A huge thanks to Fr. Michael J. Marrone, Jr. for preparing six of our youth for Confirmation.  Congratulations to  Maddy Foley, Matt Foley, Emily McKerrow, Eliza McKerrow, Danny Stratton and Lucy Smith.  See Confirmation photos.

Thanks to the great team work  at Main Spring, Brockton on Saturday, Oct. 29th. If you'd like to help us continue this work next year, please call Joan Powers at 781-545-9650. If we don't have enough interest, we will have to tell them, we can no longer serve Main Spring.

In early October we heard the Gospel parable of the rich man who ignored Lazarus the beggar who sat outside the rich man's house. I asked that we take the following week to see the Lazaruses of our own lives; I'd collect the needs noticed on the following Sunday, and then we'd let people of the congregation vote on which needs/projects seemed to be most important-or maybe more fittingly-where the Spirit might be drawing our attention. I did all of this with a bit of apprehension; some of our repeating, regular outreach projects depend heavily on older members of the church who are 'the regulars.' Our serving lunch at Fr. Bills in Brockton 5 times a year may have to end if we can't draw from a deeper roster of volunteers. So my prayer is that any of the following three projects which rose to the top might interest people not otherwise committed to the outreach work of the parish. In no particular order, the three areas of need:

 

1. Care of our seniors at St. Luke's. In general it would mean a group of parishioners who would assist those living at home but with physical challenges- changing light bulbs for example, or shoveling a walk, I'm keenly aware that such groups exist in both First Trinitarian Church and First Baptist in the form of men's groups. No reason for us to make it male-only at St. Luke's. To put this into place what is needed: one or two coordinators to approach possible members, help define what the group would be able to offer and not, and work out a way to communicate with the seniors in need and the members of the helping group. It could be as simple as arranging dump runs once a week for someone.

 

2. Backpacks filled with school supplies, to be distributed by a Scituate resident who has taken this on as well as rehabbing bicycles and shipping them to places such as Indian reservations or community centers throughout the US. This could be a one-time effort (or once a year effort) and tied to the Giving Tree we have each Advent. Coordinators needed.

 

3. The equivalent of the Appalachian Service Project for high school students, but local: Scituate Service Project. This again would join interested parishioners (high school students and adult helpers) with efforts already underway in Scituate to start the SSP. First need would be to be in contact with those already starting to plan and figure out what help is needed and what we might do to meet those needs.

 

Looking forward to seeing how these all might take on life in our community.

Congratulations to Catherine & Andrew Boyle for the Baptism of Kennedy Catherine Boyle this past month and welcome to St. Luke's!

On Sunday, November 20th at St. Luke's, we will be celebrating the ministries of Ann Johnson and Alice Dana who have blessed us with their unique gifts. Ann has taught the 7-9th grade class for decades and Alice has sung in the choir since she arrived in Scituate and before that in Episcopal choirs since childhood. This will be our time to show how much we appreciate them during the service and at the reception to follow.

Please help us reach 100 pledges totaling $200,000!

You can now find minutes from Vestry meetings starting with September's and going forward, on St. Luke's webpage, under Our Community, Vestry.

Not an original project but one perhaps worth adopting at St. Luke's. The idea would be to have a box or basket at home. Instead of opening up a window in a calendar each day in December, it would mean putting an item each day into the designated basket or box, starting with December 1, leading up to Christmas. In gathering of Advent collections could be at the Christmas eve services. This would take some commitment and steady attention: it would not mean going to the grocery store each Saturday, picking up 7 items and then just putting them all into the box in one fell swoop. This would mean an intentional inclusion of the household in saying basically: "here is our offering for today" 24 days in a row. Look closer to December in the Narthex for a short prayer ritual to use each day as you put in the item.

Please join us on Sunday, November 27th at 5 pm for a pork dinner with roasted potatoes.  See the sign up sheets in the narthex.  Thank you!