In this edition of ENews:
- Diocese Clergy gather at Trinity Cathedral for Annual Conference
- Bishop Megan visits St. Paul's Benicia
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Forward with Families Campaign for Center at St. Matthews
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Best Skills, Best Churches Registration Now Open
- General Convention Updates
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Clergy of the Diocese Gather for Conference |
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Clergy from around the diocese gathered at Trinity Cathedral in Sacramento May 10-12 for a time of renewal, worship, and learning. This was the first in-person Clergy Conference in two years.
The conference featured a workshop on story telling strategies by Corey Rosen, a writer, actor, visual effects producer, and storytelling teacher based in San Francisco, California. He hosts The Moth StorySlams and GrandSlams, and recently published his first book, Your Story, Well Told. Attendees were able to engage in exercises that honed their storytelling skills and provided a much-needed opportunity to share stories with their colleagues.
In addition, clergy spent time in worship, and fellowship, and had opportunities to tour the facilities at the Center for St. Matthews, learning about the many ways the Center ministers to underserved and refugee populations in the Sacramento region.
In all, it was a rewarding and much needed opportunity for clergy to gather with colleagues. Many thanks to Cathedral Dean Matthew Woodward and the staff of Trinity Cathedral for their hospitality.
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Bishop Megan Visits St.Paul's Benicia |
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On Sunday, May 8, Bishop Megan worshipped with the congregation of St. Paul's Benicia. It was a joyous time for all, especially the young acolytes seen above (one in particular seemed to have her eyes on her own episcopate). Many thanks to the Rector, Rev. Annie Mertz, and Deacon Rev. Beth Gaines, for their leadership, and the parishioners of St. Paul's for their warm welcome! |
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Forward with Families: Feeding the Hungry at the Center at St. Matthew’s
by the Rev. Cindy Long, Deacon, formerly at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, Carmichael
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From the time I began serving there as a newly ordained deacon in 2007, I was moved by the many ways in which St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church has been a tangible expression of God’s love for the people of the surrounding community. It has always been that way: from the 1950’s, when it was a thriving congregation of families with more than 1000 people in Sunday worship, through the 1970s, when the community began to include many people who were in need, right down to the present. Through the decades, the congregation has always looked for impactful ways to be God’s presence in Arden Arcade. These efforts–including a small food closet, a clothes closet, an after-school program, a parenting program, and a health triage clinic—became known as The Center. When the Center at St Matthew’s became a program of the Episcopal Diocese of Northern California in 2016, new opportunities for community service and outreach ministry opened up.
Consider the Center’s partnership with River City Food Bank, Sacramento’s oldest continuously serving food bank. Founded at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in 1968 and later located next to Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, River City Food Bank sought to open a second site in the food desert of Arden Arcade. In 2017, the small congregation of St. Matthew’s moved into the Parish Hall so that the large Sanctuary could be re-purposed and renovated as a food distribution center. Since opening in 2018, River City Food Bank at the Center at St. Matthew’s has grown to feed more than 700 households per week. The food bank remained open throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, moving its public food distributions outdoors for 18 months until it was safe to move back indoors.
Nonprofit partnerships like this bring invaluable expertise and capacity that help our diocese to serve and empower more people. The Center’s location—in a very diverse, low-income neighborhood of refugees, immigrants, the working poor, and the unhoused—provides a God-given opportunity to minister with and to more neighbors in need. . Real hunger draws people here: hunger for food, for health, for refuge, for education, and for a place of welcome and hope. Time and time again, I have seen that hunger fed through kindness, generosity, and the new relationships that grow when we share ourselves and our gifts with one another. Time and time again, I have seen people in need turn around and do the same for others in need. And that is how we help change the world.
That change is why I love being involved with The Center at St. Matthew’s. Change for the good can be hard to see when in the midst of things. But since Mark and I moved, I have thought often of how far the Center at St. Matthew’s has come over the years. When I think of the crowds of people coming to the Center for the help they need to survive and thrive, that makes me think of God’s Holy Realm. I am thankful for this diocese, for Bishop Megan, and for all the people who give of their time, talent and treasure to support the Center. If you have not yet done so, please consider supporting the Center at St. Matthew’s as we move “Forward with Families.” Every bit does make a difference.
How To Donate
To donate online, please visit the diocesan website’s online giving portal at:
Click on the red “Give” button and select “The Center at St. Matthew’s” from the drop-down menu. You may enter “in honor of” or “in memory of” your loved ones in the “optional memo” field.
To donate by check, please make your check payable to “Episcopal Diocese of Northern California” and write “Center at St. Matthew’s” in the memo line. You may enclose a note in honor or in memory of your loved ones. Please mail your check directly to the Center at:
The Center at St. Matthew’s
2300 Edison Avenue
Sacramento, CA 95821-1714
For more information, please contact:
Jim Schaal, Executive Director
The Center at St. Matthew's
Phone: 916-927-0115
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Best Skills, Best Churches Announces
2022/2023 Program
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This exciting program is designed to meet the professional needs of leaders of nonprofit and public organizations. Upon successful completion of the program, participants will receive a Certificate in Nonprofit Management from the ASU Lodestar Center for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Innovation.
Click here for the schedule and additional information.
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80th General Convention to proceed in person, but shorter and smaller, presiding officers say
Episcopal News Service | David Paulsen | Posted May 12, 2022
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Presiding Bishop Michael Curry and the Rev. Gay Clark Jennings, president of the House of Deputies, speak during a May 11 special meeting of Executive Council. Maryland Bishop Eugene Sutton, right, speaks later in the day during a meeting of the Joint Standing Committee on Planning and Arrangements. |
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The 80th General Convention will proceed in person this July in Baltimore, Maryland, but it likely will be shorter and smaller, with enhanced safety protocols to further minimize the risk of COVID-19 infections, according to an outline of potential changes presented May 11 by The Episcopal Church’s presiding officers.
Presiding Bishop Michael Curry and the Rev. Gay Clark Jennings, president of the House of Deputies, discussed their preliminary plan for a modified General Convention at a special meeting of Executive Council held online and livestreamed. They said that neither cancelation nor another postponement of General Convention is a viable option.
“There are essential matters for the governance and good order of the church which must be transacted. We are committed to holding the 80th General Convention in Baltimore this summer,” Curry said in his remarks. “I know how much this commitment to the city of Baltimore and to the Diocese of Maryland matters. But obviously, with the ongoing variation of the COVID pandemic, we are likewise committed to gathering in the safest and healthiest way possible.
“Love of neighbor is not simply a good idea. It is a commandment of Jesus based on the teaching of Moses to always seek the good and the well-being of each other.”
A statement on #GC80, as presented to Executive Council earlier today:
First, we are not calling for the postponement of the 80th General Convention. Let me say that again: we are not calling for the postponement of the 80th General Convention.
That commitment means that this General Convention meeting will not look like past triennial gatherings of the church’s governing body. “As hard as it is to accept, we are not yet able to hold the big family reunion we’ve all been longing for,” Jennings said. Instead of an eight-day meeting July 7-14 attended by thousands of deputies, bishops, staff members, vendors and visitors, Jennings said planners are working toward a “short, focused meeting, to hold elections, approve a budget and address other critical issues and essential legislation that cannot wait until 2024.” Read the entire story here.
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Committees hear testimony on extending Beloved Community, healing intergenerational trauma and use of ‘people of color’
Episcopal News Service | Posted May 12, 2022
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For the first time, two-dozen bishops’ and deputies’ committees are holding hearings together online in advance of the upcoming 80th General Convention. The Racial Justice and Reconciliation committees met on May 11. |
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General Convention’s committees on Racial Justice and Reconciliation received testimony about resolutions to further and extend Beloved Community and the healing of intergenerational trauma resulting from the destructive effects of racism and white supremacy during a May 11 online hearing. The committees also engaged in discussion about appropriate inclusive language to refer to People of Color.
For the first time, two-dozen bishops’ and deputies’ committees are holding hearings together online in advance of the upcoming 80th General Convention. The triennial convention is the church’s governing body, where final resolutions are considered and voted on by both the House of Bishops and the House of Deputies. For a schedule of online hearings, click here.
Julia Ayala Harris, chair of The Episcopal Church’s Standing Committee on Mission and a candidate for the president of the House of Deputies, told committee members that the “time is right to make a reality” Resolution A125, which would establish a voluntary Episcopal Coalition for Racial Equity and Justice among dioceses and congregations.
The proposed coalition was first unveiled in March in a report produced by the Presiding Officers’ Working Group on Truth-Telling, Reckoning and Healing. Presiding Bishop Michael Curry and the Rev. Gay Clark Jennings, president of the House of Deputies, created the working group last year to sharpen the church’s focus on confronting its past complicity with racist systems and the lingering legacy of white supremacy embedded in institutions like the church. The coalition also is seen as a remedy to the church’s uneven track record of prioritizing racial reconciliation, at the churchwide level and across its more than 100 dioceses. The proposal also calls on the church to set aside $2 million annually to carry out the work. Read the entire story here.
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EDNC Clergy and Lay Leaders active in General Convention Legislative Process |
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In addition to Miriam Casey, co-chair of the Commission for Intercultural Ministries, whose testimony is cited in the article above, other clergy and lay leaders from our diocese are engaged in the legislative process of General Convention:
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Rev. Grant Bakewell, Associate Priest, St. Matthew's Mission/Iglesia San Mateo, Sacramento testified in support of C027 Back from the Brink: A Call to Prevent Nuclear War at the Social Justice and US Policy legislative hearing on March 8.
Karen Nolan, representing the Commission for Intercultural Ministries, submitted written testimony in support of Resolution D019 Acknowledgement of Indigenous Lands to the Governance and Structure Committee. This resolution was written by The Rev. Simeon Lewis Powell.
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From the Episcopal Foundation |
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$100,000
Foundation Grant Fund –
Now Accepting Applications for 2022!
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The Episcopal Foundation of Northern California has joyfully committed to continue our $100,000 Foundation Grant program available to churches and missions throughout our Diocese in 2022.
The deadline to submit an application is July 1, 2022. Grants will be awarded in the month of August.
Click here to find out more, and to download an application!
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May 22, 2022
Sixth Sunday of Easter
You have heard me say, “I am going away and I am coming to you…”
— John 14:28
These few words of Jesus in the upper room discourse outline the feasts we will be celebrating in the next two weeks: The Ascension and Pentecost.
Ascension is Thursday, May 26, and it is one of the great feasts of the Christian year. It is largely neglected in the Western church, but it is important in the East. And it was of vital importance for the apostles and New Testament writers. This brief mention in John is expanded by descriptions of the Ascension at the end of the Gospel of Luke, and at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles.
A great book on the subject is by H.B. Swete, The Ascended Christ, (1910). Swete shows how the Ascension of Christ affirms that Jesus is Prophet, Priest and King; He is Intercessor, Mediator, Advocate and Judge; He is the head of the Church, the Forerunner, the Coming One. By his Spirit, he is present in our midst. It is the Ascended Christ who gives his gifts to the Church. Connected to the Ascension, and following from it is the Heavenly Session of Christ. He is seated at the right hand of God. (see Psalm 110:1 – the most frequently-cited Old Testament text in the New Testament, Romans 8:34). The proclamation that Christ is at the right hand of God, and therefore has the ultimate authority gave fresh encouragement to the earliest Christians, who faced much opposition in their proclaiming and living of the Gospel. Similarly, this affirmation that Christ is truly in charge, and is ruler of Heaven and earth can offer us comfort amid all the trials and troubles in today’s world.
– The Rev. Peter Rodgers
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Commission for Intercultural Ministries |
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I Will With God's Help:
Journey Toward Racial Healing and Justice
Saturday, June 4 | 9:30am – 4:00pm
Faith Episcopal Church | Cameron Park
The workshop was specially developed for the Episcopal Diocese of Northern California by the Commission for Intercultural Ministries.
During the workshop you will have the opportunity to renew your Baptismal Covenant as we learn about forms of historic and contemporary racism and how to engage in ministry with sensitivity and respect for all.
This workshop is open to individuals from throughout the Diocese.
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Job Opportunities Around The Diocese |
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St. Paul's | Sacramento is seeking a Music Director.
Read the job announcement here.
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Diocesan Commissions | Committees | Ministries |
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Making Disciples, Raising Up Saints & Transforming Communities for Christ
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