Second Sunday in Lent

in the Sanctuary

Sunday, March 16th at 10:00 am

The Rev. Pamela L. Werntz, preaching & presiding

Motet: Cohen Mercy on ourselves

Cantata: Bach Schauet doch und sehet,

ob irgend ein Schmerz sei, BWV 46

The Emmanuel Church website has subway and parking garage suggestions. Directions can be found here.



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Reading with the Rector in Lent:

Love Letters of the Christian Testament

March 13, 27, and April 3, 7:00pm - 8:30pm

Pam will host a study group to read and discuss 1&2 Timothy, Titus, James, 1&2 Peter, 1,2&3 John, and Jude together on four Thursday evenings in Lent: March 13, 27, and April 3 (note that we are skipping March 20). We will meet via Zoom from 7:00-8:30pm.

If you are interested in joining, please contact the Parish Office: info@emmanuelboston.org so that we can send you the Zoom link and reading assignments prior to the first meeting.

We will read the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) or David Bentley Hart’s translation if you have it. (No texts will be sent out.) At the end of each meeting, we will pray Compline together. This is a great way to get to know scripture and one another better.

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2025 Lindsey Chapel Series

J. S. Bach: Six English Suites for Keyboard, BWV 806-811

Thursdays at Noon, March 13 - April 10

The popular Lindsey Chapel Series provides free, in-person performances by solo musicians and small ensembles from 12:00–1:00pm on Thursdays throughout Lent. Our popular Lindsey Chapel Series provides free, in-person performances by solo musicians and small ensembles from 12:00–1:00pm on Thursdays throughout Lent. This year EMI presents the complete English Suites for keyboard of J. S. Bach performed by extraordinary Boston harpsichordists. Experience the architectural beauty and intimate acoustics of one of the most beautiful Lady Chapels in the country. The 2025 Lindsey Chapel Series will not be available to stream (see flyer below for more details).

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2025 Bishop's Annual Appeal

With your support, the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts annually commits $2.2 million in grants, allocations and program support to mission initiatives, congregations and special ministries, as well as support for the wider church. Our Sunday greeters will have a copy of the Bishop's Appeal Letter and a Donation Envelope available for your convenience. Also, see flyer below for more details and/or donation options.

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Bible Study with the Rector

Every Tuesday Morning in March:

Continuing Tuesday, March 18th at 7:30am

March is an odd-number month and Bible Study with Pam is back. This is a weekly Zoom happening throughout March and is scheduled for every Tuesday at 7:30am. All are welcome to participate in an always lively discussion of the upcoming Sunday scripture reading(s). To obtain the Zoom link, please contact the parish office via email (info@emmanuelboston.org).

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Snow Date for our Parish Meeting:

Sunday, March 30th at 12:00 - 2:00pm

The Parish luncheon and program that was postponed due to snow will be held on March 30, 12:00 - 2:00pm in the Parish Hall. Thanks to all who joined us by Zoom on February 9 to get the business portion of the Annual Meeting accomplished.

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Notice of Phishing Emails Circulating

Be cautious of suspicious emails that may appear to be from the church or clergy, often asking for personal information like login details, banking information, or immediate action regarding a supposed urgent issue. Never click on suspicious links or provide sensitive details unless they are certain the email is legitimate by contacting the church office directly; if you receive such an email, you should forward it to the church's designated reporting address (info@emmanuelboston.org) and delete it immediately.

Learn more about the English Suites and reserve your free tickets

The next Emmanuel Center Movie Night will be on Sunday March 16th at 7:00pm. We will be discussing the documentary film, Unspoken: America's Native American Boarding Schools.

SUMMARY: PBS Utah takes a moving and insightful look into the dark chapter of American history, the federal Indian boarding school system. The goal was total assimilation into Anglo civilization at the cost of Native American culture.

For the Zoom link, if you are interested in attending, please let us know at info@centralreformtemple.org

Available on YouTube



Emmanuel House is raising money for our community garden! This will be our seventh growing season, and we're excited to deepen our roots in the soil and in our neighborhood.

This year we aim to raise $3,625 to sustain our ministry of a welcoming and nourishing green space in Allston. Learn more about our exciting plans and donate online at creche.community/emmanuel-garden.

You can also support this mission by sending a check payable to "Creche" to 7 St. Luke's Road, Boston MA 02134. In the memo section, please indicate that your donation is to support the Emmanuel House Garden.

Dear Friends,

In case you missed it, The Philadelphia Eleven is streaming on PBS.org and PBS apps as part of the public television release. It is available now through June 2nd.

Click here for a list of broadcast dates

Click here to find your local PBS station

If your local station has not listed The Philadelphia Eleven in its program offerings, please reach out to them to find out if and when they plan to air the film.

WORLD Channel is carried as a secondary channel. It covers a total of 196 stations which represent roughly 77% of the U.S. market. Check local listings to see if you have WORLD Channel. Don't forget to adjust broadcast times for your time zone!

WORLD broadcast dates:

Wednesday, March 19th at 7pm ET and 12am ET / 4pm and 9pm PT

Thursday, March 20th at 8am ET / 5am PT

Saturday, March 22nd at 12pm ET / 9am PT

Click here to find your local WORLD Channel

#TellTheStory #PhiladelphiaEleven #50Years



Beloved of God—

For me, I’m ready for the depth and breadth of Lent. The seriousness of our country’s turn towards autocracy is weighing on me, and I’m hoping that we can all double down in our prayer lives, our mental and spiritual fortitude, and our solidarity with God’s most beloved, the vulnerable. And there are so many vulnerable people among us right now.

Are you looking for a Lenten spiritual practice? How about joining the Communities for Spiritual Vitality of the dioceses of Vermont and Massachusetts and use this beautiful devotional. Thank you to the Rev. adwoa Wilson for putting it together, assembling reflections and prayers from leaders across the dioceses of New England. For more information about this and Communities for Spiritual Vitality, click here.

More information about goings-on in the diocese is below. May God bless you with a very holy Lent.

With love,

The Rt. Rev. Julia E. Whitworth

Bishop Diocesan

The Home for Aged Women in Boston after moving from Charles Street to a new building on Revere Street in 1862. Because many elderly Black women were turned away from the Home for Aged Women, community leaders responded by creating the Home for Aged Colored Women, in the West End. (Source: Wikimedia Commons)

March 3, 2025

Boston’s Home for Aged Colored Women

To honor women’s history this month, we turn to a story of little seen women in Boston at the time Emmanuel was being founded. The Boston Globe published an article about the discovery of a marker for the Home for Aged Colored Women (1860-1944) in Dorchester’s Cedar Grove Cemetery (“From a mass grave in Boston, unearthing Black women’s lives” by Karilyn Crockett (February 3, 2025).

The Home, founded in 1860, was among the Boston institutions that offered shelter

and support to women who did not have financial or other family support. In the

case of the Home for Aged Colored Women, historical news accounts and the

organization’s records (located at the Massachusetts Historical Society) state that

women of color applied to the Home after not being welcomed at almshouses and

other benevolent institutions. We discovered that Emmanuel parishioners were benefactors of the Home from the 1860s onward (among them was Susan Coombs Dana (Mrs. William R. Lawrence)).

We invite you to explore these sites which explore the Home’s history in more

detail:

--- The West End Museum

---The National Park Service’s page about the Home.



--Mary Beth Clack, Mary Blocher, Cindy Coldren, Pat Krol, Liz Levin



 A Faith That Does Justice is seeking volunteers for its English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) program for beginner English-learners. Many of our students are newly arrived migrants and learning English provides vital skills as they begin their new lives in our country. This is an opportunity to support newly arrived immigrants and provide community and kinship.

We offer ESOL classes both in-person and virtually to give students and volunteers the flexibility to choose the style that works best for them. Our next classes will begin in February and March with training provided to volunteers beforehand.

Teachers are provided with a curriculum and lesson plans designed by our partner, Jewish Vocational Service. Prior teaching and other language skills are not required.We will provide orientation and training for volunteers. Please see our flyer and our website for more information. We encourage you to make 2025 the year you volunteer to make a difference in people’s lives.

If you are interested in volunteering or have any questions, please send an email to volunteering@faith-justice.org.

Bill Sheehan

Director

Last Wednesday, I decided to do a performance-based workshop with my common art poetry

group, using Dylan Thomas’s Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night. We mixed things up with

some acting exercises that had everyone laughing and really brought the poem to life. It was such a great reminder of how performance can transform poetry into something so dynamic and engaging. The energy in the room was contagious!

Then, on Friday, we kicked off the first movie day of the year with the first half of West Side Story. I was a little nervous going into it because I wasn’t sure how many people would want to join the discussion afterward. I decided to hold the discussion in the Emmanuel room to make the space feel more contained and intimate. Four people showed up to the discussion, which turned out to be the ideal number. We dove into a discussion activity called a “spectrogram,” where participants line up along a spectrum based on how they feel about a statement (from “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree”). It sparked some deep conversation, touching on themes of racism, prejudice, conformity,

and love—both in relation to the movie and personal experiences. The group seemed to get a lot out of it, so I’m really excited to continue with the second half of the film next week and see what other themes emerge.

This week, I’m diving back into my superhero interviews and also starting to gather participants for Richie Berman’s legendary annual Easter play, scheduled at common art for April 16. It’s a busy time, but I’m really enjoying the process and seeing everything come together.

– Mary Schwabenland

Common Art Website

The leadership of Central Reform Temple (CRT) and Emmanuel Church (the Board and the Vestry) have been engaged in conversations together over the last several weeks about the horrific events of October 7th and the subsequent war in the Middle East. This has given us the opportunity to express our love, care, and support for one another as covenant partners, and our anguish for the wider human family, as well as consider how we might engage together at this time.

Our covenant relationship provides a deep foundation for us to talk about our thoughts, feelings, and concerns about the people of Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, rising anti-Semitism here in the US and around the world, rising Islamophobia, and the impact on our communities. These thoughtful conversations have enabled us to examine our values, spiritual disciplines, and what we might consider our religious responsibilities as communities of faith.

To that end, it is our desire to widen the conversation to our whole community about possible programs, educational courses, volunteer and advocacy opportunities, and the varied ways that CRT and Emmanuel can work and pray separately and together. We believe that our criteria for advocacy must be to support those seeking a resolution to this conflict between peoples, highlighting peacemakers and assisting those bringing humanitarian aid and sustenance to all who have been affected in the region. This will be how we prioritize our choices about our learning and action.

Our first program was ‘Music Speaks’ highlighting the work of the Jerusalem Youth Chorus, a combined Israeli and Palestinian choir and their work to build bridges between High School Youth of conflicted communities which was attended by close to 100 people last week.

We hope that as we begin to post information in our weekly e-newsletters and on the bulletin board in the lobby, you will find a project, program, course, organization to support, or place to volunteer that is meaningful to you.



Want to learn or brush up an ancient language? Join one of Emmanuel's Reading Groups. We currently offer



• Greek Reading Group - Thursdays at 9AM
• Hebrew Reading Group - Wednesdays at 9AM
• Latin Reading Group - Fridays at 9AM

Beginners are always welcome. Email Parish Office for the Zoom link.

Do you know someone who is in the hospital, or confined at home? The Care Commission provides pastoral ministry by writing notes, making visits, and more. Pastoral care needs are being coordinated by Deacon Bob Greiner. If you have a need, please contact them.

For all people struggling with or in recovery from any form of addiction, Join us on Zoom on Fridays at 3:30 pm. This service draws from the wisdom of the 12 Step program and the liturgies of the Episcopal Church. Contact Susan Ackley for more information and/or a Zoom invitation.

Emmanuel Church is located on an area once used by the matriarchal Massachusett Tribe for fishing for thousands of years. Read our statement of acknowledgement and what our collective response should be.