so much for your support.

Of Interest to the Community 
 

Parting Thought
 
The Summer Ends
by Wendell Berry  
 
The summer ends, and it is time
To face another way. Our theme
Reversed, we harvest the last row
To store against the cold, undo
The garden that will be undone.
We grieve under the weakened sun
To see all earth's green fountains dried,
And fallen all the works of light.
You do not speak, and I regret
This downfall of the good we sought
As though the fault were mine. I bring
The plow to turn the shattering
Leaves and bent stems into the dark,
From which they may return. At work,
I see you leaving our bright land,
The last cut flowers in your hand.
 
"The Summer Ends" by Wendell Berry, from A Timbered Choir.
GRACE EPISCOPAL CHUR CH
  130 First Avenue, Nyack, New York 10960

845-358-1297