Staying Safe and Staying Connected
Good Morning Saint Stephen’s Church,
We continue our life of daily prayer. The Lord be with you!
Today’s Prayer
And now to him who is able to keep us from falling, and lift us from the dark valley of despair to the bright mountain of hope, from the midnight of desperation to the day break of joy; to him be power and authority, for ever and ever.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., 1968
After preaching at the National Cathedral on March 31, 1968, Dr. King went to Memphis in support of sanitation workers in their struggle for better wages. There, he proclaimed that he had been “to the mountain-top” and had seen “the Promised Land,” and that he knew that one day he and his people would be “free at last.” On the following day, this day, April 4th, he was cut down by an assassin’s bullet. The above benediction, Dr. King gave to his congregation in Montgomery years earlier as he left them to devote all his time to political action.
From Our Prayers of the People
Today, let’s pray:
For the peace and unity of the Church of God; for all who proclaim the Gospel, and all who seek the truth.
For all affected by the coronavirus around the world. For comfort and healing for all who are affected by the Coronavirus, and for physicians, nurses, and all others who minister to the sick and the suffering, may God grant them wisdom and skill, sympathy and patience, and may God keep them healthy and safe.
For those on the Parish Prayer Chain: Pauline, John, Rick, Bob J., Arthur and Al.
For those who are homebound: Stephen, Pauline, Joan, Janet and Marilyn.
Those who are imprisoned: those particularly vulnerable at this time, especially the women in the Schenectady County Jail.
For those in need of healing: the Guiles family, Cindi, Peter, Mary Frances, Debbie, Budd and Joe.
For all the blessings of this life.
For Jack G – today is his birthday!
For our dioceses in the Anglican Communion: Melbourne (Australia) and West Missouri (The Episcopal Church).
For all who have died: especially Sara, William, Emma, Dorothy, Glenn and Clark.
For one another.
Something to share
Connections
Marge Piercy
Connections are made slowly, sometimes they grow underground.
You cannot always tell by looking at what is happening
More than half a tree is spread out in the soil under your feet.
Penetrate quietly as the earthworm that blows no trumpet.
Fight persistently as the creeper that brings down the tree.
Spread like the squash plant that overruns the garden
Gnaw in the dark, and use the sun to make sugar.
Weave real connections, create real nodes, build real houses.
Live a life you can endure: make life that is loving.
Keep tangling and interweaving and taking more in, a thicket and bramble
wilderness to the outside but to us it is interconnected with rabbit runs and burrows and lairs.
This is how we are going to live for a long time: not always.
For every gardener knows that after the digging, after the planting, after the long season of tending and growth, the harvest comes.
News and Updates
Free Online Concert from The Washington Cathedral – Mozart’s Requiem – Sunday, April 5, 4 pm – Join us for an encore online presentation of last year’s Palm Sunday performance of Mozart’s Requiem, as we enter the drama and emotion of Holy Week. Featuring the Cathedral Choir and Baroque Orchestra.
https://cathedral.org/online/
Reminders
If you did not receive a phone call in the next few days from a member of the Vestry and you would like to be added to the communication list, please let me know (james.ross.mcd@gmail.com) and share with me the best telephone number(s) where we can reach you. We will add you to the list right away.
If you have an update/news, a prayer or poem or something inspirational you would like us to share with the congregation, please send it to us. Please also send us any prayer requests. We will incorporate these into the Morning Prayers as best we can.
Our church campus is closed. All parish meetings and gatherings are canceled and postponed until further notice.
Be careful what you read online. There are reports of false information circulating in an attempt to create fear and confusion. And, God forbid, always remember – any online or texted-based solicitation from me for money is A SCAM. Do not reply to such messages. Delete them.
Our goal is for all of us to stay in touch and connected in this time of isolation.
Share this news, and spread some love, not the virus!
Be of good courage. We are in this together, and we will be together again soon. God bless you and may God be with us in the days ahead.
Peace,
James+