Dear People of Ascension,
What will be of most benefit for most of you and the good of the whole at this time, I imagine, may be worthwhile information more than ingratiating prose. I welcome you to scan the following for what may be of most use to you and any others in your household. I'm sure I've missed, mis-ordered and misrepresented some things. Thank you in advance for your patience.
Worship & Music
+ A beautiful Stations of the Cross liturgy
was created yesterday with help from Br. Nathanael Rahm and incorporating images from the Stations at Ascension.
Organist David White
and Ascension choir
Mezzo Soprano Cassidy Smith
and I recorded the service (with proper ‘social distancing’) yesterday evening. You will be able to see it
here at our Ascension YouTube
channel ... if it ever completes downloading!
+ The Wardens and I will soon be forming a Holy Week and Easter Worship Planning Team.
No remote foot-washing, I'm guessing, but how will we gather and make sense of and be blessed by what we cling to and profess in our Holy Week and Easter liturgies?
+
Our musicians are very eager to contribute their gifts
at this time. Other than the 'Stations' recording mentioned above (my thanks to Benjamin for arranging for Cassidy Smith to take part as well)
Pastoral Care
I've been doing my best to make contact
with at least a few of you every day, and I know many of you are also reaching out to others. Although I won't publish my cell phone number here online, I welcome any member to call it ... ask around; a lot of people have it.
Your Survey Responses - or NOT
My thanks to those of you who responded to the survey I circulated earlier this week. Sadly, I didn't know that Survey Monkey's 'free' survey feature limited responses to 40 -- so I don't know how many more of you may have wanted to use the survey after we quickly hit the limit. Stay tuned on what if any further surveying may follow, and know that I plan to take a closer look at those 40 results later today.
Vestry Meeting -- with God's help
We'll hold a Vestry meeting tomorrow, Saturday, March 21, starting at 1 pm.
I'm not at all confident that I've sufficiently mastered the Meet feature of G Suite, but in theory all Vestry meetings are open to all, so if you'd like to take part, pay attention: please send an email
only to this address -- connect@ascensionchicago.org --
with 'Vestry Meeting' in the subject line by 12:30 p.m. tomorrow. If I don't connect with you, please don't take it personally. If I do connect ... thanks be to God!
With prayers, gratitude and hope,
Patrick +
