Thanksgiving 2007
My dear Friends,
What a remarkable thing it is to live in a world full of wonders. Just below our skin, a four-letter alphabet in DNA telling our bodies how to be. And in the bread we had at eucharist this morning, the same four letters telling bread how to be bread. Beneath our feet a teeming city of minute creatures keeping the soil healthy and nurturing the roots of grass, flowers, trees, and wheat. Without their toil, plants would die, then cattle would die, and we would have no food at all. While science cannot uncover God, science does uncover God’s finger-prints. Not gaps, but an enormous fecundity inside ourselves and without, an overflowing abundance beyond imagining. Each year, for easily 50 years, an apple tree may produce 2000 apples, each bearing 10 seeds. That’s 10 million seeds in its life-time, when it needed only one single seed to grow a new tree when it died.
At harvest we celebrate abundance. But we celebrate more than simply a surfeit of pumpkins; we celebrate what lies behind those fields of orange which stretch to the horizon, itself lit orange by the setting sun. We celebrate in inarticulate ways, spurred on by our groping sense that there is far more beneath the surface reality than we can ever imagine. There are hints of what is below all things in “...the glorious sun’s life giving ray, The whiteness of the moon at even, The flashing of the lightning free, The whirling wind’s tempestuous shocks, The stable earth, the deep salt sea Around the old eternal rocks.” Some, like us of faith, would say these hints point to a wonderful reality – that, beneath all that is, lays a generosity, a creativity, an inclusivity, which upholds us and surges through us and which will thrill us for all eternity.
To better grasp such amazing fecundity, we will strew pumpkins, apples, leaves and flowers throughout the church at Thanksgiving. We will entwine our liturgy with the images of the natural world in Celtic worship. We will allow ourselves to be thrilled with the presence of the Source of all.
In such a world, there is no lack of resources for discovering thin places through which this cosmic love can be experienced as it surges out. St. John’s has made many opportunities available around Thanksgiving – please make good use of them.
Please note that Thanksgiving weekend is October 5th, 6th and 7th, with the holiday Monday being October 8th. That weekend, St. John’s is hosting a Celtic Festival. In the attached calendar you will find details of the many opportunities to experience Celtic culture and spirituality, culminating with a Celtic Eucharist on the Sunday morning at the 10:00 a.m. service, when Bishop John Hannen will preach on connections between Celtic spirituality and that of the west coast first nations.
A hot Divine Sunday Brunch (with two menu choices) will be hosted by Chuck Neilson and Gary Doering (retired professional cook) for the whole congregation on October 21st, November 18th and December 16th. The cost is only $5.00. This gift of their time and talent will make it possible for St. John’s to all have lunch together once a month. Reservations are necessary by the previous Sunday.
At their September monthly meeting, your Parish Council recommended that St. John’s retain the 10:00 a.m. service time, with regular use of the BCP service. The clergy are now arranging dates for regular BCP services. There was overwhelming support for this change from those who sent notes to the council – 96% of those who wrote, both 11:00 o’clockers and 9:15ers, asked for the 10:00 a.m. time to be made permanent. Late last spring, Karen consulted with all the 35 people who attended the 11:00 o’clock service, and found the vast majority were enthusiastic about this change – indeed, many have written during the trial period to say how wonderful it is to worship in a full church again.
There are many special events this fall:
On October 10th and 11th and 15th and 16th Sarah Coakley from the University of Cambridge presents four John Albert Hall lectures on Flesh and Blood: The Eucharist, Desire and Gender.
On October 12th St. John’s hosts the ever-popular “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” fun event – call the office to be a mystery guest or a mystery host and meet new people around St. John’s.
On October 14th, the Sunday after Thanksgiving, we will have one of our “special” services, with eucharist celebrated at a central altar and the congregation in the round. All are encouraged to bring animals for a blessing at the 10:00 am service during which we will celebrate God’s creation and re-commit ourselves to its care.
The same afternoon, at 2:00 p.m., people who have recently joined St. John’s will be hosted at a tea to meet parish leaders and learn about St. John’s. Come, if you’ve been here a little while and haven’t been to a welcoming tea.
That evening, stay for a parish potluck and games evening, to celebrate the Feast of the Blessed Pumpkin – a fun time for people of all ages, being a potluck dinner with pumpkin from beginning to end and with games and fun in between. Come and educate Sue, our youth worker, about the mysteries of Canadian pumpkin decorating. Sign up at the church doors so we don’t all bring pumpkin pie.
Sunday, November 11th will be Remembrance Sunday, using the BCP service.
Saturday, November 17th will be the annual Marketplace sale and tea at 1:00 p.m., followed by our float in the Santa Claus parade featuring El-cam our camel, Levi-athon our whale, and a host of little angels and shepherds.
Sunday, November 25th is Consecration Sunday, our opportunity to indicate our financial gifts for 2008. Gary Nicolosi, our diocesan congregational development officer will preach, and a celebration lunch will follow for the whole parish: fun and abundance are the themes.
Sunday, December 2nd at 7:00 p.m. will be the annual Advent Lessons and Carols.
The opera “Amahl and the Night Visitors” will play December 6th through 9th.
The Christmas Pageant, featuring our camel, our whale, and live donkey and llamas, will have two performances December 14th and 15th.
I am enclosing a Thanksgiving envelope which you may wish to use to make possible our proclamation at St. John’s that the whole world is undergirded by a God of immense generosity – that is Good News indeed!
Sincerely yours,
Harold Munn
The Rev. Canon Dr. Harold Munn
Rector
