The View from Bolton Street
The view from Bolton Street
But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to govern us.” 1 Samuel 8:5
In the Episcopal tradition, we use something called the ‘Revised Common Lectionary’ to guide the readings we use on Sunday mornings. It is a three-year rotating set of readings. After Trinity Sunday we have the choice of two ‘tracks’ or selections of Old Testament readings. One track follows a particular story, and the other reflects the messages of the New Testament epistles and the Gospel readings.
This summer, we have the entirety of the story of David. From the birth of the prophet Samuel to the calling of the Israelites for a king to rule over them to King David’s death and Solomon’s “eulogy” at his funeral. These are important stories for our Jewish brothers and sisters, and often stories that we misinterpret in our own tradition when we talk about David, about kings in general, and about the failures of David. We like to imagine that we would never want a king like David, or that we would be jealous, covetous, or angry, like David.
In fact, particularly as Americans we have an aversion to kings and lords. So how do we, as 21st-century Christians, make sense of Scripture that proclaims kings, that names Jesus as Lord? Can we still think of Jesus as King of Kings? Or is there too much patriarchy, too much baggage, are those terms too loaded for us to make sense of today. All of us will have our own answers to these questions — but I do hope we can be together in the questioning.
This summer we will dig into the story of David and see how it relates to our own story. In this Sunday’s reading the people ask God for something God doesn’t really want to give them, a king, and they demand it anyway. Yet, out of that, God makes a good thing. And a surprising thing.
What good things, surprising things has God done with your own stubbornness? And how can we look at the things we are embarrassed or ashamed of, the things that we perhaps would have done differently — and ask God to make a Good thing out of that, too?
For more on David and “Good Things” — see you in church!
Green Team: MREMS Pollinator Garden update
Update on the Pollinator/Garden Classroom project at Mount Royal.
Elementary Art Club students designing garden stepping stones in the MICA Ceramics Department under the supervision of Professor Mat Karas. The dozen 12”x12” stones are now being kiln-fired slowly due to their thickness—about 1-1/2 in.
Design
Alfredo instructing the MREMS students
It's a Lobster.... a Rock Lobster
Who's that?
That's right- Memorial's very own Mary Anne Wells designed one of the stepping stones!
Stones
MICA professors helped with the design and construction of the stones.
Boundary Block Party - June 14
June 14th — meet at Memorial at between 10:30 and 11:30 am
The Boundary Block Party is an annual event to connect and celebrate Central West Baltimore across the boundaries of race, class and neighborhoods. June 16. Pennsylvania Triangle Park, Pennsylvania Ave. & Presstman St. Free. 410-728-1199. For the past 11 years, Jubilee Arts and local advocacy group No Boundaries Coalition have thrown this annual block party to bring together Central West Baltimore residents across boundaries of race, class, and neighborhood. Celebrate the strength of the West Baltimore community with family-friendly art activities, a resource fair, fresh produce, and live performances by youth dance program Dynamic Force and the Twilighters Marching Band.
Memorial will be walking over from Bolton Hill with friends and neighbors on Saturday Morning -so join us for a ‘pre-party’ on the Church steps at 10:30 am (bring something to share!) or meet us in Triangle Park anytime after noon.
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Lenten Pilgrimage - 2019
Pilgrimage to Montgomery, Alabama – Lent, 2019
Fr. Grey and the wardens, together with Memorial’s Justice Committee, are planning a unique beginning to our season of Lent next year. Together with our friends at St. Katherine of Alexandria, we will have the opportunity to visit the newly opened Legacy Museum, and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, in Montgomery, Alabama, and to walk the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma.
The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration opened in April, and is located on a site where enslaved people were once warehoused. To quote from its website, it “employs unique technology to dramatize the enslavement of African Americans, the evolution of racial terror lynchings, legalized racial segregation and racial hierarchy in America.”
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice “is the nation’s first memorial dedicated to the legacy of enslaved black people, people terrorized by lynching, African Americans humiliated by racial segregation and Jim Crow, and people of color burdened with contemporary presumptions of guilt and police violence.” It “was conceived with the hope of creating a sober, meaningful site where people can gather and reflect on America’s history of racial inequality.” At its opening, The New York Times headline read, “A Lynching Memorial is Opening. The Country Has Never Seen Anything Like It.” https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/25/us/lynching-memorial-alabama.html
For more information on The Legacy Museum and The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, please visit:
https://museumandmemorial.eji.org/memorial
In Selma, we will walk the bridge that bears the name of a Confederate general and reputed grand dragon of the Alabama Ku Klux Klan. On March 7, 1965, some 600 peaceful protesters crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge on foot, protesting thwarted black voter registration, and planning to take their message to Governor George Wallace in Montgomery. As they crossed the bridge leading out of Selma, they were violently attacked by helmeted state troopers, in patrol cars and on horseback. Though tear-gassed and beaten, the protesters remained nonviolent. The day became known as, “Bloody Sunday.” It was a watershed event leading to the passage of the Voting Rights Act.
We envision a contemplative and educational pilgrimage for the start of a holy and penitential season. Please stay tuned for details in the coming weeks and months. Please direct any questions to Fr. Grey, or to Bill Roberts, Junior Warden.
Trinity Sunday - getting the kids involved
This past Sunday, if you were in church, you may have noticed a much...younger tone was set. Kids helped out as welcomers outside the church, served as lay readers, and, as the picture below attests, got intimately involved with the Eucharistic Prayer. It was different; it was mostly adorable; it was effective in keeping the kids involved.
As we explore the idea of youth engagement in church and how to make the service accessible for our kids while not exasperating the adults (too much), experiments like this will be more likely to happen. As any parent will tell you - give the kids something to do , because idle hands will find something to do you would prefer didn't happen. If you have suggestions, or would like to help, your thoughts are MORE than welcome. You don't need to have children, or even much experience with kids, to lend valuable insight into this process. What's working, what's not working, and what we haven't even considered that might be great.
Hats off to all of our kids, who read with aplumb, and stayed focused, and got involved. Here's to many more Sundays with many, many kids.
BUILD Accountability Session - June 6 - 125 N. Hilton St. 21229 @ 6:30 pm
BUILD Accountability Session
Wednesday June 6th at 6:30pm
at the Kingdom Life Center
125 N Hilton St, Baltimore, MD 21229
BUILD will be holding the first of its accountability sessions Wednesday June 6th 6:30pm
at the Kingdom Life Center, 125 N Hilton St, Baltimore, MD 21229 with Police Commissioner DeSousa.
The purpose of the meeting is to have the police commissioner report on the implementation of the consent decree to a large number of citizens. Memorial committed to send 12 people, but the more the better. For more information, contact Steve Howard stevehoward.howard@gmail.com
preferred attire: blue T-shirts.
The View from Bolton Street
What’s your ‘Top Ten List’?
Last week a friend challenged me to name my top ten movies from 1996. This was one of many ‘online’ challenges that roll around from time to time to generate actual conversation on social media instead of just arguing for the sake of arguing. Now, in 1996 I was a freshman in High School, so this was a combination of awkward first date memories and movies I saw hundreds of times at High School sleepovers. When I accepted the ‘challenge’ I fully expected to pick certain movies yet when it came down to actually choosing, my list was quite different, and included movies that reminded me of my parents, my grandparents, and the excitement of re-watching some of these movies years later when Monica and I first met.
Often the things we think are the most important are not in fact the most important.
So this week, I challenge all of you to think about your ‘Top Ten List’ for Memorial. What are the things you love about this place. The things that keep you coming back? The memories that kept you here or make you long for Memorial when you are far away?
On my list?
Being presented the ‘Keys to the Kingdom’ by the children of Memorial at my installation
Walking the Via Dolorosa of our Parish and Communities History of Racism on Good Friday with Jesus and all of you
Seeing the Holy Spirit come alive through the creative energies of all of our artisans and actors
Going on Retreat with our vestry
And Celebrating Weddings, Baptisms, and Funerals — the full cycle of the Christian life — with people I hold very, very dear.
Among many others!
I ask because it is possible that when you sit down to think about it the things that you thought would be the most important perhaps are not! And it is more than likely the things that did stick with you are the moments and memories that you felt connected to God, that you felt in relationship with Jesus, enveloped by the Holy Spirit. And those are the moments we should seek to share with others, and re-create for our friends and neighbors to experience.
Now one of the movies on my Top Ten list was ‘Jerry Maguire’ - which has three significant lines for Parish Ministry:
The First - “you think we are fighting, and I think we are finally talking!” - Sometimes we hear and see things differently, and if we carry an attitude of grace and forgiveness with us, we can easily overcome a lot of otherwsie difficult situations.
The Second - “Show me the money!” - which, speaking frankly, is a pretty effective Stewardship message! Not because the Church should be greedy! But because when the need is great (as we see in Ellicott City this week) sometimes we just have to ‘show the money’. Which is why we are taking a special collection this weekend for those seeking to rebuild again.
The Third line? — “Who is coming with me!” - The evangelical message of the Church. We don’t know quite what we are doing! We aren’t sure we can make it! But we know God is with us and we really want you to come along for the ride!
So... Who is coming with you?
As we continue to tell the story of Memorial Episcopal Church as a Jesus-Centered, Justice-Focused Community, I hope that you will draw on your own ‘Top Ten’ list to invite new members into our community, and help them craft their own journey of faith as they get to know themselves, us, Memorial and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ a bit better.
Walking the Green Talk - May 2018
“Creating a Device to Pick Up Trash,” by Arden Fisher
I did a project in school about how to be environmentally friendly and to create a device or prototype to pick up trash. Basically my device was a remote control car with string and cardboard making a flap to pick up the trash (like a scoop on the front) which would then be put in a container. It had a smaller solar powered car pulling the larger car with the trash pickup system. Over the course of the project we made a ton of changes to the vehicle. The device got in the top three projects at school, but didn't win the top spot and go on to regional judging.
Next Century Circle
NEXT CENTURY CIRCLE – MEMORIAL MEMOS
Memorial Church is blessed daily with many generous acts of giving – time, talent and treasure. And for that we are so fortunate – it is what keeps us going, and able to advance our growing community.
At the same time that we focus on the “here and now,” we’re also mindful that we need to be good shepherds of our future, and our ability to sustain growth for future generations.
Several parishes in the Diocese of Maryland have established programs whereby parishioners and/or interested others designate, in their Last Will & Testament, specific bequests to the church of their choice. Bequests can be in various forms – securities, real property, life insurance proceeds, IRA designations, and can be designated to go to specific programs or for general use.
Early this year, Memorial established the “Next Century Circle,” to recognize those individuals who have already included Memorial in their Estate plans. We are very excited to establish this program – to appreciate these acts of giving … and to pave the way for others to follow. In this way, we will help to provide for future operations and facilities as Memorial grows and evolves.
On Sunday, June 3rd, we are happy to welcome The Rev. Charles Cloughen, Diocesan Planned Giving Officer, who will lead us in discussion related to our Next Century Circle. Charles+ will join us at our early and mid-morning services, and at Liturgy & Living.
Until then, thank you for all that you do, and all that you bring to Memorial.
In Peace ~~~ Grey
Trinity Sunday, 2018
Trinity Sunday, the first Sunday after Pentecost, May 27 this year, will be the last Sunday of the "program year" at Memorial. And while it is in one sense the last Sunday, it is also the beginning of the planning and re-creation that occurs over the summer. This year, in homage to that new beginning, we're going to be relying on youth much more than usual during the 10:30 service. Come see what surprises are in store!