Fr. Harrison's Letter for August 21, 2016

 Dear Hearts,

So much for the quiet, hazy days of summer! The Acolytes Car Wash is Saturday; Beach Communion and Potluck Supper is Sunday; and Vacation Bible School starts on Monday!

While out on Saturday errands, please include the Red Barn at Bishops' Orchard Farm Market on your route.  The Acolytes, and other helpers -- including YFNR, will be there from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. washing cars.  Your donations help fund Acolyte and Youth activities and service projects.  In 2016, those activities include the Middle School retreat's Ropes Course at Camp Incarnation, an upcoming Nightwatch at NYC's Cathedral of St. John the Divine, and, in October 2017, a return pilgrimage to Washington National Cathedral and the National Acolyte Festival.  Recent service projects included sandwich-making for the Chapel on the Green, Loaves & Fishes morning of service, and support for the Diaper Bank.

On the occasion of our July Beach Communion, the forecasted deluge held off until well after Sunday's activities.  Let's hope to luck out in the same way this Sunday.  The morning services will include the baptism of sweet William Nicholas, who so far has shown the good sense to become totally calm when held by YFNR.

On Sunday evening, a pavilion at Jacob's Beach is reserved for our Communion and Potluck Supper.  We'll gather at 5p.m. for a brief, and totally child-friendly, service of Holy Communion, followed by a potluck supper of whatever y'all bring.  Paper goods, flatware and beverages will be provided.  The forecast kept many of you at home in July, but the Beach was the place to be -- lovely breeze, good company and some delicious food!
 
Our new Sunday School Directory, Laurie Varley continued to prepare this week for our Vacation Bible School's Deep Sea Discovery!  Just walking into the Parish House makes you excited!  The adventure starts Monday, August 22, and will continue through Friday, August 26, from 9 a.m. until Noon each day.  Fresh approaches to dramatic Bible stories will help us all realize that even when we've gotten ourselves out on a proverbial limb, God is with us wherever we go!  There'll be fun crafts, games, music, snacks (thanks to your generosity)...and oh yes, time to play in the Parish Hall yard. You can find more information and registration here; just scroll down to the bottom of the page. 

V.B.S. is not just for rising Kindergarten to 5th graders!  Youth and adults who would like to get in on the fun are urged to contact Laurie Varley for ways they could be helpful for a day or more. 

Please keep in your prayers the people coping with floods in the south and fire in the far west.
In faith and hope,
Harrison+
YFNR
p.s.  My sermon for Sunday, August 14, quoted verses from a hopeful poem by Seamus Heaney.  I promised to print the whole poem here:

Doubletake

Human being suffer, / They torture one another,
They get hurt and get hard. / No poem or play or song
Can fully right a wrong / Inflicted or endure.

The innocents in gaols / Beat on their bars together.
A hunger-striker's father
Stands in the graveyard dumb.
The police widow in veils /Faints at the funeral home.

History says, don't hope / On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime/The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up, / And hope and history rhyme.
So hope for a great sea-change
On the far side of revenge.
Believe that further shore / Is reachable from here.
Believe in miracle / And cures and healing wells.

Call miracle self-healing: / The utter, self-revealing
Double-take of feeling./If there's fire on the mountain
Or ligntning and storm /And a god speaks from the sky

That means someone is hearing / The outcry and the birth-cry
Of new life at its term.
 
from The Cure at Troy
Thanks to Bishop Porter Taylor for introducing me to this, and many other, terrific poems!