McClure Newsletter March, 2016

Transcription

1 McClure Newsletter March, 2016 Inside This Issue: Baptisms & Sympathies 2 Easter Flowers 2 Food Bank Barrel 2 Friendship Inn Pasta Drive Holy Week Services 3 Photo Directory 4 Lenten Lunch & Worship McClure Men and Women s Gatherings McClure Church Information Services Committee McClure Garage Sale 5 The Big Shred 5 McClure Place Happenings McClure Place Foundation Office McClure 50th Anniversary Celebration of Memo- Memories of McClure Fundraising for Syrian Refugees & Dresses for Africa 9 9 Lent The season of Lent begins on Ash Wednesday and continues for the next forty days (not counting Sundays) until Easter. The word Lent comes from the Anglo-Saxon lengten, which refers to the lengthening of the days in spring. The church has traditionally observed Lent as a time of fasting and penitence, a time of wrestling with ultimate questions. So, here are some questions to ask this Lent. The colour for Lent is purple. Forty days of purple, forty days of wrestling with decisions: How will I spend my days and evenings? How will I spend my life? What will I give up? What will I take on? Forty days for the forty years the Israelites wandered in the wilderness: When will I come home? What would coming home mean and look like for me? Where is my source of living water? Forty days of fasting, Moses becoming a prophet: What am I called to do? When am I called to speak-up and to not remain silent? Where and how will I find the strength to do this? Forty days of testing and prayer, Jesus preparing for his ministry: What is my purpose, my ministry? Will I accept the guidance and empowerment of the Holy Spirit? Who or what is my authority? Forty days for forty hours in a tomb: What does it mean to sacrifice? What does it mean to repent? Will I defy the deadly thoughts, words and actions that have killed me, literally and figuratively? Forty days of preparation for Easter: Learning to trust, the only way that it s possible to do this, by not staying stuck in the muck and mire of betrayal, my own or another s. But, instead, risking and daring to trust again and again. Trust in the midst of my seeking, that I will be sought. Trust in the ache of my questioning, that I will be heard. Trust in the midst of my hoping, that I will yet learn to hope beyond hope. Forty days of journeying toward Easter, the Day of Resurrection that is already now, even as it waits to be born anew in you and me. Am I willing and ready to receive God s gift of New Life now? Each day, throughout these forty days, might you make this your own Lenten prayer: God, with open arms you invite me back to your embrace time and time again. As throughout these Lenten days I examine my life s priorities, help me to grow in faith and use me as an instrument of your grace. Help me to make and to stick with those choices that will better reflect your desire, love and will for me as these are reflected to me in the words, deeds and face of Jesus Christ. Amen. Ron

2 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 2 Baptisms: Baptisms Emma Elizabeth Stubbs, daughter of Richard & Francis Olivia Marie Stubbs, daughter of Richard & Francis Katey Nicole Herle, daughter of Christopher & Jamie Herle Baptisms and Confirmations: Mary Mah Nick Burke Richard Stubbs Sincere Sympathies The family of Irene Konkin Joyce, Jim and Mandy Fraser on the death of their mother and grandmother Lucy Williams Lawrence & Gail Pinter on the death of his mother Roza Maureen Bourke, Jim Hinatsu & family on the death of their brother-in-law Bruno Mona & Tom Eremondi and family on the death of their brother-in-law Don Colin Ward on the death of his wife Joyce Confirmations: Francis Denis Next Bapism Dates: March 27 th June 19th Easter Flowers We would be happy to have any Easter flowers to decorate the Sanctuary for Easter Sunday services. Please drop off your flowers either on the Saturday before Easter Sunday or before the 9:15 service. Thank you Food Bank Barrel During the season of Lent let us especially remember those less fortunate than ourselves. A blue Food Bank Barrel is located in the church lobby year round. Please consider bringing non-perishable food items on Sundays, or anytime, and depositing these in the barrel. As a part of our Lenten faith practices this year, let s seek to fill this barrel, over and over again, that our hearts too might overflow with the joy of Easter s new life. Friendship Inn Pasta Drive We also as a church support the Friendship Inn s Pasta Drive. So please bring packages or boxes of pasta (macaroni, noodles, spaghetti, etc.) and deposit these in the Friendship Inn box that is also in the church lobby.

3 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 3 Services at McClure United Church Sunday March 20 th Communion at 9:15am & 11:00am 12:15pm Potluck Lunch 1:00pm - 2:30pm Eggstravaganza ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Thursday March 24 th 12:00 Noon Lenten Lunch & Service 7:00pm Service with communion Prayer Vigil overnight ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Friday March 25 th 10:00am Service with communion ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Saturday March 26 th 8:00pm - 6:00am (Sunday) Youth & Young Adult Vigil ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Sunday March 27 th 6:45am - Sunrise service at Wildwood Hill (Parking at Wildwood School) 9:15am & 11:00am Worship Services & Baptism

4 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 4 Calling All Smiles We are going to have a New Photo Directory in conjunction with the 50th Anniversary Celebration in October. Photo Directory committee members are Terry Cutler, Carolynn Drabble and Carol Dean. We have several volunteers signed up to assist us. If you are interested in joining us contact Terry at or terry.cutler@shaw.ca The photo directory helps connect names with faces and that connection fosters friendship and strengthens our community. There were 5 photo dates at the end of February. The dates available the beginning of March are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 11,12. These are the bulk of the days available. There will be minimal dates added to catch returning snowbirds and perhaps a day or two in early September. Each family who has their photo taken for the directory will receive a directory and a free 8x10 print. Each family will have an opportunity to purchase photos. There is no obligation to purchase. Bookings will be done after services on Sundays. On-line booking isavailable. Follow this link to go to on-line booking The link is also available on the McClure website at mccluresktn.ca The photo directory includes the mailing list for everyone whether or not you had your photo taken. If you do NOT want your name, address and phone number included in the directory please contact Terry Cutler at or terry.cutler@shaw.ca This is McClure's 50 Anniversary, come and be a part of this special edition of the photo directory. Photo Directory Committee Lenten Lunch and Worship Time Thursdays During Lent Noon until 1:00 pm Our Lenten lunch and worship times occur each Thursday from February 11 to March 24. We meet at noon for a catered lunch by Oven Scents - $ Following lunch, we have a short worship time ending by 1:00 pm. Plan to join us for any or all of the Thursdays, and invite your friends from the neighbourhood, from work, or other churches. Please contact the church office ( ) or mcclureunitedchurch@shaw.ca by Tuesday morning each week to confirm your attendance and enable us to have an accurate count for lunch. Indicate a gluten-free preference.

5 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 5 McClure U.C. Men s and Women s Gatherings Saturday March 12 th 8:00 9:30 a.m. Men meet in the Craft Room, and Women in the Music Room. Both will enjoy a light breakfast and thoughtful program time. Newcomers are always welcome! McClure Church Information Services Committee The name of our committee may have people thinking we deal only with computers. Actually we deal with a wide variety of Technical things: computers, the audio systems, the hearing assist system, the video system, the sanctuary lights, user support. Like many committees in the church we are always looking for new members. You might think that the only people this committee needs are tech people. However, like all successful committees, we need committee members to organize, record, communicate, be a board representative. Please sign up on the sheet posted on the bulletin board at the church. For more information contact Ron Ford at ronford@sasktel.net or Terry Cutler terry.cutler@shaw.ca Pancake Breakfast McClure Garage Sale May 14 8:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. Sales - Garage, Book, Bake, Purse/Fashion scarves, Jewelry 08:00 a.m. to 1 p.m. Hot Dog Lunch: 11:30 to 1:00 p.m. When you do your collecting of items for the garage sale, please make sure they are clean and in saleable condition. A list of desired items will be in the next two newsletters. The Big Shred! Mark your new calendar today for Saturday, May 7 from 9 am- 12 noon for the 3rd annual Big Shred! This is your chance to quickly shred any old personal papers that are taking up space. The team of smiling faces including our partner, Shred-It, will quickly shred your documents in the McClure United Church parking lot. The service is by donation (suggested $10 per box, or $5 per shopping bag) and the funds raised will assist the McClure Place Foundation in paying down the mortgage at Amy McClure House.

6 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 6 To enrich the lives of McClure Place Residents by providing support and services We have great support at McClure Place through staff: administration, health care, maintenance, housekeeping, cooks, and activity coordinators. Our staff does its best to keep everyone physically active. Not only do we have regular Forever in Motion exercises but we are connected to the Council on Aging s Moon Walk which encourages regular activity. This in turn opens opportunities to walk in other venues such as The Forestry Farm, the Fieldhouse, and even out in Martensville! The motivation to be active is high right now. I have noted more hallway walking, and busy treadmill and exercise bike. The McClure Bus is being put to good use by making trips to the grocery store, and walking venues as well. It is a valuable support to being able to live independently. It is so important to be able to have good nutrition, and to have the opportunity to share a meal, and enjoy being together. On Feb 2 we enjoyed our regular Potluck Supper. The entertaining musical group was the Good News Trio. A week later, on Feb. 9, we were treated to a special Valentine Supper. We were even treated to muffins or cinnamon buns with morning coffee a couple of days later.. McClure Place Happenings Activities are so helpful for alleviating boredom, loneliness, and isolation. The knitters club has been busy producing, mittens, socks, and toques. The writer s club has been encouraging the writing of personal stories. School children have visited with their valentines and songs. A movie The Great Seduction was the late Jan. feature, complete with popcorn. Jack Millar showed slides of Cuba for our taste of armchair travel. Who s Who, the story of our residents is progressing well. The project volunteers have managed to collect the stories, and now the publication is being compiled. Thank goodness our staff keeps us reminded and informed of the many events through our weekly publication, The Canopy. McClure Place is a busy community. John and Alice Hanlin McClure Place Foundation Office has Moved! Effective immediately, the office for the McClure Place Foundation will be moving to the office of McClure Place. Donations to the Foundation can be received anytime between 8:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. Monday to Friday except for the lunch hour from noon to 1 p.m. If you wish to mail your donations, they can be sent to McClure Foundation, 1825 McKercher Drive, Saskatoon, S7H 5N5. Tax-deductible receipts will be provided. The current mission of the Foundation is to assist in paying down the mortgage for Amy McClure House through donations, planned gift giving, the Golden Heart Dinner and the Shred-It.

7 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 7 It s Time to Celebrate! 2016 is McClure United Church s 50 th Anniversary Year. Many activities are being planned to mark the occasion. In fact we have enough to celebrate all year long! But this is about just one of those ideas to help us remember our journey. We plan to set up a display in the Sanctuary for the second last Sunday of the month and leave it up for one week. The first display will be for February to tell our story of the Dinner Theatre days. A tentative 2016 schedule for the Celebration of Memories Displays is as follows: Feb Dinner Theatre Days March Easter Celebrations. April Refugee Committee May Banner and floral arrangement display June Our Fabulous Fundraisers September18-25 Our Portable Worship Services October November TBA December - TBA Our heritage from our namesakes, Bob and Amy McClure To accomplish this project we need your ideas, suggestions and willing hands. For more information, please contact coordinators: Mary Davidson ` Alice Hanlin Welcome to Memories of McClure, a new feature of the newsletter where you will find submissions by various members of our congregation. They will give us a glimpse of their special memories of McClure United Church beginning in the 1960 s followed by each decade leading up to our 50 th Anniversary in October of this year. A huge thank you to all who will share their stories a monthly anniversary gift to us all! McClure in the 1970 s - A Growing and Maturing Faith Community The 1970 s was a decade of dynamic growth and maturing for the McClure congregation. We became an established faith community, while still being the new congregation in the city. Events pushed us to be more specific about what we were, and what we wanted to become. They were truly exciting years! Church services continued in Walter Murray Collegiate auditorium and we became more skilled with the challenges of setting-up and taking-down associated with not having our own building. We took pride in our adaptability. The communion table and pulpit, still in use today, had protective covers and, along with the cross, were placed in storage each week. Banners were hung for church service, but stored on a coat rack in the storage room. Church school enrollment grew by leaps and bounds. Classrooms were rented and the children now had desks, rather than blankets on the floor in the school hallways. Wheeled carts were used to move church school materials from the storage room each Sunday morning. Socializing after church was a well-attended, stand-up affair with coffee, Kool-Aid and homemade cookies being very popular. Rev. Don Johns held our rapt attention in the pulpit.

8 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 8 We were a social gang, and activities and family events were planned that could take place away from a church building. Congregational camping trips and outdoor services started in 1972 at Pike Lake; choir practices were held in the basement of the Nordon Drug Store on Early Drive. Alice McAuley was the senior choir leader and Elaine Nutbrown led the junior choir. Shirley Blackburn joined the music leadership of the junior choir in Who can forget the musical presentations of Sunshine and Snowflakes, and It s Cool in the Furnace? And, then we started Guess Who s Coming to Dinner, an event where you signed up to host a dinner, or to be a guest in another s home. What a wonderful way to get to know your church friends, and lasting friendships were made. In the same way, Lenten study groups in our homes were a blessing, as we became friends in those early years. Maundy Thursday service became very meaningful to us. Easter morning congregational breakfasts were held in the school cafeteria. Weekday meetings were in our homes, or in the manse on Arlington. The rumpus room was a gathering place, and Carolyn Johns made our visits pleasant. In May, l972, a one-bedroom apartment (# McEown Avenue) became our church office. Marion Pope was hired in October that year and became a longtime, faithful, staff member. Her office was the dining room area and she was the only secretary in the city with a chandelier over her desk. The small bedroom was the minister s study. The office was well used for groups like CGIT, and the Teen Group that was led by Margaret and Ken McKeckney. Choir practices were held there, too. It was a busy, crowded, happy place! Big decisions were being made. Presbytery had purchased land for us on Arlington Avenue for a church building. After many meetings with St. Stephen s Anglican and Holy Spirit Roman Catholic people, it was concluded a joint building project with another congregation was unlikely. We were going to be on our own. After more meetings, the decision was made, on October 22, l972, to not erect a building. After still more meetings, the property was sold in l974 and the proceeds used for outreach projects. These two major decisions made us think of a different kind of future for McClure. Longerterm rental arrangements for Walter Murray Collegiate were discussed with the School Board. Rev. Bob McLellan became our minister, as the Johns family moved east in June, l973. We lovingly referred to him as Rev. Bob to differentiate him from Bob McClure, who we equally lovingly referred to as Dr. Bob. Rev. Bob gave us spiritual guidance from September l973 until his death in April l978. It was a very meaningful learning time for us to see our minister s strength and Rowena s courage as they led us through cancer. The lay people stepped up to help, and we also had interim ministers - Betty Alford, Rev. Brian Thorpe and Rev. Alan Porter, come to mind. Memories of Rev. Bob in the Bible study group remain as he guided us as we all crowded into his little office on McEown. Our current church library bears his name. July, l975, the exhibition booth was started, a major fundraiser for outreach projects, but actually started by the Christian education committee. We had a McClure logo by then in block letters arranged in the shape of a fish. The refugee committee started up in late 1970 s with a group from Vietnam arriving. As our numbers grew, our celebration cakes kept getting larger. We recall one in Diefenbaker Park delivered on a 4 x 8 sheet of plywood. The Baxter twins were just old enough to peek over the edge of the handy-man table to see this huge cake. We had a big celebration for the 50th anniversary of the United Church of Canada and special projects, to mark the event, were undertaken. And, now, here we are celebrating 50 years of McClure United Church!! Rev. Frederick Seller accepted our pastoral call, commencing on July l, We had refurbished the manse, and Frederick and Carol moved in with some of their Prince Edward Island furnishings and their two young children. Carol Stevenson- Seller s induction service, as deaconess, was held on Dec. 7, l980. The l970 s were interesting and rewarding times. We tried to improve our Christian learning and, in ways that often surprised us, to serve our Church without a Steeple, and our community, and the world at large. McClure is a church without a steeple, Serving God by serving people.

9 March 2016 McClure Newsletter Page 9 Fundraising Opportunity for Syrian Refugees I want to let you know about an opportunity for a chance to help make a difference in the lives of our new neighbors and friends from Syria. I am a Singer and Songwriter and I have written a song entitled You Didn t Even Know Me which was part of an evening of songs with a group of family and friends on November 26th. During that event, two women came up to me with tears in their eyes and asked me if I could do something with that song to help support the refugees from Syria. I asked my friends Cynthia Block and Tara Yolan to help me with this idea and everything has snowballed beautifully from there... How can you participate? Go to my website: and download the video for $1.00. ALL downloads of the song will be donated back 100% in support of the refugees. Kay and Dora Nasser are my parents in law. Dora has a sister in Syria. They will partner with me to raise funds in support the refugees. Kay will match the donations up to $100,000. Also, any other monetary donations can go through my website ( and Kay will match that as well. I love being a part of McClure United Church and I hope you can help me spread this word near and far because little by little we can make a huge difference. Elly Thorn Dresses For Africa Please join us every Thursday afternoon at 1:30 for coffee in the craft room to sew little dresses for orphans in Zambia. A local missionary, Clair Ziolkowski is going to Zambia in November and would like to take 2000 dresses to girls in an orphanage he visits. The children only have shorts to wear. The group he asked to do this is small and needs our help to accomplish this. We have been sewing for a couple of weeks now and people are welcome to drop in with your sewing machine or come for information if you would rather sew at home. To see sample patterns they are found at: the following websites: Phyllis Barber McClure United Church 4025 Taylor Street, East, Saskatoon, SK S7H 5N7 Phone (306) Fax: (306) Ministry Personnel: Rev. Ron McConnell ronmcconnell@shaw.ca Rev. Laura Fouhse laurafouhse@shaw.ca Rev. Debra Berg debra.b@shaw.ca Office Administrator: Darren Schwartz mcclureunitedchurch@shaw.ca Music Coordinator: Shirley Blackburn Accountant Tracy Williams-Duerr tracywd@mccluresktn.ca This newsletter is published monthly by McClure United Church Editor: Brenda Zuk Phone: brendazuk@sasktel.net Letters, articles and comments are most welcome Next Deadline: March 20 For submissions: Please send them as attached Word files if possible. This reduces the amount of re-typing. Thank you