Celebrating our Feast Day Today is the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, our patronal feast day. Each parish of the Episcopal Church celebrates annually the Feast of its namesake; we will do so this coming Sunday. Most often (for churches named after saints) the feast day commemorates the day of that person’s death—the […]
Come and SeeIn this week’s reading from the Gospel of John (John 1:29-42) we hear of Christ’s first encounter with some of the disciples. Actually, it seems that some of them were disciples of John the Baptist first; after meeting Jesus, they change their alliance! Why the change of allegiance? Well, the clue comes in […]
Claimed by God Baptism is the initiation by water and the Holy Spirit into life with Christ, and into full membership in the church. This week we read Matthew’s account of the baptism of Jesus in the river Jordan. At the moment John baptizes Jesus, the heavens open and Jesus sees the Spirit of God descending like […]
What’s Your Star? January 6 is marked on the church calendar as the Feast of the Epiphany—the commemoration of the visit of the Magi to the Christ child. We will “transfer” that celebration to this Sunday. We are all familiar with the elements of this story: Wise folk from the East, a disgruntled king […]
Welcome to St. Paul’s as we Celebrate We invite you to celebrate with us as we usher in Christmas! December 22 Fourth Sunday in Advent: 8:00 a.m. Holy Eucharist, Rite I 10:00 a.m. Holy Eucharist, Rite II with music Greening of the church following the 10:00 service. Many hands needed! 24 Christmas Eve: 5:00 p.m. Harp Prelude […]
Waiting and Rejoicing On the Third Sunday of Advent, also known as Gaudete Sunday, we pause and give space for our deepest joy as we feel the nearness of the birth of Jesus. Lighting the pink candle in our Advent wreath this Sunday reminds us that in our season of soul searching we also come […]
A Voice Crying Out in the Wilderness On the second Sunday of Advent we turn our focus to John the Baptizer. He is a transitional character—one foot in the old world, one foot in the new. This wild man, clearly on the margins of society, attracts the attention of those in the center: “the people […]
Counting and Waiting As a child I always had what we called an Advent calendar – a way to understand how many days until Christmas Day. But in actuality, it was a Christmas countdown calendar, because it followed the December calendar (starting on December 1), rather than with the first Sunday of Advent. But this year, […]
Christ the King On the final Sunday of the church year, we celebrate the Feast of Christ the King. This is a very recent addition to the liturgical calendar—it was first instituted in the Roman Catholic Church in 1925, a time of great unrest throughout the Western World. The Episcopal Church, as well as many […]
Weaving Our Nets Together: One Service at 10:00 am this Sunday This Sunday we have our annual Ingathering Sunday, where each of us makes his or her estimate of giving to St. Paul’s Church for the coming year—but with a twist. In this coming year we are going to focus on our stories: specifically, how […]