Please join us for Bible Study at 6:00 pm as we look at the following Sunday's Gospel. The Zoom link is on the sidebar.
This is more of an encounter with the Word within community. Please join us whenever that Spirit moves you.
Thought for the Week
Dear Friends,
This Sunday, the new Church year begins!! Happy New Year!!
We call this fist season "Advent," as we await the promise of the advent of Christ. To do this, we recall when God previously came to earth in Jesus at Christmas. We give thanks for the vulnerability of God to come amongst us in this way, to show great love and ways that we too can create this love with God.
The Gospel readings this year come predominantly from the writing of the Lukan community. You will notice that they sound different than what we've just heard in the Gospel according to Mark. Luke also has the more expansive story of the Incarnation, which will be told to us this year again by our younger members in the Christmas Pageant.
We are offering some ways we can observe this beautiful time of year together as a community. One is our gift exchange which will benefit the Lifebridge community. The other is our parish Anti-racism Advent Calendar. Our worship services will help us prepare for a deeper relationship with the holy, and we can also explore Scripture together at our Wednesday evening Bible Study.
Please know your presence and participation in any of this would make Advent more meaningful for everyone. O come, o come Emmanuel and enlighten our hearts with your love.
In the Way of Love,
Debbie
This Sunday
This Sunday, as we usher in a new Church Year, our services will be more reflective.
At 10:00 am, we will celebrate Holy Eucharist in-person and online. During this service, the greens will be blessed. We will hear the anthem, "Rejoice, rejoice, believers," by Evelyn Larter sung by the choir, and we will be singing "Behold your God," as a canticle. Assisting will be LAura Beasley-Topliffe as lector, Hugh MacKay, Joanne Moar and Gavin Watson-Bertrand assisting at the altar, and Jason Stonehouse as our Digital Verger.
The service may be found on Zoom and Facebook Live (links are in the left sidebar). The leaflet may be found on our website www.gracechurchsalem.org.
At 4:00 pm, our Celtic Evensong with Communion will also be in-person and online. Paul Massari and Eric Wagner will assist and Christine Reichert will give the reflection.
The service may be found on Facebook Live (links are in the left sidebar). The leaflet may be found on our website www.gracechurchsalem.org.
Please join us wherever you are
in your search for meaning.
Everyone is welcome at any and all services at
Grace Episcopal Church
Parish Prayer List
Please keep the following in your prayers:
Jono Gray, Gardner Gray, Mel, Barbara Hawlena, Melissa Glassman, Corey MacNeil, Cliff Cutler, Helen Phillips, John Gourley, Martin Ryan, Kristin Gourley, Scott Tucker, Zan Duffy, Dianne, Sarah Colvin Duffy, Michael Towey, Jesse Kamp, Stacia, Bob Peterson, Brian Peterson, Jenny, Loretta and Kris, Deb Papps, Derek Fuller and Family, the people of Palestine, Afghanastan, and Haiti, and the Salem Public Schools. For an end to racism, gun violence and oppression.
If you have prayer requests, please email regathering@gracechurchsalem.org by Tuesday at noon for publication in that week's e-news.
Advent is Coming!!!
For many people, this is their favorite time of year. It is a time of greens, of hope and promise, a time of preparation for new birth.
At Grace Church, we are looking forward to this time. Our Regathering Committee is looking into ways we can support the less privileged in our midst. The Anti-Racism Committee is developing an Advent Calendar.
The services will be a little different too. We will have an Advent Wreath at Church. The Advent Wreath was originally an at home symbol as a way to count down the weeks until Christmas. It helped us to remember to stay focused on the promises of God. Lately, it has been brought into the Church so that we can count down as a community; in our household of God. We encourage you to continue to have an Advent Wreath at home.
We will also sing canticles in place of the psalms. These canticles come from Isaiah who prophesized the coming of Christ, the Song of Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist, and the Magnificat of Mary. We will add hymns during communion as well.
Blue Christmas will be observed on Sunday, December 19th at 4:00 pm. This service is in solidarity with those for whom Christmas may be a difficult time. In particular this year, we will pray for those families who are victims of the opioid crisis, and those in recovery.
Through song and prayer, we hope to lift the spirits of those in pain. Following this service, we will go outside and sing carols on the patio for the neighborhood.
We are so grateful to be able to be together in some way this year for Advent. We hope to see you here at church when you feel comfortable being with others again.
LifeBridge Project for Advent
Dear Grace Folk!
As we contemplate the meaning of this season and begin to slow down, get quiet and still, and prepare our hearts for the most wonderful gift of our Lord, the Regathering Committee invites you to offer your own gift to some of our most marginalized people in the city. During Advent, please bring a ‘gift’ for a Lifebridge Basket which will be at the entrance of the Church. A member of the Regathering team will take the week’s donations to Lifebridge after services each week. The most needed, and heartbreakingly simple things needed are: Gloves, Hats, Socks, Pocket Hand-warmers, Women's Sanitary Products, Toothpaste, and Disposable Razors.
Thank you for whatever you can provide materially, and if that is not possible for you, we thank you for directing your thoughts and prayers to this segment of our community. Look for the Lifebridge Basket starting next Sunday.
Thank you, The Regathering Team
2021 Advent Calendar
The Anti-racism Advent Calendar this year will follow the themes for the four Sundays in Advent: Hope - reflection and imagining; Love - action; Peace - A conversation with Scripture, and Black Joy. Each day has its own theme: slowing down, vulnerability, repentance, saying "yes" with Mary, more than one right answer with Joseph, sanitizing Christmas, and community.
After much study, the Regathering Team has approved the return of the healing ministry to the Celtic Service. As there is no face-to-face encounter, it is only for a very brief period of time, and both ministers of healing are fully vaccinated, we feel it is safe to bring this important prayer back. We look forward to its return.
Care-giving
During this time of anxiety-producing transition and pandemic, the Rector would like to gently remind everyone to take care of oneself, especially attending to one's mental health. Although we must continue to physically distance, please try to stay in touch with one another during this time. God gave us our minds and bodies as gifts to celebrate and to use to bring much love into the world. We are to be good stewards of these gifts. If you need to seek professional help, know that you are being a faithful steward of this gift. God needs you and loves you.
