This Week's Announcements | |
Sunday School Kick Off!
Our first day of Sunday School will be after Labor Day, Sunday, September 13. Sunday School is available to all youth pre-k-5th Grade. We follow the Spark All Kids curriculum, and are looking for one more lead teacher this year. Let Kate know if this is something you'd be interested in! This curriculum takes very little outside planning time, which has been a lovely change for our teachers. No previous teaching experience required, we will have you take the Diocesan safeguarding courses. As always, there are at least 2 non-related adults in each classroom to ensure safety for our children.
Nursery(Infant+)
Our Nursery is open during our 10:30 AM Service and will be available on September 13. Nursery is provided for Youth aged Kindergarten and younger, as we enjoy having our Sunday School youth present for service. We never mind having our littles making joyful noise in church service either, but love to offer parents an option to enjoy service uninterrupted if they would like!
Nursery volunteers follow the same protocol for Safeguarding as our Sunday School Teachers. If you would prefer your baby to stay with you, but need a quiet space to feed or change, or to just let them crawl around, the Care
Room is just outside of the sanctuary, and has a tv to watch the service.
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Trivia Night-1 Week Away!
Friday, September 18
Our Inaugural Trivia Night is a week from tomorrow! You MAY still purchase a table with friends (see full announcement). If trivia isn't your thing, but you would like to come help out on Friday evening to be part of the fun, you can contact Fr Ben about volunteering to help with prizes and taking up answer sheets — we still need 1-2 trustworthy judges to score the answers! If you would like to play trivia but don't have a full team, please contact Kate Kielion to see about joining in with one of our parish-member teams that has an open seat. Questions? Ask Fr Ben!
How can you help to make this a success?
- Find a Group of 8, and come for some trivia!
- We will have some specific asks, to fill raffle baskets, in the Narthex (the
entryway behind the red doors) soon. As those are up, please choose a
few items to purchase if you’re able.
To purchase a table for the night of the event online via credit card, please use
the below QR code, to purchase at church and pay via check or cash, please
contact Kate. There are 3 price points available for tables with different accommodations. Once your team has decided which table you would like to purchase, one person from the group will purchase for everyone. If you need a particularized tax receipt, we can take checks/cash separately once a table lead has collected the money from each team member.
Please let the office know you would like a receipt. If one of your team
members needs to pay separately online via credit card, please contact us for
instructions.
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Camp Song Sunday
Sunday, September 20
at 8:30 AM Service
Camp Song Sunday - 9/20 at 8:30 am service
As our Joyful Noise band leadership takes their show on the road for vacation weeks, Fr Ben will lead music on guitar for the early service on 8:30. If you're curious about some of the music our summer camp program uses, feel free to join us for some of the greatest hits from the Sunday worship side of the set list.
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Office Hour Change
As we go into the program year our office hours will return to 9am-1pm, Monday – Thursday. A note as well that the office will not be open on Monday, September 7th, in observance of Labor Day.
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Welcome Lizi Watkins, New Parish Administrator
We're happy to announce that we have hired Elizabeth (Lizi) Watkins to be our new parish administrator at St A's! Lizi is a member at All Saints Episcopal Church, where she will also begin coordinating their nursery this year, and has served as a counselor at Camp Canterbury this past year, where she's met some of our church families already. Lizi began work in the office on August 17th, and is getting oriented to our tasks, programs, and projects here at church. Please take a moment to welcome her during office hours (9-12 M-Th Summer, 9-1 M-Th, Sep-May) if you're here mid-week.
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August Thanks & September Special Collection: Episcopal Relief & Development
In September, our special collection (the wicker baskets in worship) goes to Episcopal Relief and Development. ERD is the Episcopal Church's organization that responds to major events, natural disasters, and ongoing cycles of poverty where intervention and resources can make a difference. We recognize and support ERD's work in September because they were the church's immediate response to the 9/11 attacks, and it is often a month in which we're aware of both fires from dry areas and storm seasons throughout our world. You can learn more about their work HERE.
Thanks also for a very successful August collection, which raised a total of $1,641 for The Furniture Project!
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Children, Littles & Youth Sundays
This coming year, we’re going to specially celebrate our youngest members
once a month by inviting them to explore leadership and service roles during
worship. Young people are welcome to help us with readings, leading prayers or psalms, offering music, serving communion, and more. Our clergy team will have a special children’s sermon moment before preaching (more briefly) to the adults. Fr Ben and our Director of Ministries, Kate, will be coordinating volunteers for these services. The first set will be held on September 27, October 25, and November 29th. And our young people are always welcome to help in our worship ministries, so if these days sparks an interest, let’s talk!
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Fall Adult Formation Opportunity Thursday's at Noon
This fall, adult formation will be available on Thursdays at noon! All are welcome to join us for one week, one month, or all of these opportunities!
September 17, 24: Reading the Bible
During these studies, we will consider how to read Scripture faithfully. Is the Bible history? How do we read the bible in its literary context? How do we approach ethical issues in the Bible such as patriarchy, slavery and abuse of power? Bible study meets Thursdays at noon. A Zoom link is also available on the parish Google Calendar.
October Midweek Study: Rule of St Benedict
On Thursdays in October, we'll be studying the Rule of St Benedict, led by Fr Benedict (no relation). The lives of monastic Christians have long been a model for contemplation and community, and the commitments made by monks, nuns, oblates, novices, and others were among the earliest examples of holding to a "rule of life" grounded in faith. For those who would like to read along further, Fr Ben will be using Joan Chittister's commentary, "The Rule of Benedict: A Spirituality for the 21st Century" to help guide this class. It is also a great chance to learn more about monastic practices as we prepare to welcome the Benedictine Way monastery community to lead our worship on Sunday, October 18th.
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Outreach Notes from August
Our parish Outreach Committee met on Sunday, August 9th , after the late service. We discussed our upcoming events, including the Blood Drive on October 17th , the Holiday Marketplace in December, and COPE activities. We noted that our Saturday COPE breakfasts have been very enthusiastically received by the COPE clients, but that we need more volunteers if they are to continue. The Outreach Committee also needs a lay chair to send the monthly email reminder convening the group, send notes to the vestry and these announcements, and write the end of year report. The next Outreach Committee meeting will be held on Tuesday, September 15 at 6:30 pm.
Join Us in Supporting COPE With Your Time & Talent!
The Christian Outreach Program of Elkhorn (COPE) is seeking additional support from their sister congregations. Currently, St. A has a board member and an alternate, but we are looking for parishioners eager to make a difference in the lives of our COPE neighbors.
We have two upcoming projects that need leadership.
The first is the COPE Breakfast on Saturday, September 26. We're seeking a person or team to lead this effort. Your role would involve gathering helpers to prepare scrambled eggs and breakfast burritosin advance of serving at COPE from 9 AM to 12 PM.
The second is the COPE Adopt a Family Event. Rhonda is hoping to train a person or team to help organize St. A's part in this project. You would set out Gift Tags, and ensure all of the donors turn in gifts by the alloted time, organize, sort and deliver them to the host church.
If you're interested in leading or participating, please let Kate know. Your involvement can make a significant impact! Thank you for your support and dedication.
COPE Breakfast
Saturday, September 26 from 9:00 AM-12:00 PM
The neighbors at COPE very much appreciated the last breakfast, so we're doing it again! We're going to need your help to make this a success. There will be a sign up online, and on the table by the bulletins. Many hands make light work. The assumption is usually that there is more than enough help. The fact is, it's usually just a handful of dedicated helpers. If we want to continue offering this very appreciated event to our friends at COPE, we need as many hands as we can to make it a success. Thanks for any help you can give!
What can I do to be of service to my neighbors in need?
- Bring 10 (or more) breakfast burritos to church the week before the event. We need sausage, egg & cheese and egg, and cheese. Homemade Burritos are preferred
- Bring a crock pot of scrambled eggs to church Friday, the 25
- Bring a crockpot of sausage to church Friday, the 25
- Bring 24 juice boxes to church Friday, the 25
- Bring 24 chocolate milk boxes/bottles to church Friday, the 25
- Bring 24 bottles of water to church Friday, the 25
- Be at church Friday to ensure everything was dropped off and organize items that need to go to COPE in the morning
- Be at church Saturday, the 26 to heat up food, make coffee & ice the drinks in coolers
- Help transfer food to COPE Saturday
- Spend some time helping at the event
- Transfer crockpots, etc. back to church after the event
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Sacred Ground
Tuesdays 6:30-8 PM, 9/29 to 12/15
Fr Ben and Barb Hall are convening a group to go through the Sacred Ground curriculum this fall. This 11-session workshop uses 2-3 hours of reading and video preparation for each session. This builds up a foundation for group conversations about the history of race in our country, our churches, and our communities. Our church setting invites us to bring a theology of God's vision of the whole human family to have a deeper awareness of where sin has divided us, and to discern what reconciliation and healing look like in our own lives and day and age. The curriculum has been updated, so previous registrants may find it valuable to participate again to review the material and experience the new offerings! The invitation is to sign up for the full 11 sessions, although it is fine to miss a week or two if necessary. For questions, please contact Fr Ben or Barb; contact info available through the parish office at 402-378-5690.
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Pet Blessing and
Celebration of Creation
Wednesday, October7 6:00 PM
We will offer a chance to have our pets blessed on Wednesday evening, October 7. Please load up your pets and feel free to join us in some holy chaos as we gather for a pizza dinner (and pet treats) and bless our animal friends.
We are hoping to have an animal encounter of some kind this year, details will be coming soon!
This is a great event for the young and the young at heart. Please join us, and feel free to bring friends! RSVP’s to Kate are helpful just to get a sense of numbers, but we’ll plan for plenty of food and friends!
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Red Cross Blood Drive
in Honor of Amy Churchill
Saturday, October 17
Our quarterly blood drive for the fall will be on Saturday, October 17! Our blood drives began with our friend Amy, who was battling Metastatic Breast Cancer. Her goal was to give back the amount of blood she had used through the course of her treatments. We believe she had done all of that and more in the many blood drives she hosted.
Amy's Blood Drives have become a core ministry for us at St Augustine's, so we will continue them in her honor as long as we have friends show up to give blood. If you are able to help with this drive, or have friends who would like to give back to others by donating blood, please join us at St. Augustine Episcopal Church in Elkhorn (285 S 208th St, Elkhorn, NE 68022).
The need for blood is dire right now, please be sure to share the blood drive, even if you are unable to give. We would love to exceed our goal! If you have any questions, please contact Mary.
Appointments are scheduled in 15 minute increments(Whole Blood) and on the hour (Power Red). For eligibility requirements and to see the difference between the two donations, CLICK HERE. To schedule your donation time, CLICK HERE St. Augustine Episcopal Church should be at the top, click "see times".
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Forming Some CLAY
(Children, Littles, And Youth) Our next meeting will be Sunday, November 8 at 11:45 AM. At our first meeting, we shared lots of ideas for strengthening ministry with children, youth, and families:
Reimagining VBS: Keep an eye out for information regarding VBS next summer – we discussed a reimagined plan, aiming for more of a day camp style, offering a full week in early August, after many of the summer camps that working parents depend on have ended and families are preparing for back-to-school. If we do move forward with this plan, we hope to have registration open by February.
Faith Formation for Parents: We talked about offering a Bible study for parents and asked when would be easiest for families to participate. Most parents felt that Sunday would be the most accessible day for a regular Bible study. We also discussed offering quarterly Sunday afternoon or evening classes on topics such as internet safety, parenting, and other areas that support families.
Fun & Fellowship: There was also a desire for more opportunities for families to have fun and build community together — including board game nights and other “fun nights.” One idea is for youth to help play with younger children so that adults can enjoy some kid-free fellowship and conversation.
Sunday School & Nursery: Our Sunday School teachers are interested in finding a curriculum for next year that is more closely aligned with our liturgical life. We may revisit Godly Play as one possibility and will continue those conversations. We also discussed ways to make nursery time more intentionally formational, with books, songs, and simple learning led by a teacher rather than having nursery be primarily open play.
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August Vestry Notes
The Vestry (the parish board) met on Sunday, August 16th. They reviewed and approved financial reports and an annual audit report, which showed no major issues, and included a recommendation to create a written description of parish financial policies and procedures. The vestry noted that we have a number of areas in which that would be a helpful tool. The Vestry also heard about an invitation to be considered as a site for the Munroe-Meyer Guild Garden Walk in June 2027; serving as a site would involve visitors to our garden throughout a Sunday. The Vestry voted to approve participation pending conversations with our local Property Owners Association and with a requirement that we do not cancel worship that Sunday; if we are selected as a site, we expect a team will discuss garden needs, traffic management through the day, and what hospitality we'd like to offer alongside the walk. In addition, the Vestry reviewed our Summer staffing changes and conversations, and noted that with a new administrator this Fall, we have a prime moment of opportunity to review various staff needs and goals, which our Finance Committee will also be participating in. The next Vestry meeting will be held on Sunday, September 20 at noon; meetings are always open to anyone who would like to participate. If you have something you would like the vestry to review or discuss, please let Fr Ben know a week ahead so it can be added to the agenda!
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Unplug The Christmas Machine
On October 3rd at St. Andrews Episcopal Church take an early opportunity to rest and reflect with Episcopalians from around the area, using materials from Unplug the Christmas Machine, a guidebook written by Jo Robinson and Jean Coppock Staeheli. We will meet from 10:00 AM – 3:00 PM for a workshop led by Mother Kate Hennessy-Keimig and Father Ben Varnum. Lunch is included and childcare is available upon request. Thanks to underwriting from Bishop Barker, a registration fee of $15 covers lunch and materials, with a suggested additional fee of $15 for childcare through the event. Scholarships are available on request. Register for the event HERE
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Collaboration between Elaine Randal book Club and Culture Club Events: Read The Day the World Came to Town and See the play Come from Away
In late summer the Elaine Randall Book Club (ERBC) will be reading The Day the World Came to Town: 9/11 in Gander Newfoundland by Jim Defede.
We have also arranged for a block of seats for September 27, Sunday afternoon at 2 pm, to attend the musical based on the book. The play is called “Come From Away” and it will be playing at the Omaha Community Playhouse. This year will be the 25th anniversary of September 11th.
From those of us who have seen the production, be assured it is a good one—Tom Scott has seen the play in various locations 4 times already and I’ve seen it twice! The music is great and the story is told well. The book is available from Omaha Public Library or from your favorite bookstores both used and new. The book is available in paper, audio, and digital formats.
For those wanting to go to the play, please get the count to Sandra via email or text me. If we get 12 seats we qualify for the group rate of $35 per adult and $25 for students. Bring your checks made out to Omaha Community Playhouse by September 11 so we can fill this block of seats for a great Sunday outing. I reserved seats in the Center section fairly close so you won’t miss a thing!
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Elaine Randal book Club
Tuesday, September 22 at 11:30 AM
Over the course of the next month, the Elaine Randall Book Club will be reading Our House by Louise Candlish. The book is a 2018 psychological suspense novel about a woman who returns home to find strangers moving into her property, setting off a dangerous chain of events involving her missing husband and hidden secrets.
Join us September 22 to discuss the book. The book Bag is available above the coat rack across from the kitchen. Please be sure to sign your book out.
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Young Adult Retreat
October 10-12
Young Adult Retreat Our Neighbor, The Earth is an overnight retreat Oct. 10-12, starting that Saturday afternoon at 2pm and ending on Indigenous Peoples' Day that Monday at 5pm. The theme is "Our Neighbor, The Earth: How She teaches us to heal". This retreat is a continuation of the joint young adult retreats that The Benedictine Way has held with the Diocese of Iowa. The age range is wider than the "Here I Am" retreat. You must be at least 18, and the program is designed for a mixed group of young adults in their 20s and 30s. To register, CLICK HERE by September 22.
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Sunday, September 13
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8:30 AM -Service of Holy Eucharist
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10:20 AM -Sunday School/Nursery Open!
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10:30 AM -Service of Holy Eucharist
Wednesday, September 16
Thursday, September 17
Friday, September 18
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6:30 PM -Trivia Night Fundraiser
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September 26 -Serve Breakfast at COPE
September 27 -Instructed Eucharist Both Services, Youth Service w/ children's sermon 10:30 AM
October 3 -Unplug the Christmas Machine @ St. Andrew's
October 7 -Blessing of Animals
October 17 -Blood Drive
October 18 -Worship Led by Benedictine Way
October 25 -Youth Service w/ children's sermon 10:30 AM
October 28 -Boo Bash (Halloween Party)
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Reflection for Thursday, September 10, 2026
Remembering September 11th
I’ve found myself cringing a bit at the signage I’ve seen around town over the past few weeks. It’s done up in patriotic bunting with America-blue backgrounds and red stars with swishy tails … spelling out an announcement of 25 years since the attacks of September 11th, 2001. I haven’t bothered to look into what groups or websites the various signs are for – mostly I’ve just been startled to see something so visually cheerful about such an awful day, season, and shift in our world.
I was in high school that day. As I recall, third-hour Spanish class was the first moment that a teacher wheeled in a box-tv unit and got public news on, canceling class plans so we could bear witness to what was unfolding. I remember thinking about pending flights I had for college visits. My worried mother told me, when I got home, that because I had just listed ordination as a possible career path on a college application, maybe I could claim conscientious objector status if a draft came in to go fight in a war. We were all reeling through the day as the information slowly became clearer about what had taken place, and how, and about the other attempts that were stopped.
It’s hard to fully unpack all the ways those events shaped and changed our lives and culture. For some, it was a return to an awareness that global events can come home to roost – my mom’s memory of Vietnam-era drafts, for instance, felt pretty alien to me, growing up in a world where the armed forces had always been volunteer. Generations who had lived through the Cold War had a different sense of the possibility of harm coming from other nations than did I, having grown up after the fall of the Berlin Wall. So far as I was concerned, warfare was something Americans did with overpowering force in places far from my home … the idea that there was anyone out there who thought of us as “the enemy” to be hit at home was a startling new reality.
A 25th “anniversary” is an odd thing for that day. The number is a “nice round number” but it’s completely arbitrary. I’m not sure we know less or more than we did 24 years after, or than we will after 26 next year. But it’s on our minds, and I’ll add some of my thoughts.
As a priest, I’m aware that the attacks did spiritual damage as well as physical and other kinds of harm.
What is spiritual damage? Here, let me say that it’s a distortion of the vision by which God sees the human family.
Some of this was done in an instant. The violence done by the terror attacks was, by its nature, dehumanizing. The terrorists chose violence as their tool and simply named human beings as their enemies, or as a means to whatever they imagined the end of their actions might be. They may have been steeped in the old religious affirmation that dying against evil people guarantees you a heavenly reward … full spiritual maturity requires Christians to somberly reflect that this was taught to Christian crusaders back at the turn of the first millennium, and echoes of it can still be heard from extremist Christian voices today. Whatever the motives of the terrorists, they treated human beings as less-than-human, and slaughtered innocent people in the midst of their lives. The World Trade Center as a target in particular meant that they took lives from all across the globe, indiscriminately and violently. There’s perhaps a spiritual invitation there for Americans: although this attack took place in our country, the violence of it killed neighbors from throughout the global community … if we can let that reality help move our hearts to understand that lives of all people are as sacred as our own, we will move away from the warped, sinful vision the terrorists had, of imagining their targets were worth killing.
That, I think, underlines for us some of the other spiritual harm that was done. Terrorism does violence and harm … but it also, by its nature and by its intention, seeks to create terror. And despite whatever speeches might have been given then or now about courage and perseverance in the face of such evil … they did. They did make people afraid.
How could we not be? How could someone not wonder whether the next plane on someone’s list is this one I now board? And more broadly, in shattering a sense that these were safe shores, and in an attack that came so suddenly, so brutally, and with such indiscriminate desire simply to harm people from this vast group they had described as their enemies, they raised the specter that some new evil would come someday. This is one of the hardest fears to control or respond to: the unknown. We can take steps to prepare and prevent the things we can imagine … we can’t prepare for the unimaginable.
Having named that fear, let me pause to offer some comfort. There is quite a bit of safety that we’ve built back up. Some of it lies in the particular captures – or killings – of the terrorists who were responsible for those attacks. There’s no Christian way to celebrate a death, but we can admit our sense of safety when someone hoping to cause more harm can no longer do so.
The military events that unfolded in response are difficult to parse, and I don’t claim special expertise to understand them deeply. I’m sure that there were events and moments that built greater fear and suspicion of the United States abroad, and allowed terroristic groups to campaign and recruit. I’m also sure there were military actions undertaken that did make the world safer and remove weapons and tools of harm from organized groups who would use them. And I believe that the overwhelming majority of the enlisted of our armed forces seek to undertake their missions with every hope of protecting the country and building a lasting peace.
Beyond that, I believe that much safety is built up in things less dramatic. The long, slow work of building up diplomacy, understanding, and relationships often keeps us safer than the threat of our nuclear arsenal. It’s hard to hate when you get to know someone, as we have seen time and time again across the divisions of history. Over the years, diplomats, artists, business partners, scholars, students of the world and even simple tourists have gone to see what other cultures are like, including those across the lines the terrorists have tried to paint as wholly separate and unintelligible to one another. Every time someone makes an absolute statement dismissing or demonizing across those lines, they participate in the terrorists’s continuing echoes. But meanwhile, many people have been quietly learning that the shouting about the inhumanity of other nations, other peoples, other religions is a myth just seeking to create a basis for more violence.
Part of the spiritual harm we’ve experienced has been the festering growth of that myth. Like scratching at an itchy scab, it can make us feel like we’re easing the buzzing pain of our fears of what might happen again or what might happen next … but actually, the scratching lets the infections of sin get in and warp us. The idea that some people are too strange, or too evil, or can never be known, understood, loved, or related to … those falsehoods start up a slow chorus whispering that there are some places where we need not treat our neighbor as ourselves: our neighbor – THIS neighbor at least – can have their rights, their dignity, their very life set aside, if it makes us feel safer.
Friends, that is the nature of one of the lasting wounds dealt by the terrorists. They weren’t the only nor anywhere near the first to cause such spiritual harm or to play notes on that evil theme. Whether there’s some abstract metaphysics of sin or some specific real devil, this has been a tool in his employ since the stories of Genesis. And twenty-five years has not been long enough for that wound to scar over into a somber reminder of what harm to our hearts we must learn to avoid.
But Jesus Christ beat the devil in the wilderness, and showed us a way to rise above the temptations of comfort and power and a false sense of safety in this world. Jesus Christ beat the devil in the garden of Gethsemane, when he might have sold out his soul to prolong his days. Jesus Christ beat the devil from the cross, when he might have raged and relented from the way of love and condemned all the world that had caused him such harm … and instead he spoke forgiveness, and spent some of his last breaths making sure particular people from his life would still have love and care.
And the way of Jesus Christ can beat the devil today. Part of how Christians can work today to honor those who were killed on September 11th, or in the name of September 11th, is to work against the fear, terror, and division that those evil acts caused. Some wounds will scar rather than heal, but scars teach us reminders.
Other wounds, perhaps, can be places where our hearts, by the grace of God, can fully recover … beating wholly and openly and fully again with the neighbors God loves and helps us love as a common human family. And as with other illnesses, perhaps recovering from the fear we were pushed into can give us a resistance for the next time fear wants to tempt us to abandon God and neighbor. Perhaps it can give us a firm conviction of the need we have to build up a common life that can withstand attempts to tear it down into divisions.
Perhaps we can remember that hope is not a silly thing of shyly wishing for something that isn’t here … but rather hope is an immortal and powerful calling from God that calls us to stand in the world and walk with it towards its renewing by the power of the Holy Spirit and the grace-filled gardeners that God calls us to be as partners in the work of restoration.
That’s where I find an ability to honor the memory of those harmed by that day and its aftermaths. That’s where my faith feels like my guide. So I invite you to know the healing of God from the terror that sin wants you to feel. May you know the comfort of a love that dissolves away our fears and hatreds, and shows us the love that remains and abides from our creator, and may we use that foundation to build up a world that need not know fear.
Amen.
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St. Augustine of Canterbury Episcopal Church
285 S 208th Street
Elkhorn, NE 68022
402-289-4058
Church Communication and Announcements
Those of you who need to share information with the parish, please be sure to send it to parish@sainta.net as well as ministries@sainta.net Jay and Kate will need to have this information by Wednesday at 10:00 am to be included in that week's communication for bulletin and newsletter. We appreciate your support.
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