Vestry
First, the vestry thanks all of you who participated in our annual meeting January 30th, it was good to have a strong turnout for this.
The vestry met with Bishop Ihloff on Tuesday, February 15th, after his visit to preach and confirm members of St. James’ on Sunday. He was pleased to see young people on our vestry and new members that hadn’t served before.
Our regular vestry meeting will be held together with our annual retreat Friday and Saturday this weekend. We’re still using Zoom this month, but with Covid case rates declining things definitely look more hopeful for our March meeting.
Canon Scott Slater will conduct a mutual ministry reflection with us on Saturday, so we hope to continue discerning both our strengths and areas that we can improve on. Vestry members completed a survey and some brief essay questions and submitted them to Canon Slater. He reviewed those and will use the information to base the mutual ministry review, using a different format than Canon Mary Sulerud. It’s appropriate that this review is being held during our annual retreat and prior to Kristin’s sabbatical.
These are unsettled times, please pray for those in our community and the world at large that are suffering. We recently read “the beatitudes on the plain” in chapter 6 of Luke and they seem especially timely, even if they’re challenging: “Love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for God is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”
Preparing for Lent
Sunday Worship Information
Join us on February 27th for the Last Sunday after the Epiphany for Holy Eucharist at 8:30 am or 10:30 am, or watch the 10:30 am service livestreamed on Facebook.
A printable bulletin is available here.
Lectionary Readings for this Sunday:
Facebook Livestream
We plan to begin streaming to Facebook at 10:30 am. If you arrive at Facebook and you don’t see the video, please refresh your screen. There is a delay.
Sunday School classes for 3rd – 5th grades with Natalie DelRegno and middle-high grades with Joan Fader, are meeting in-person and indoors at 9:30 a.m. (Masks required and guidelines followed).
NOTE: K – 2nd grade with Betsy Davis and Yvette Allen will continue on Zoom through the end of February. Beginning March 6 our youngest will begin meeting in person again.
Thrift Shop
Things continue to go well at the shop. Many volunteers and many donations make many people busy! 😃
We are planning to transition from winter to spring/summer clothing on Saturday, March 19, from 4:00-6:00 with a pizza dinner and on March 20, from 1:00-4:00 with a pizza lunch. Many hands make light work for such a large undertaking. Please let Cheryl Windsor know if you can help. One, two or three hours would be great. Email her at dcwindsor@comcast.net. We will need a head count for pizza too!
Thank you!
Scouts
It’s been a great start to the year for Troop 829. Our scouts started the year on January 1st celebrating our Maryland State Parks with their First Day Hike Program.
We did a 7.5 mile hike. A number of our scouts and leaders camped in 10 degree weather (a troop temperature record!) and we also camped and competed in our district’s Klondike Derby (a scouting winter “Olympics” competing against other troops using scouting skills). Compared to our January campout, it was a balmy 22 degrees overnight.
On February 6th, we celebrated the anniversary of scouting in the U.S. with a Scout Sunday church service at St. James’. Kristin+ provided a blessing to all our scouts and leaders. We additionally learned that three of our scouts (two from our boy troop and one from our girl troop) were accepted into the U.S. Contingent for the next Scouting World Jamboree that will be held in SaeManGeum, South Korea in the summer of 2023.
On March 13th we are doing our first Scouting for Food door-to-door collection of food donations for the Mount Airy Net. We will canvasing the following neighborhoods (if you do not live in these neighborhoods, please support our food drive by bringing non-expired canned and/or dry goods to the 8:30am or 10:30am service at St. James’ on that day.
If you have a son or daughter age 11-17 and are interested in having them participate in an outdoor program that teaches leadership, service and many other skills (as well as FUN!) please reach out to Bill Cunnane (Scoutmaster of Troop 829B for Boys) billcunnane@hotmail.com or Jennifer Swift (Scoutmaster of Troop 829G for Girls) jennifer.e.swift@gmail.com.
Announcements
Outreach Ministry Appreciates You!
The mission of St. James’ Outreach Committee is to serve as a liaison between our church and the wider community. Our Christian faith calls us to seek out those in need or crisis and provide necessary resources.
Over the past year we were very productive from Easter Baskets for Lorien to Angel Tree gifts for foster kids in Carroll County. Our success is made possible in large part by the generosity of your donations and giving of your time.
please stop by the narthex and pick up a treat!
Next Week’s Commemorations:
Prayer Rotation
Please join the Daughters of the King in praying for each parishioner in rotation during 2022 by taking this notice home and by posting it where it will remind you pray to on a daily basis for the needs and blessings of:
Leslie Murphy and Chris Richard
Alan and Nancy Nanavaty (Kali, Connor)
Christopher and Dawn Neary (Aubrey, Natalie, Molly, Daniel)
A member of the Daughters of the King will be contacting you this week for special prayer requests.
