Latest News – Page 46 – The Church of the Ascension in the City of New York

This week, the rector finds resonance in the season of Advent, especially against the dark and terror-filled backdrop of yet more gun violence, this time in Chesapeake, Virginia, and Colorado Springs: “Advent is full of paradoxes — crisis and possibility, hope and profound challenge, watching and preparation, yearning and mystery. We see with deepening clarity the brokenness of the world; we wait with longing for the coming of the holy one.” Following the 11 am service, we’ll be making an Advent wreaths (greens, wreath forms, and candles will be provided). And next Saturday, our diocese will elect a new bishop coadjutor, who will eventually become our new diocesan bishop. Sleepers, awake!

This week: the rector shares a poem by Joy Harjo, “Perhaps the World Ends Here,” to reflect on gathering around a table for food and relationships, but also to bring to it all our loves, struggles, griefs and joys — to make, in other words, a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. Also this week: Sunday’s forum will discuss our diocese’s upcoming election of a new bishop coadjutor, and at the 11 am service, we will ingather and bless the pledges that have been made to support the parish in the coming year. If you haven’t filled out your pledge form yet for 2023, you can do so here!

This week, the rector reflects on the entwined themes of gratitude and choice: “Sometimes our thanksgiving simply overflows, and we rest in the grace of God and the awareness of our dependence on one another and others we may never know. Sometimes gratitude is a discipline, a practice as we choose to trust and honor interdependence. Sometimes our gratitude makes it possible to be generous or take a risk.”

This week: On Sunday we celebrate the Feast of All Saints, with special hymns, anthems and commemorations — and the baptizing two new saints into the household of God! Then, Tuesday is Election Day; in this newsletter, the rector exhorts us to vote on or before Tuesday with our love and our prayers.

This week: The Eve of All Hallows, the Feast of All Saints, and the Day of All Souls — an autumn triduum, some of it silly, some of it sorrowful, and all of it, in one way or another, celebratory of lives lived and also life eternal. The rector puts these days into the context of our life as a parish community in this week’s letter.