News from the Red Doors - January 14, 2022
A Shovel to Spare?
Thank you to whomever brought in the shovels. We have two of them AND hope to not need them much (wishful thinking right?).
Save the Date - Annual Meeting on 1/16
Our Annual Meeting is scheduled for this Sunday, 1/16, immediately after the dismissal. We will remain seated and move directly into our business meeting, keeping it as brief as possible. Please plan to attend. We must have quorum in order to conduct our business, which primarily includes passing a budget and electing leadership for 2022.
If, for any reason, in-person attendance is not the best choice for you, please feel free to join us on Zoom. While it's not like being in the building, Zoom attendees do count toward quorum and are eligible to vote. The link is available below and will be opened up directly at the end of worship:
Hard copies of the report will be available at church on Sunday, and here is also an electronic copy.
Thank you for helping us tend to the business of the church.
This Week at St. Paul's
Mother Michelle Walker
Dear St. Paul's Family,
On Monday - Wednesday of this week I was in Crawfordsville attending the January session of my Wabash Pastoral Leadership Program training. I don't talk about the program much as there always seem to be many other things demanding our attention. Since last January we have learned about the following topics:
Adaptive Pastoral Leadership (making small shifts that yield large returns, over time)
Community and Pastoral Well-Being
Demography and Immigration
Indiana's Changing Economy
Education in Indiana
Hunger and Poverty.
By the end of 2022 we will also cover:
Administering Justice
Healthcare
Conflict Resolution and Reconciliation
Your (my) Leadership.
At every reasonable opportunity we are provided information for both the state as a whole and for LaPorte County specifically. I've learned a great deal about both. I've learned a great deal about myself, and the other faith traditions present at the table. This program encourages pastors to live into the relationships within the community as a necessary extension of our ministry and to partner with other local organizations to provide help.
It is a significant commitment of my time and energy and is well-funded by the Lilly Endowment, whose mission is to care passionately for the people and communities of Indiana. I'm immensely thankful for the chance to ground myself in the city and county of LaPorte. The information I'm learning is forming me as a preacher, pastor, and priest. I pray that this all reflects well on the success and longevity of St. Paul's.
This Sunday we will hold our annual meeting, looking at our successes in 2021, electing our leaders for 2022, approving a budget that outlines how we spend our money, and above all looking to the future. While there is no specific 5-year plan for growing St. Paul's, I am increasingly confident it will happen through the community connections we are fostering. I expect to continue loving and caring for each of you, to the best of my ability, while we all strive to more tightly integrate the faith community of St. Paul's with the community outside our walls. I hope you will join us on this journey, and bring along a few friends! See you on Sunday!
Blessings,
Mother Michelle
priest@stpaulslaporte.org | 219-575-0226 (c)
LIVE from St. Paul's - January 9, 2022
News from the Red Doors - January 7, 2022
A Shovel to Spare?
Do you have an extra snow shovel or two laying around your garage that you can spare? If so, please bring one in! We don't mind if it's used (or well-loved, as I like to call it). We're looking for one for the Michigan Avenue entrance and one for the parish hall (Harrison Street) entrance. There's often a little extra snow lying around there waiting for the shovel that we can never find! (* If none show up by the 16th, we'll purchase two for the purpose.)
Save the Date - Annual Meeting on 1/16
This is a friendly reminder that our Annual Meeting is scheduled for 1/16 immediately after the dismissal. We will remain seated and move directly into our business meeting, keeping it as brief as possible. Please plan to attend. We must have quorum in order to conduct our business, which primarily includes passing a budget and electing leadership for 2022.
Speaking of leadership, we are still looking for a Junior Warden!
Community Dinners - Main Dish
Will you donate a main dish for one of our Community Dinners? There are 12 dinners a year and we are currently planning for approximately 30 people per meal. If providing one on your own is a challenge, but you would still like to help out, we can make arrangements to share a month or find someone who would be willing to cook the ingredients you provide. Our next dinner is Tuesday January 25th.
The Sign-up sheet is on the Harrison Street bulletin board and questions can be directed to Mike Konieczny (theeleventhofnowhere@gmail.com) or Margie Bender (mabender3@gmail.com).
Collecting Christmas Card (fronts)
As you reset your home from the holidays, if you're not a keeper of Christmas cards you received, would you consider donating them for our Christmas at Sea program? The Seamen's Church Institute collects Christmas card fronts (simply tear them at the bend) and uses them to write notes of appreciation to be sent to the mariners with their knit/crocheted items. Please bring them to church and leave them at the usher stations. I will collect them from there.
Thank you, Mother Michelle.
Our New Community Partners!
Did you know that we have two new community partners here at St. Paul's?
In November we offered our parish hall, and some storage space in the freshly cleaned former choir room in the basement, to The Service League. They meet the first Thursdays of the month and are excited to call St. Paul's their home. Most of you know The Service League is a wonderful women's organization dedicated to community service here in LaPorte. We are thrilled to have them call St. Paul's their home!
In December we offered our unused former counters' room in the church office to Arts in the Park. They will be renting that room, and occasionally using the front office meeting space, for all of their Arts in the Park needs. We are thrilled to welcome this wonderful community program to our St. Paul's space. And for those of you who remember Fr. Kanestrom, his daughter Julia Kanestrom is the Executive Director.
God continues to do great things, right here at St. Paul's! It's wonderful to stop and notice them.
This Week at St. Paul's
Mother Michelle Walker
Dear St. Paul's Family,
On Thursday morning we celebrated a spoken Eucharist for the Feast of the Epiphany. The wise men, who have been traveling along the interior of our church building, made it to the baby Jesus in our creche. During the sermon I shared with the congregation thoughts about light. An Epiphany is a revelation, in this case the revelation of the birth of the Savior of the world, and this one was discovered because the wise men were brave enough to follow the light of a star that led them to Jesus. (The Gospel for Epiphany is Matthew 2:1-12.)
The light of the star that led the wise men, the light of the world revealed to us in that manger, the light of the day that signals the morning - light is a vital aspect of our lives. As the light of the morning sun dawns on this frigid and white morning, after a long dark night, I am reminded that the promise of light sustains our faith. We seek it; expect it; long for it; miss it; and revel in it. May this season of Epiphany be a constant reminder of the light ... the sUn, the sOn, and our reflection of both in the world.
Many years ago I was introduced to the poet Mary Oliver. I leave you with this poem from her 2004 Collection entitled "Why I Wake Early".
Hello, sun in my face.
Hello, you who make the morning
and spread it over the fields
and into the faces of the tulips
and the nodding morning glories,
and into the windows of, even, the
miserable and the crotchety -
best preacher that ever was,
dear star, that just happens
to be where you are in the universe
to keep us from ever-dakrness,
to ease us with warm toughing,
to hold us in the great hands of light -
good morning, good morning, good morning.
Watch, now, how I start the day
in happiness, in kindness.
Blessings,
Mother Michelle
priest@stpaulslaporte.org | 219-575-0226 (c)
LIVE from St. Paul's - January 2, 2022
News from the Red Doors - December 31, 2021
A Word about Weather
With predictions of wintery weather that may affect Sunday morning, I want to remind you to use caution in determining whether the roads are safe for your travel. I will always do my best to be there to lead service AND I will appreciate knowing you are home and safe in the event you don't make it to service.
IF there is a cancellation, I will send an email, post to Facebook, and initiate our Vestry calling tree. Sometimes the conditions in my subdivision, especially related to freezing rain, make it impossible for me to get out to the main roads. If that is the case, I'll let you know immediately. I typically leave the house by 7:45am so you can expect notification around 8am. Thank you.
Save the Date - Annual Meeting on 1/16
This is a friendly reminder that our Annual Meeting is scheduled for 1/16 immediately after the dismissal. We will remain seated and move directly into our business meeting, keeping it as brief as possible. Please plan to attend. We must have quorum in order to conduct our business, which primarily includes passing a budget and electing leadership for 2022.
Speaking of leadership, we are still looking for a Junior Warden!
This Week at St. Paul's
Mother Michelle Walker
Dear St. Paul's Family,
Greetings! Can you believe it's New Year's Eve? It's challenging to think the year 2022 is only hours away at this point As we look into 2022 I pray that we can be filled with hope and expectation. I know Advent is OVER, but hope and expectation do not belong exclusively to Advent, to the birth of our Savior. Hope and expectation is also a great way to begin a new year.
For all of us, a new year is a new beginning. It is a time to look at what 2021 provided us as we hope and expect better for 2022. As believers, that hope and expectation resides in our love for and faith in an all-loving God. What do you desire from your relationship with God? With your fellow believers? How do you intend to be more present to the Holy in this coming year?
I choose to begin 2022 believing God has wonderful surprises in store for our St. Paul's family. There are many details and statistics I will share with you in my Pastoral Address at the annual meeting. Until then please know God is present with us here and now, in the past, and in the future.
So however you choose to celebrate this New Year's Eve and Day, remember to whom you belong. Set God first and watch for the surprise and delight that is yet to come!
Happy (almost) New Year!
Blessings,
Mother Michelle
priest@stpaulslaporte.org | 219-575-0226 (c)
Announcements & Requests
Join us Thursdays at 9am for an offering of Morning Prayer (side altar of church) followed by a book study of Bible Women: All Their Words and Why They Matter (parish hall). All are welcome. (We resume on 1/6 after the Eucharist.)
This Week at St. Paul's
Mother Michelle Walker
Dear St. Paul's Family,
December is upon us. It hardly seems possible to me that Christmas is only three weeks away. What a whirlwind of a year this has been.
As I mentioned in my sermon last Sunday, Advent is a season of waiting and expectation not only for Christ's first coming as a babe in the manger but also for his second coming in all glory. In the midst of the hustle and bustle of Christmas preparations we are also listening for prophetic voices, like that of John the Baptist. This Sunday and next we will hear from John, whose voice cries out from the wilderness reminding us to be ready for the Christ - ALWAYS. How are you preparing yourself this Advent? How are you readying yourself for his birth?
I hope you are praying the Advent prayers of the Anglican Rosary. I hope you are finding time to be still and be with God. I hope you are reading one chapter of the Gospel of Luke a day (Luke is the Gospel most used in Year C). But above all I hope you are noticing the Holy in the many daily moments of your life.
Be well my friends. Take time for God. And see you Sunday.
Blessings,
Mother Michelle
priest@stpaulslaporte.org | 219-575-0226 (c)
Announcements & Requests
Are you a saver of old Christmas cards? If so, please consider donating them to our Christmas at Sea program. The front of the cards are torn off and used to hand write notes to the mariners (to send along with their knit or crochet items).
Also, if you've made any items for donation, please bring those to church on Sunday 12/5. We will bless them for shipment early next week. Thank you.
Join us Thursdays at 9am for an offering of Morning Prayer (side altar of church) followed by a book study of Bible Women: All Their Words and Why They Matter (parish hall). All are welcome.