After 11 years and many requests, the church has embarked on a new pictorial directory for our congregation.  Photo sessions will be held in the social hall April 20-22 and April 27-29 as follows:

 

Thursday, April 20, 2:00 - 8:30 PM

                                    

Friday, April 28, 2:00 - 8:30 PM

Saturday, April 29, 9:00 AM - 3:30 PM

 

The pictorial directory will make it easier to get to know other Westmorelanders and we need YOU to make it a success.  There is no cost to participate and each household will receive a complimentary 8x10 portrait and free pictorial directory.  You will also be able to purchase additional pictures for your personal use.  The photo sessions are open to friends and neighbors (although of course, they won't appear in the directory).  This is a chance for people you know to have lovely photos taken by professional photographers at our group discounted rates.

 

To sign up click here. 

Vickie Allin is coordinating this project.  However, we'll need volunteers to help with registration during the photo sessions.   If you can spare 3 hours of your time on any photo session day, or if you can help in other ways, please contact Vickie at church or by email: [email protected].

Now through April 23

The Westmoreland Arts Committee is announcing an exhibition featuring Fabric Artist, Ann Harwell. Her work is displayed in the Lee Hansley Gallery in Raleigh, NC, in Piedmont Craftsmen Gallery in Winston Salem, NC and in many homes. You might recall Westmoreland Arts Committee's winter 2015 exhibition of Ann Harwell's beautiful astronomy-themed quilts. This spring's exhibition will run until April 23, 2017, and features Ann's floral-themed quilts. Please enjoy the quilts with your eyes and not your fingers.

Briggs Center for Faith & Action ESL Program

Saturday, March 25, 9:30 am - 3:30 pm,
Westmoreland Social Hall

 

Please join us for this unique Craft & Beauty Market. 30% of all sales will be donated to the Briggs Center ESL Program. Students and teachers will offer the following services and handmade items for sale:

 

 

All Westmorelanders are invited to attend and/or participate. If you would like to provide a service, sell your homemade items, or if you have any questions, please contact Stacey Fannon at [email protected] or 301-564-4330. 

Letters to Support Synagogues

On Sunday, the people of Westmoreland Congregational United Church of Christ signed letters of support that will go to twenty DC-area synagogues. These letters denounce anti-Semitism, decry recent anti-Jewish threats and acts, call for national conversations of respect, express our church's commitments to peace and justice, and offer support for our Jewish friends and neighbors.

Bright Lights in a Wintry Climate of Deprivation - Social Justice and Action Update

The final tally is in for the series of three collections at Christmas for the grant funds that the Social Justice and Action Board will be distributing on your behalf in the fall of 2017 to social justice and service organizations in metropolitan DC. The SJA Board celebrates the generosity of Westmorelanders who donated a total of $25,489.92. This is such a witness to the core values of this church family.

 

We will have one more collection to enlarge that fund even more at our Easter Service. In this period of uncertainty as new federal budgets call for slashes in social services, and medical care for previously insured people under Obamacare is on the chopping block, we expect groups we have supported in the past will have even greater demands as the gap continues to widen between the rich and the poor. As was said in SJA's Mission Moment at Christmas, the kind of gifts your dollars represent don't come in a box with a bow, but offer far greater value: the gifts of dignity, transformation, empowerment, health, hope, new beginnings, employment, voice, shelter, creativity.

 

You are invited to join me in the Library at 9:00 on Sunday mornings. As you may know I am in a doctoral program at Wesley Seminary, focusing on how the church engages (or not) in public life. I will lead this class based on material I am reading in my program. Each week I will bring paragraph, an idea, or an article for discussion. Your job is to show up with you best ideas.  

Razors and Shaving Cream for Samaritan Ministry of Greater Washington

 

Samaritan Ministry of Greater Washington is a community partnership bringing together homeless people and others in need in Greater Washington, with support and volunteers from churches in a joint effort to improve the lives of all.

 

We will collect and donate the following for their clients: disposable razors (men and women) and shaving cream.

ImmigrantsWelcome.org 

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