banner photo by Janet Best
EXTRA! EXTRA! Read all about it! The Fall issue of the Anglican Montreal is here!
/A Message from the Editor
I hope you take the time to read this issue of the Anglican Montreal. As is evident from the front page, the focus is on Black Lives Matter; and the stories within are often deeply personal and moving. I am grateful to those who offered to share their thoughts and experiences of racism here in Quebec... and sometimes here in the Church. I would like to thank Ros Macgregor, who encouraged the (sometimes) reluctant authors to write about a topic that can be painful to confront. And also the Rev'd Stanley Brooks, who provides a fascinating overview of our diocesan history of racial integration in his article, The Evolution of Ethnic Diversity in the Montreal Church. We have so much to learn from each other. I hope the conversation continues.
Nicki Hronjak, Editor
Beyond the Plate on Zoom. 10am, Tuesday August 25th
/Join Neil Mancor and his guest Gillian Doucet-Campbell from the Diocese of Niagara for the first of a new season of Beyond the Plate coaching calls on Zoom. 10am, Tuesday August 25th.
With the summer coming towards an end, RIGHT NOW is a great opportunity to write a thank you letter to all your donors who have faithfully supported your church all summer long. With our tentative reopening beginning, it is an even greater opportunity to thank those who have hung in there all through the pandemic.
In this conversation we will look at why you need to send out a thank you now, take a look at some great design tips for impactful thank you communications, and together we will write a sample letter you can adapt for your community.
Meeting ID: 816 6365 8407
Supper Club Blog: A reflection on who we are and what we are up to…
/““What is the need right now around which I’m willing to show you my need and let you basically create something new together to mark, to witness, to invent: start with the need” - Priya Parker”
Like all good things, this is an evolving story! Supper Club has transformed over the years. As an experimental ministry we have tried different approaches. But truth be told, Supper Club gained its sea legs and found her momentum in 2019 once we made a few strategic tweaks and modifications.
We gained clarity by asking questions such as:
What is the need?
Who are we serving?
What is our purpose?
I prayed, listened and consulted on these questions until I felt a stirring to create something new. I sensed that there must be others like me, who are interested in faith and Christian spirituality and wish to explore these ideas outside of the context of the Sunday morning model. It soon became clear that gathering with a shared purpose, with a focus on relationships, scripture, stories, food and prayer was the new direction we were called in.
As a result, we created a community of seekers that actually listens, prays, supports and wonders together. We were blessed by face to face gatherings including prayer and conversation over a meal throughout the Fall and Winter until we were forced to adapt and shifted to digital. Now we are enthusiastically looking forward to hanging out in a park for a socially distanced picnic next week!
What impresses me and makes me most proud of the Supper Club community and its evolution is the ways that we have cared for and supported each other especially in the last 6 months. During this time of global pandemic, we have deepened our connection in both tangible and intangible ways. I personally thank God in prayer every day for this community and how we have enriched each other's lives.
The other day I was walking in NDG and I passed by a church with this quote on the lawn.
“We will never change the world by going to Church
We will only change the world by being the Church”
-unknown
It’s kind of a cliché I know but when I read this I thought about The Supper Club community and this filled me with hope knowing that we have accomplished meaningful acts of friendship, outreach and generosity together, knowing that we have been the church!
I can’t wait to plan, pray and dream about the direction of Supper Club and the ways that we will continue to transform our gatherings with mission, purpose and love this year!
Find Resources for Sunday School Leaders on Engaging with Children and Youth Online HERE
/In preparation for the Back to School Season, we hosted a series of webinars with different speakers on the topic of Engaging with Children and Youth Online
You may view the sessions here
Week 1 Engaging with Children and Youth Online An Overview
Week 2 Responding to the Topic: A discussion on the theme (not recorded)
Week 3 Engaging with Children Online
Week 4 Engaging with Youth Online
(cover photo by Deleece Cook)
Scarcity or Abundance (Blog by Neil Mancor)
/Scarcity or Abundance
How do you see the world?
One way we have of dividing ourselves up as human beings is into the glass-is-half-full or glass-is-half-empty camps. That is to say those who look at life or circumstances and see what is there and those who see what is lacking. The optimists and the pessimists. It’s considered a way of establishing a person’s worldview.
We could be forgiven for thinking that the cup is more than half-empty right now in Church. We haven’t been able to meet together since March. Some of us have managed to maintain our levels of giving, others have not. For many of our Churches, this has been a time of having to very seriously rethink the very economic foundations of our communities as rental and event-based income have dried up due to the pandemic. Indeed we may not be able to go back to depending upon those sources for a long time.
So perhaps it feels not only like the cup is half empty but, to change metaphors, that the cupboard is bare. Resources are scarce. But when we allow a sense of scarcity to guide our decisions and thinking, we tend to turn inward, hoard what we have for ourselves and become fearful of the future and suspicious others. That can only lead to a downward spiral of discouragement, inertia, fragmentation and dwindling.
Or, it could throw us into the hands of the Living God. I don’t see half-full or half-empty thinking in the Bible. The Scriptures talk about a glass overflowing kind of thinking. My cup runneth over says the Psalm writer. It is about abundance, not scarcity. I do not think that is intended to be thought of in material terms, prosperity gospel terms. It comes from the writer’s awareness of the utter closeness and care of God the Shepherd. It comes from who the Lord is and what the Lord does. You prepare a table before me; you anoint my head with oil: my cup runneth over. When the young adults in my family sit in my kitchen eating and laughing and being loud; when I sit looking at the wildness of the sea on holiday at Métis – my heart is filled with the gratitude that says: my cup runneth over with abundant blessing. Not scarcity – abundance.
In our Churches we can look at what we have managed to do since the pandemic began with such gratitude. It is amazing to think that we are still together. The very fact that so many of us went to the effort to keep on meeting somehow, anyhow, is a sign of God’s abundant blessing. So now, with the expectation of God’s loving care and abundant blessing, let us together press into God and look for God’s abundant generosity for our communities. When we allow ourselves to be guided by an abundance mentality, we place ourselves in the cross-hairs of God’s grace, and we are better able to see what is there, rather than what is missing. We open ourselves up to the possibility that God is God and has plans and purposes for us. We see the potential in a mustard seed, we regard the other faith communities around us not as competitors but as collaborators in the Kingdom of God. And we will find that God is enough.
Psalm 73:26
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
photo credit: Manu Schwendener
A Series of Webinars with Tools and Information to improve Digital Worship : Save the Date
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Week 1. Friday September 18 10 -11:30 am EST Presenter Dr. Jonathan White Theme: Music & Worship
Week 2. Friday September 25 10-11:30 am EST Presenter: TBA Theme: Safety & Ethics
Week 3. Friday October 2nd 10-11:30 am EST Presenter: TBA Theme: Formation & Community
