my morning paczki

When you say it, it sounds like "punch-key." It's a Polish jelly-filled pastry - kinda like a jelly doughnut, but much, much better. It's traditionally made just before Lent. And that would be today. One of my parishioners made a special delivery early this morning to share a little of his tradition with me. I love traditions, especially when they're yummy.

















Paczki go nicely with coffee. That's Buffy in the background lying in wait for an unattended moment alone with my paczki. Subtlety is not his thing. He was disappointed.

leadership prayer

As a perpetual student of leadership I find myself naturally gravitating to new ways of engaging leadership. I was given a prayer in December that I love. It's all about leadership.

I was ordained on the feast day of St. Nicholas. In the spirit of the saint I decided to give everyone a St. Nicholas medallion as a gift for joining me on that wonderful day. The medallions came with a small prayer card. It has an iconic image of the saint on one side, and a prayer on the reverse. I'd like to share it with you.

O God the Father of all, who has given me these my children, and committed them to my charge to bring them up for you, and to prepare them for eternal life: help me with your heavenly grace, that I may be able to fulfill this most sacred duty and stewardship.

Teach me both, what to give and what to withhold; when to reprove and when to forebear; make me to be gentle, yet firm; considerate and watchful; and deliver me equally from the weakness of indulgence, and the excess of severity; and grant that, both by word and example, I may be careful to lead them in the ways of wisdom and true piety.

Pour your grace into their hearts, and strengthen and multiply in them the gifts of youy Holy Spirit, that they may daily grow in grace and in knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ; and so, faithfully serving you here, may come to rejoice in your presence hereafter. Amen.

I use we & us instead of I & me, and pray it with my Vestry at each of our meetings. It really moves me. It's beautiful.

associate rector

We shifted things around at the parish and I now have a new office that I'm slowly organizing. One of the additions to the office is a new staffer. Meet my new Associate Rector for Catechism... get it? CAT-echism... it's a pun. Hhmmm, he didn't think it was funny either. He's decided to take up residency on one of the chairs in my new office. He's been there all day in deep, deep, deep meditation. He's very spiritual. Or maybe he was asleep all day. It's hard to tell. I managed to rouse him for his directory portrait.

Eucharistic theology?

I returned to my office yesterday afternoon to discover a package on my desk. I love getting packages. Bad news never comes in a cardboard box. UPS, FedEx, and the others are like everyday Santas to me. You can imagine my delight when the box that arrived was from the Jelly Belly company. Usually I get boxes from Amazon.com, and I can't help but smile back at the grinning Amazon logo. Dell is another one that sends shivers - insatiable technophile that I am. I haven't got a sweet tooth necessarily, but a big box of sweet delights from Jelly Belly is still fun to get, and I opened it with gusto. Now imagine my surprise, and yes, a little amused shock when I opened the box to find, not a colourful assortment of 10 flavor sours, but rather two 500 count bags of Eucharist wafers!

What th'?!

















Naturally I read into the message of the medium. What was the church supplier trying to tell us? Are we boring and flavourless? Do we lack colour? Are we sour?! (*gasp!*) What kind of Eucharistic theology is this? Are they saying we need to repackage something of our liturgy to make it attractive, spontaneous, and fun? Ohhh, THAT'S opening a big can of jelly bellies for sure.

I often wonder how churches in general, and The Episcopal Church in particular, can respond to the changing needs of the people we serve. We are one of the more sacramental churches in town, so our Eucharistic focus, and these little wafers, are big parts of our identity. There's no question here, we simply must remain relevant. What would cause people to see our little church sitting there and say Wow. What's in that? Indeed, what might cause people to say, I don't have much of a sweet tooth for church, but I want to go in there anyways.

I'm certainly not going to commune people with the Jelly Belly of Christ, but it has gotten me to thinking about our identity as liturgical/sacramental people, our mission, and others' perception of us in the new paradigm of the 21st century. It might have come to me as Jelly Bellies, but it's certainly not junk food for thought.

Kudos to the church supply company for reducing, reusing, and recycling their packaging materials. I think there's more here to speak to environmental stewardship than Eucharistic theology. Many thanks also for giving me a new way to look creatively at The Episcopal Church, and my function as a leader in it.