Dear Brothers and Sisters,
On Sunday, Canon Missioner Barbara Harrison Seward will be making her first visitation to St. Margaret’s. Bishop Kevin and Bishop Audrey (Central PA) are changing the way visitations are handled. Please make a point of coming to meet Canon Barbara, who is a really fun and interesting person to talk with. Let’s show her St. Margaret’s wonderfully hospitable welcome. She will be preaching and celebrating at the service. I’ve never
heard her preach before so I’m looking forward to it!
A few months ago, the Bishops and Canon Missioners of the Diocese of Bethlehem and of Central Pennsylvania came up with some plans to help us get acquainted with each other as we move toward reunification. We will become the Diocese of the Susquehanna on January 1. Among other things, they decided to do visitations in each other’s dioceses, which has already begun. And to invite parishes to create sibling-parish links. We have been paired with St. Andrew’s in Lewisburg. Because Doreen Tobin (vestry)
and I are also on the Board of the St. Barnabas Center, St. Barnabas is part of the mix as well.
Doreen and I have already met by zoom with Fr. Kevin Lowe, the priest in charge of St. Andrew’s, and it sounds like a GREAT match! The St. Andrew’s folks are very excited and even up for a road trip to come see us, among other things. A number of our vestry have thought the same thing. St. Andrew’s is praying for us weekly and this week, we start praying for them as well. It’s very exciting!!
On the back of this page, is a list of ideas for sibling parishes that the 4 Canons have created. Take a look and see if some of them interest you. You know me, I’m thinking how fun it would be for St. Andrew’s to celebrate the feast day of St. Margaret of Scotland and us to celebrate St. Andrew’s day—the other patron saint of Scotland. A match made in….well….Pennsylvania!
Praying daily with you, for our nation, our parishes, and the world,
Mo. Laura
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COMING UP!
- July 20 9:00 service, Canon Barbara Harrison Seward ‘s Visitation
- August 11-15 Music Camp, student show at 6:00 on Friday. FREE!
- **Wednesdays, noonday prayer via zoom at 12:00
- **Saturdays, Seventh Day Adventist congregation, 9:00-3:00
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Ideas for Getting Started with the Sibling Parish Project
• If possible, on a given Sunday, members of one parish travel to the other parish to share in worship and fellowship and include a tour of the parish in the day’s events.
• Schedule meetings for different groups within the parish: Vestry, Wardens, Altar Guilds, Youth groups, Men’s groups, Knitting groups, Social Justice groups, etc. Come to the Zoom with curiosity for how the other group is organized, what successes and challenges they face, how they draw new members, etc.
• Lead a weekly bible study together on Zoom (or open an existing Zoom bible study to the sibling parish).
• Engage in a book study together over the course of a few weeks (3-5 meetings is optimal).
• Make a commitment to have Compline on Zoom on the last Sunday evening of the month and share together in worship. Share, also, items of interest in the parish in the last month.
• If there is a monthly parish newsletter, create a “corner” in the newsletter to profile one member of the sibling parish in a “getting to know you” format in each edition: Who are they, how long have they belonged to their church, what activities do they participate in at church, one dream or hope for their parish and/ or reunification, etc.
• Have the children in the parish draw pictures of their church/people/clergy and send to the sibling parish.
• Have a small group compose a prayer for the sibling parish relationship and include it weekly in worship.
• Engage, if distance allows, in a “pulpit swap.”
• If the church has an intercession list, add the names of those people to your weekly bulletin.
• Write a “letter of introduction” to the other parish talking about customs, history, etc. and print it in the Sunday bulletin and/or read aloud during announcements.
• If travel permits, have a joint choir event at one of the churches some Sunday. Repeat at the other sibling church.
• Mail an artifact or two (old bible, photographs of the parish from years ago, scrapbook, parish history, etc.) for a loan and display in the sibling parish. Share the item during announcements.
• Swap an article that is used in weekly worship (chalice and paten, priest and deacon’s stoles, processional cross) and use that article in your worship each week as a physical reminder of the sibling parish.
What other ideas do you have?
Share them on our website by emailing Ms. Drew Dorgan at d.dorgan@globalhma.com