Seeking Authentic Voice

One of the things I got for Christmas was this Garmin. It captures all my steps, heart rate, sleep patterns, calories burned and can be a motivator to stay active. If I sit too long it vibrates and tells me to move!  Recently I discovered that there is an app for my cellphone that claims that for just five minutes a day one can rewire one’s brain and produce an attitude of gratitude. The app has a variety of ways to do this, including a journal for inputting five things every day that one is grateful for, and a variety of settings to motivate one to do this for 21 days in a row, because it takes 21 days for any practice to become a habit. Research indicates that a daily gratitude practice enables one to develop a deeper capacity to experience positive emotions, feel more alive, sleep better, express more compassion and kindness, and even have a stronger immune system. Some people, instead of using a cellphone app or keeping a gratitude journal have chosen to create a g...

A number of people in the congregation wonder why we are considering an outreach project in Liberia instead of doing something in the Detroit area. Another good question! No doubt there is plenty of work that could be done in the metro Detroit area. The answer is simple – no one has proposed an idea to the Undesignated Gifts Fund for a project in Detroit or this area. The Undesignated Gifts Fund is governed by a Vestry constructed policy put in place in 2008. This policy states that monies received from a parishioners estate and allocated to the Undesignated Gifts Fund can only be accessed through a proposal for the use of funds. The proposal can be submitted by any parishioner using the proposal form and guidelines. Proposal forms are in your bulletin this morning and in the parish office. The guidelines state that project needs to help us live into our Mission and fit two criteria – the proposal needs to be an outreach project or a new project never considered by the parish. The...