Keeping in Touch September 28, 2016
Good evening, James Bay United Church,
I'm sending out this note a little earlier this week, after a conversation on Sunday with Franklyn Roy who alerted me to a special event this Friday, at Camoson College, Landsdowne campus. The invitation is to come and be part of this sea of orange shirts. What's the story? You may recall that following the Truth and Reconcilliation Commission hearings, the Commission proclaimed 94 calls to action.
Friday's event to honour residential school survivors is one of the college's steps in responding to that call.
Franklyn has sent along the following information ...
Further to our conversation on Sunday, here’s the link to the Camosun website describing this Friday’s Orange Shirt Day – Every Child Matters the event that honours Residential School Survivors on September 30th.
Here’s Phyllis telling her story of the origins of Orange Shirt Day.
Here’s the link to the Camosun Bookstore's website. They have been selling the student-designed orange t-shirts for a very reasonable price – approx. $16. As I said, I don’t know if there are any shirts left.
Na’tsa’maht – the Gathering Place at Camosun’s Lansdowne Campus, is not warm. I recommending bringing layers and a blanket to sit on. I think you’d really appreciate the hearts of the two students behind this event.
This Sunday is World-wide Communion Sunday ... a day that helps widen and deepen our awareness of Christian people all around the world. It's a day in which we tend and attend to the connection we have with one another through the Spirit across time and space, across differences in language, race and gender, denomination and social location. It's a day in which we consider deeply what it means to belong to one another, to be members of one another. I caught a glimpse of this last week visiting with Irene Nepstad in hospital. I assured her that as the congregation gathered the following morning, we would be holding her in prayer ... and she said, "and I will be praying for all of you. There's real strength in that," she said. Earlier in the conversation she was speaking of her loss of physical strength. "Coming up to 102, I can expect some things to be wearing out!" she said. But then there was this naming of another kind of strength through the companionship we share, the care that is extended, the faith that is kindled -- all of it while "absent" from one another, and yet not! Of course we needn't wait til this Sunday to be aware of that communion, to draw on its strength or to uphold others within it. But come Sunday morning, it's this gift and mystery that we will be celebrating.
In the meantime, Grace and Peace, Karen