Merry Christmas

Christmas is coming - as a matter of fact it is coming on Saturday.  We know that because the Christmas pageant was Sunday.  Here's a picture from our crack photographer, Charlie Hibschweiler.   The youth group created the pageant.  What would the Hogwarts Christmas Pageant look like?  Now we know - check out the video on St. Paul's web-site

Here's the new Christmas banner - hung in the church - thank you Jason, Brian, Brie and Kate for getting it up, looking good and not hurting yourselves in the process.

Hope to see you and your families at Christmas services -

Christmas Eve Services are at 4pm, 7pm & 11 pm
Christmas Day Service is at 9 am

January 1 the service is at 9 am

If you are travelling, be safe.

Have a Merry Christmas

Happy Thanksgiving

It is in fact that time of year - as hard as I'm finding it to believe.

I hope that all of you have safe travel and a happy thanksgiving.

We all have so much to be thankful for - it's good to take some time and stop and remember it.

Moving Quickly into fall

I can't believe how quickly fall has not only come - but has moved on.

Fall events have happened one on another. 

We did Sunday School kick-off and youth group kick-off with hot dogs on September 11.

We had a Ministry Fair on September 18.

We blessed pets on October 2.

We've gone to the UB game.

We are having a fall food festival and a Halloween Party.

This is a busy place - please let me know if there is something else that you would like to have happen - hold on tight, Advent and Christmas will be here before you know it.

Remembering 9-11

I'm struggling with the sermon for Sunday - the 10th anniversary of 9-11.

I'm still not sure what I'm going to say - you'll have to come to church or check out the sermon on the web-site on Monday to find out - but, the media has already begun talking about the anniversary and NPR has been having various people share their memories of that day.

But one of the things that I am thinking about is - oddly enough - Mount St. Helen's - the volcano in Washington St.  I have aunts and cousins in Oregon and we went out to visit them just after the 1980 erruption and visited Mt. St. Helen's.  My mother still has a jar of the ash.  One of the things that I remember about 9-11 was how much the ash that covered people and buildings reminded me of the Mt. St. Helen's ash that covered everything. 

However, the reason I'm thinking about it today is that about 5 years after the erruption we went back to visit Mt. St. Helen's and the trees and flowers were beginning to push their way through the ash - the ash was still there - but there were saplings and flowers growing in the midst of the ash. 

I'm hoping that as the 10th annivesary of 9-11 nears that we are able to see some saplings and flowers pushing up through the ash of that day as well.

Making a Difference

This is a picture of some of the school supplies that we collected this year.

We filled 20 backpacks and two big bins with school supplies and still had a few bags of supplies too.

In addition to the basic providing of supplies - I hope that we also sent the message to the kids that receive them that there are other people who think that education is important and who think that they are important. That is so much more vital than having a new pencil - knowing that there is someone out there who thinks you are important and who wants you to succeed - that is outreach to the soul.

Thank you all.

Wealth and Riches

In the recent debates over the debt ceiling there has been lots of talk about "the rich" and what "the rich" are doing or not doing.

It got me thinking - everything depends on your perspective - I mostly don't think of myself at one of the rich - however - everyone else in the world does.

Don't believe me - go to globalrichlist.com and see where you fall in terms of the richest people in the world - I bet you'll be surprised.

Once you've done that - if you want to easily help those less fortunate than yourself go to freerice.com and by answering some trivia questions you can donate rice to people who have much, much less than you.

Twenty First Century Stuff

We are using more and more social media here at St. Paul's. Right now it's just additional ways to stay connected - but I'm hoping over the summer and into the fall to move to more spiritually focused contact as well.

We have decided to move from Facebook groups to a facebook page - you can "like" us at St. Paul's Episcopal Church - Harris Hill on Facebook. We'll be posting some thoughts for reflection as well as parish news.

I'm also going to be using my Twitter account for some thoughts and prayer tweets - you can follow me @vdzust if you use twitter - but be warned you might get some things about my life as well as the church