Dear People of Ascension,
Last night, Friday, Bishop Lee updated his directives in response to Covid-19 circumstances and has indicated that no persons, including clergy, should be on church premises for any reason beginning this evening in conjunction with Governor Pritzker's guidelines and directives for Illinois' general public.
'Live mass' for the Fourth Sunday in Lent will be at or close to 4 pm this afternoon via our Facebook page.
Due to the change indicated above, the live mass that had been scheduled for tomorrow morning will instead be live-streamed this afternoon at 4 or soon thereafter. Don't count on a fine sermon!
I'm not all that sophisticated about Facebook but I do not believe that you need to have a Facebook account yourself to view the live stream here. I may be terribly mistaken, but I believe that ....
I must sign off now, in order to prepare the mass. Below is yesterday's Apart and Together, unchanged, for any of you who missed it.
Bless you,
Patrick +
Worship & Music
+ A beautiful Stations of the Cross liturgy
was created yesterday with help from Br. Nathanael Rahm and incorporating images from the Stations at Ascension.
Organist David White
and Ascension choir
Mezzo Soprano Cassidy Smith
and I recorded the service (with proper ‘social distancing’) yesterday evening. You will be able to see it
here at our Ascension YouTube
channel ... if it ever completes downloading!
+ The Wardens and I will soon be forming a Holy Week and Easter Worship Planning Team.
No remote foot-washing, I'm guessing, but how will we gather and make sense of and be blessed by what we cling to and profess in our Holy Week and Easter liturgies?
+
Our musicians are very eager to contribute their gifts
at this time. Other than the 'Stations' recording mentioned above (my thanks to Benjamin for arranging for Cassidy Smith to take part as well)
Pastoral Care
I've been doing my best to make contact
with at least a few of you every day, and I know many of you are also reaching out to others. Although I won't publish my cell phone number here online, I welcome any member to call it ... ask around; a lot of people have it.
Your Survey Responses - or NOT
My thanks to those of you who responded to the survey I circulated earlier this week. Sadly, I didn't know that Survey Monkey's 'free' survey feature limited responses to 40 -- so I don't know how many more of you may have wanted to use the survey after we quickly hit the limit. Stay tuned on what if any further surveying may follow, and know that I plan to take a closer look at those 40 results later today.
Vestry Meeting -- with God's help
We'll hold a Vestry meeting tomorrow, Saturday, March 21, starting at 1 pm.
I'm not at all confident that I've sufficiently mastered the Meet feature of G Suite, but in theory all Vestry meetings are open to all, so if you'd like to take part, pay attention: please send an email
only to this address -- connect@ascensionchicago.org --
with 'Vestry Meeting' in the subject line by 12:30 p.m. tomorrow. If I don't connect with you, please don't take it personally. If I do connect ... thanks be to God!
With prayers, gratitude and hope,
Patrick +
