Praying For Communion: Prayer & Song For All God’s Family (Updated)

"Praying for Communion: Prayer & Song for All God’s Family"
…a pilgrimage of trust, a vigil of reconciliation…

The idea is a simple one.

On the last Saturday of each month in 2009, one person from each parish gathers with others from the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh… Praying together in song and silence… celebrating the beauty of an inner life, a communion with God, and the love which Jesus Christ taught us.

Amidst the realities of grief and gratitude, we seek to be available for such a Spirited Presence, a leaven of communion in the Church, in the human family.

With humility and openhearted gentleness, we pray for the grace of deep listening, to live in loving balance: contemptus mundi, amor mundi; nothing matters, everything matters.

Teach us to care and not to care;
Teach us to sit still.

                                     –T.S. Eliot

The goal is to gather at a different parish each month, for the graced specificity of place. Given people’s schedules, it may work best for at least two people within each parish make a commitment to insure that one of them will be able to be present each month.

2009
Sat, Jan 31 – Emmanuel Episcopal,  Northside 2:00-3:00pm
Sat., Feb 28 – Trinity Cathedral, downtown Pittsburgh, 2:00-3:30 pm
Sat., March 28 – Church of the Redeemer, Forbes Ave. (Sq Hill, Pgh), 2:00-3:30 pm
Sat., April 25 – St Stephens, (Wilkinsburg), 2:00-3:30 pm
Sat., May 30 – St Andrews (Highland Park, Pgh), 2:00-3:30 pm
Sat., June 27 – Calvary (Shadyside, Pgh), 10:00-11:30 am
Sat., July 25– All Saints’, Brighton Heights, 2:00-3:30 pm
Sat., Aug 29 – St. Paul’s (Mt. Lebanon), 2:00-3:30 pm
Sat., Sept 26 – Community of Celebration (Aliquippa), 2:00-3:00 pm
Sat, Oct 31 – St Peter’s, Blairsville, PA (co-hosted at St. Peter’s by Christ Church, Indiana), 2:00-3:00 pm
Sat., Nov 28
Sat., Dec 26

Additional parishes are in the midst of confirming schedules for hosting one month’s vigil, including: All Soul’s, Christ Church, St Peter’s (Blairsville), Holy Cross, and St Brendan’s.

It will take more than two years before we’ll have gathered at each parish. In 2010, we may try meeting on the last day of the month in order to connect with some existing prayer groups within some of the parishes. These decisions will be made in late 2009.

Carol Gonzalez is the coordinator and can answer any questions about this project.  Carol can be reached at Teacher41@aol.com or call her at 412.322.2189.

“It is by the love that unites you
that all will know that you are my disciples,”

Jesus tells us in John 13:35

With Love in Christ,

Nancy Bolden, Church of the Redeemer, Squirrel Hill
Walt Bowman, Calvary, Pittsburgh
The Rev. Cynthia Bronson-Sweigert, Church of the Redeemer, Squirrel Hill
The Rev. Nano Chalfant-Walker, St. Stephen’s, Wilkinsburg
The Rev. John Fetterman, All Souls, Pittsburgh
Schuyler Foerster, Trinity Cathedral
Carol J.S. Gonzalez, Emmanuel Episcopal, Pittsburgh
Tom Moore, St. Andrew’s, Highland Park
The Rev. Bruce Robison, St. Andrew’s, Highland Park
Celinda Scott, Christ Episcopal Church, Indiana, PA

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