The Villager Voice Happy vernal equinox, it’s the first day of Spring! Now all we need is a full moon and Easter can come… Last week one of you sent me some information about a Holy Week Walk for Peace sponsored by the Atlantic Life Community, a Roman Catholic organization founded in 1973 by a group dedicated to nonviolent resistance and community; Fr Philip Berrigan was one of the original organizers. The local Walk for Peace will begin in New Haven on Palm Sunday (March 29) and slowly make its way to Groton by Good Friday (April 3). This is…
Postcard from the Edge I’m working from home this morning, as we will be leaving in a few hours for our cousin John’s memorial service in Pennsylvania. Sunday will be a special day at the United Church (aren’t they all!) Once again we are tailoring the start of worship for Children and the young at heart. We’ll have a quick Bible story and some special music and movement for them before they head downstairs to Fellowship Hall for themed crafts and activities. A big thank you to our children & families outreach team for designing and facilitating this. And continuing…
Simon’s Says It was California Senator Hiram Johnson who reportedly said, in 1918, ‘The first casualty of war is truth.’ His words came to mind when I read the (to me) dubious-to-unbelievable headline, “Military Leaders Say Iran War Is So Trump Can Bring About ‘Armageddon.’” (I’m reading these in both The Guardian and The New Republic.) According to the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, more than 100 troops have complained their superior officers are framing the war as a blessing from God, which whether intentionally or unintentionally (the divine mind is an inscrutable thing) will bring about the Second Coming of…
The Villager Voice In the six weeks spanning the last week of January to the first week of March, the Froggatt family has a surfeit of birthdays. And as a musician, I try to stay mindful of the birthdays of classical composers, famous and otherwise, and send family greetings appropriate to the day. My first-born niece, for example, shares a birthday with George Frideric Handel. (I joked with my sister, her mother, that we should sing “For Unto Us a Child is Born,” but she didn’t find that very amusing.) Her sister, the next born, has Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as…
Simon’s Says In the past month a couple of you – and thankfully, only a couple – told me you received an email from me asking for gift cards. Experience has taught us to delete them immediately, and that I will never send out mass requests for money in any form. I’m pretty certain this is but the remnant of an old data leak, and I hope it disappears completely. Oddly enough, after eight and a half years as your minister, I have only recently begun to receive spam emails of my own in my church account. Why it has…
The Villager Voice One cannot be blamed for wondering if Mother Nature (Winter edition) has something against Sunday morning worship. Last Sunday saw icy conditions and temperatures in the single digits accompanied by drifty winds. We had 20 hearty souls in church that morning, with the choir matching the pew-sitters in number. Two weeks ago a winter storm kept us all home for church, the first wholly-remote worship since the pandemic. And a month before that wintery weather put a damper on a special Christmas service we had planned for children and families, although a half dozen young people came…
Simon’s Says Between 110 and 120 souls assembled at the United Church Wednesday evening for prayer, meditation, song, and most of all to witness to our commitment to justice, compassion and solidarity with those whose lives are being upended by unjust and lawless actions against our immigrant sisters and brothers. Our wider interfaith community gathered to stand together shoulder to shoulder in the recognition that the love and mercy of God sustain us especially in these fraught days. Lutheran and Congregational, Baptist and Episcopal, Jewish and Christian, folks from Chester and Deep River, Essex and Westbrook, Ivoryton and Centerbrook, we…
Valley Shore Interfaith Prayer Vigil – Standing Together Please join us either online or in-person as the United Church of Chester will host an Interfaith service on Wednesday, February 4th at 7:00pm. We will include a candlelight service as we pray for world peace. The link to the bulletin and service are below: Link to Bulletin Link to Service If attending in-person please consider carpooling.
The Villager Voice The Rev Karen Georgia Thompson, the General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ, sent the following message to clergy and congregations of the UCC in the wake of the violence and senseless shootings of the innocent at the hands of ICE. These are her words to us. “This is God’s Message: Attend to matters of justice. Set things right between people. Rescue victims from their exploiters. Don’t take advantage of the homeless, the orphans, the widows. Stop the murdering!” (Jeremiah 22:3, MSG) The peace we long for seems elusive, as we witness the violence…
Simon’s Says We rolled the dice last Sunday, and won. But this Sunday, to mindfully mix metaphors, you gotta know when to hold ’em and know when to fold ’em. Last week we believed the expected snow would fall lightly in the morning and wait until afternoon to make an impact. While this Sunday’s forecast looks similar, we aren’t going to take a chance: worship this Sunday (January 25) will be remote-only, meaning you can find it on the UCC’s Facebook page (link, as always below). Because it’s been a few years since we’ve done this, here is a reminder…