ECCT offers the following frameworks and resources in the hopes that they are conversation partners with you as you finalize if/how your Parish or Worshipping Community engages with the observation of the 250th Anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of the Independence. There is no singular approach to this observation.
Scripture The Propers of the Day for Sunday, July 5th are Proper 9, Ordinary Time, Year A. The Propers of the Day provide some excellent opportunities for exploring what it means to be a follower of Jesus today. We suggest you might add the Collect for the Nation (BCP pg. 258), Collect For Peace (BCP pg. 258), or Thanksgivings for National Life, For the Nation (BCP pg. 838).
Hymns The Hymnal 1982 has some excellent choices for marking this moment. Some suggestions include In Christ there is no East or West (#529) and America the Beautiful (#719).
There are also strong choices beyond Hymnal 1982. One we might suggest is Finlandia. Our invitation to you, regardless of what hymns you pick is to spend time prayerfully with the hymns exploring how they proclaim the gospel message of love. How do they further our mission of growing in faith, living in hope, and serving in love? If you reproduce the hymn for a service leaflet please make sure you have copyright permission.
Prayers There are a number of excellent resources for prayers, both within the Book of Common Prayer and beyond. We encourage you to look for resources that will incorporate the voices of marginalized communities today and ones which speak to our calling to be followers of Jesus.
Using historical prayer books If you choose to offer a liturgy out of one of the historical prayer books of The Episcopal Church, please be in touch with the Bishop Suffragan’s Office to be in conversation. Some questions we are asking you to explore include: What teaching are you offering around the liturgy, including acknowledgement that only White male clergy were leading the services? What spaces are you giving for everyone to reflect on how the liturgy speaks to the community gathered in the 1700s and how it does or does not speak to our communities today?
Readings in addition to those from scripture There are several resources that people are exploring from some of the marginalized voices of our country. If you would like to include one in the liturgy of the day, please reach out to the Bishop Suffragan’s Office for conversation and idea sharing about how it could be incorporated. If you would like to offer such a reading during a coffee hour or forum after church with a discussion, we commend your exploration of those topics.
Middletown PrideFEST is the State of Connecticut’s largest pride event, on Saturday, June 6, 2026 and ECCT will be partnering with Holy Trinity, Middletown, and parishes from across the state to participate.
Before the Parade
11:30 AM — Gather at Holy Trinity, Middletown (381 Main St., Middletown).
12 PM — Depart the church together to lineup for the parade on Pease Street.
1 PM — Parade begins and makes its way down Main Street ending at the intersection of Main Street and Union Street. The parade route is about ¾ of a mile long
Notes about the day:
Many streets will be closed. Get more info about closures here.
Allow plenty of time to park and make your way to the church. Find parking here.
The church will be open for folks to use the bathroom.
If you prefer, you can watch and celebrate the parade at Holy Trinity, Middletown (it’s on the route).
Don’t forget to wear your ECCT swag! (Looking specifically for ECCT Pride items? Check out our special ECCT Pride Shop—featuring only ECCT Pride branded merch.)
ECCT at Pride across Connecticut
ECCT parishes will be marching and celebrating at Pride events across Connecticut this June. Check out all the events submitted so far, and add your own today!
Looking for Pride swag to give away at your event? ECCT has stickers and bracelets available for parishes to pass out at your Pride Events. Contact the Office of Advocacy, Racial Justice & Reconciliation to arrange pickup.
ECCT has gathered a variety of resources to help individuals & congregations plan for and celebrate Pride month on our Advocacy, Racial Justice & Reconciliation page and our Liturgy & Music page. Find liturgical resources such as Pride Sunday Collects and Prayers of the People for Pride, and other resources including Inclusive Language Do’s and Don’ts.
The ECCT Shop has expanded to include ECCT Pride items just in time for Pride month. From mugs to scarves, from t-shirts to hats—you’ll find something for everyone on ECCT’s online shop! We have a variety of items including toddler and children’s shirts, adult shirts and hoodies in a variety of sizes and styles.
May 18–19, 2026 (optional: Sunday, May 17) The Heritage Hotel & Conference Center, Southbury, CT
Attendee Survey
The Clergy Conference Planning Team wants to hear from you! Take a few moments to share your thoughts with us about your experience of this year’s Clergy Conference as well as your preferences for next year. The survey is open to all attendees.
If you’re interested in joining the 2027 Clergy Conference Planning Team, please contact the Rev. Cn. Rebekah Hatch at rhatch@episcopalct.org.
I am writing to follow up and offer clarification regarding the licensed lay ministry requirements outlined during Clergy Day, November 18, 2025.
We encourage everyone involved in our parish and diocesan ministries to participate in the Safe Church Program and reap the benefits it offers. It supports our shared commitment to a healthy, transparent, and trustworthy culture in our faith and tradition and provides a concrete tool to help us live into our Baptismal call to “respect the dignity of all human beings.”
I apologize for the confusion at Clergy Day and appreciate the grace and understanding we offer each other. Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions or need additional information.
Peace,
Marsha McCurdy Adell (her/she) Director of Lay Vocations & Ministry
Listen to Story in EnglishEscuchar cuento en Español
Thanksgiving, like many holidays, holds a space for both joy and grief. It’s an opportunity to appreciate those who are with you while being in remembrance of those who aren’t. It’s a time of reflection, holding loved ones close to you, and sharing food as a communal act of love while holding the Native and Indigenous peoples within your prayers and hearts.
Old stories about “Pilgrims and Indians” have traditionally carved out a singular narrative for this feast day, which in turn lacks respect for Indigenous perspectives and realities. At first glance, these conversations are uncomfortable because they force us to grieve what we once knew and wholeheartedly believed—narratives that once looked like Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa become distorted like Pablo Picasso’s Seated Woman, a space where we reckon with disenchanted layers of new information.
Left: Mona Lisa (Leonardo da Vinci, 1500s) —– Right: Seated Woman (Pablo Picasso, 1932)
Although difficult conversations feel heavy, you may find sincere peace in knowing that doubt is actually a door. I read in Spirit Wheel: Meditations from an Indigenous Elder by Steven Charleston“Faith is not the absence of critical thought, But thought put to the greatest question… Religion not a court but a laboratory. We were not made to conform but to explore.” The Episcopalian community is shifting as we learn to unlearn. Without questions, we do not learn new information, and without listening as a form of active worship, we do not grow into the inclusive community God wants us to be.
There is power in duality, friends; it is a pillar of faith because, in a world with individualized perspectives, environmental variables, and hereditary factors, the truth is that there are multiple truths when it comes to lived experiences. We must hold space for multiplicity, like Pablo Picasso’s Girl Before a Mirror. Duality is a sacred experience that allows us to stand in the infamous world of “Both/And” thinking. Without it, existence would be one-dimensional.
Girl Before a Mirror (Pablo Picasso, 1932)
Where there’s duality, there’s God…
Jacob was a cheater
Peter had a temper
David had an affair
Jonah was avoidant
Paul was a murderer
Thomas was a doubter
Moses stuttered
Lazarus was dead
Having hard conversations around Indigenous experiences was a mission Vicki MarkAnthony embarked on during her visit to the Cheyenne River Lakota Reservation in South Dakota, where she met up with 17 like-minded Episcopalians from Texas to work on three churches badly in need of repair, spend time with the children, plan activities, and learn from the elders (which required a lot of active listening).
Each day began and ended with communal devotions, led by one of my fellow missioners. Then we headed off to the day’s project, under the supervision of a woman with extensive experience managing disaster renovations. St. Andrew’s in Cherry Creek was not quite a disaster but in need of serious repair: windows were broken, floors had been flooded and warped, cracks in the wall were so wide the light came through, and both the outside and inside walls were in need of a paint job. The churches on the reservation are not just for worship but also for community gatherings, especially after a funeral or a baptism. And there are many funerals. When my former Rector, Ellen Huber, and her husband Kurt, formerly Rector of St. Peter’s Monroe, first arrived in 2020, they conducted over 50 funerals in the first month. Poverty, hunger, addiction, depression, COVID, and distances from healthcare have taken a toll on the Lakota people. But there is also much resilience, hope, and joy in each community.
Following the completion of each project, we celebrated with a Eucharist and sang Amazing Grace in Lakota before having a community meal. Since I had been asked to bring my banjo, the children gathered around, and we sang with joy. What a wonderful way to get to know the young ones of Bear Creek! At Cherry Creek, some folks played basketball with the teenagers while books and clothing were distributed after the meal. We learned how much the churches meant to the families in each community. Spending time with the elders gave us insights into their boarding school experiences, family traditions, love of the land, and connection to the horses, which freely roam throughout the indigenous communities. We also learned of the ongoing prejudices they experience from the non-natives, who own large tracts of rich crop land and horse and cattle ranches on the reservation, while the natives live on small plots in close communities.
At St. Andrew’s, we replaced broken glass with plexiglass, caulked the cracks, scraped and painted interior and exterior walls (painted in the 4 Lakota colors of red, yellow, black, and white), built a kitchen area for serving after weddings and funerals, cleared overgrowth, moved and reinstalled a wood stove, connected broken electrical outlets, dug drainage ditches, and installed new moldings and flooring. Only a few were construction experts; the rest of us learned on the job with lots of prayer. At St. John’s Eagle Butte, we painted the entry way (not technically a narthex since it leads to a community room) and repaired an exterior wall to the kitchen that a truck had driven through earlier that year. At the end of the week, we were invited to the Huber’s Black Horse Ranch, where they hold 4-H programs (America’s largest youth development organization) for the children, host summer camp programs, and offer Equine Therapy sessions (healing with horses).
We were invited to talk about the grief and joy we experienced while we were there and to spend time with the horses and nature, a source of healing. Lakota women made star quilts to present to the representatives of the three new churches. Christ Church Easton has recently installed theirs in the nathex, a symbol of a journey of discovery and a lament for our colonial sins.
Aid and Resources
If you are interested in following the Cheyenne River Episcopal Mission and/or the Black Horse Ranch, you can follow them on Facebook: Cheyenne River Episcopal or BlackHorseRanchEB, and their website is www.cheyenneriverepiscopalmission.com. You can make donations via PayPal. If you want to send checks, their mailing address is Rev. Kurt and Rev. Ellen Huber, PO Box 552, Eagle Butte, SD 57625.
Written by Caela Collinsfeat. the Hispanic Ministry Network
Listen to Story in EnglishEscuchar cuento en Español
Without saying where you live, what you have, who you know , or what you do… Who Are You?
That question stumped you, didn’t it? Don’t worry; I’m pretty sure that’s a boat we can all collectively float in. When I first came across that question, it snatched away each and every safety blanket, leaving me exposed to fend for my identity in a way that required me to place my core under a spiritual microscope. It’s ironic, but the truth is, it’s easy to introduce ourselves through external things: job titles, favorite hobbies, who our close friends are, what town we live in, ect. But when those aspects are off the table, defining yourself, truly and internally, isn’t as easy. In order for other people to know who you are, you must do an internal inventory of the secret ingredients that make you, you and I can tell you, tracking down something as elusive as your core essence is courageous. To clarify: I’m not saying that the external things you connect with shouldn’t be important to you; anything that’s within your personal solar system holds value and is a great indicator of your orientation. I’m just painting a bigger picture, like René Magritte in La Clairvoyance, 1936.
The benefit of knowing the answer to the question above isn’t for yourself; it’s for the greater collective. When you know who you are at your core, you can establish the essence of your ministry and emit the very energy that represents your heart. That energy is what you want to contribute to the world as a means to aid all beings and free them from suffering. There’s beauty in knowing yourself because it is the very thing that helps build community beyond the surface, which is a journey one of our ministry networks has bravely embarked on.
From the Hispanic Ministry Network to the Diocese,
Our challenges are many, but we try to do God’s work with what we have. Our gifts are of love for one another, and our goal is to share that love with the larger community. Many of our parishioners speak monolingual Spanish. There are members who are monolingual in Spanish, some who are bilingual in Spanish and English, and some who are predominately English speakers. Some of the parishes are involved with a food pantry to assist those in need in the community. Many of our parishioners are working-class people who try to make ends meet to have food and shelter. Some work long hours to try to achieve this. The language barrier is overcome whenever diocesan events have translators from English to Spanish and when communications in social and electronic media are provided in Spanish. It opens the doors for the community and allows them to participate.
There are many cities and towns in Connecticut where there can be an Episcopal presence within the Latino community, which is a major opportunity for growth. The church has always been the number one source of social enjoyment for most families. It is usually the foundation that we get as children from our first educational lessons, beginning with learning our prayers. It’s where we are taught to have hope for medical and psychological healing and refuge. Religion encompasses every facet of our lives, as found in art and philosophy. The church plays a vital role in every community.
As the needs of the community transition, our hope is that the church can meet these new challenges. We are seeking potential leaders in our community to come and work with us and tap those who may want to discern in lay leadership and Holy orders, especially in the diaconate. There is currently one Latino deacon, one Latina transitional deacon, and five Latino priests: one Haitian Spanish speaker and two White Spanish serving in the eight parishes, ministering to the Latino community.
Amidst the challenges before us, we do try to find time for celebration for all God has given us through our various cultures in music, dances, costumes, singing, and, of course, food. Our music is rhythmic through our Spanish, Indigenous, and African influences. Our food speaks of an open invitation to the table, with all its cultural variety. Our costumes reflect our music: bright, colorful, and fun.
Ways to Engage with the Community: In order to engage the Community, we must engage in the resident’s lives. We must invest in the Latino Community with tangible actions by implementing and offering…
Food Drives in front of Local Grocery Stores
Online Educational workshops via Zoom
Engage in Community Issues: homelessness, domestic violence, health care, ect.
Open Dialogue in safe spaces beyond Sunday for mass
Sharing Resources
Translation Services
We formally invite you to connect with your local communities and visit our community with questions, volunteers, and ministry. We are eager to connect with the wider ECCT collective and want to exchange ideas and resources. This letter is not only an opportunity for you to get to know us, but an invitation for us to connect on a deeper level as we continue to participate in God’s mission!
Primary contact for Ministry Network
The Rev. Dcn. Felix Rivera
E-mail
felix5312003@yahoo.com
Let’s Connect, Plan, and Brainstorm!
Cultural Identity
There is no one Latin America, or Latino or Latin American culture. We often hear the terms Hispanic and Latino used interchangeably; however, each term holds a distinct cultural nuance.
Hispanic: refers to individuals who speak Spanish as their first language. Typically, are from Spain or a country that has been colonized by the Spanish.
Latino/a/x: refers to individuals with Latin American roots/heritage. This term can be applies to those who speak a Latin based language such as Spanish, Portugese, and French. Typically, live in territories such as America, Haiti, and Brazil.
The heritage of Latin America blends indigenous, European, African, and Asian peoples, languages, and cultural traditions. Therefore, it is possible for those within this community to be considered White, Creole, Black, or Indigenous based on their unique ancestral lineage in which terms like Afro-Latino stem from.
What About Connecticut?
The Latino/Hispanic community in Connecticut makes up about 17% of the population.
A multi-cultural and multi-race community with origins primarily from Central America, South America and the Caribbean.
Racial Makeup:
White (60%)
Black (15%)
Indigenous (5%)
Mixed also known as Creoles or Criollo (pronounced cree-oyo) between White, Black and Indigenous) (20%)
The largest concentration of Latinos (greater than 30%) are found in the following cities/towns of Connecticut:
Sin decir dónde vives, qué tienes, a quién conoces, o qué haces… ¿Quién eres?
Esa pregunta te dejó perplejo, ¿no? No te preocupes; Estoy bastante seguro de que es un barco en el que todos podemos flotar colectivamente. Cuando me encontré con esa pregunta por primera vez, me arrebató todas y cada una de las mantas de seguridad, dejándome expuesta a defender mi identidad de una manera que me obligó a poner mi núcleo bajo un microscopio espiritual. Es irónico, pero la verdad es que es fácil presentarnos a través de cosas externas: puestos de trabajo, pasatiempos favoritos, quiénes son nuestros amigos cercanos, en qué ciudad vivimos, etc. Pero cuando esos aspectos están fuera de la mesa, definirse a sí mismo, verdadera e internamente, no es tan fácil. Para que otras personas sepan quién eres, debes hacer un inventario interno de los ingredientes secretos que te hacen, tú y yo puedo decirte, rastrear algo tan difícil de alcanzar como tu esencia central es valiente. Para aclarar: no estoy diciendo que las cosas externas con las que te conectas no deban ser importantes para ti; cualquier cosa que esté dentro de tu sistema solar personal tiene valor y es un gran indicador de tu orientación. Simplemente estoy pintando un cuadro más amplio, como René Magritte en La Clairvoyance, 1936.
El beneficio de saber la respuesta a la pregunta anterior no es para tí; es para la comunidad. Cuando sabes quién eres en tu esencia, puedes establecer la esencia de tu ministerio y emitir la misma energía que representa tu corazón. Esa energía es la que quieres aportar al mundo como medio para ayudar a todos los seres y liberarlos del sufrimiento. Es hermoso conocerse a uno mismo porque es precisamente lo que ayuda a construir una comunidad más allá de la superficie, que es un viaje en el que una de nuestras redes ministeriales se ha embarcado con valentía.
Nuestros desafíos son muchos, pero tratamos de hacer la obra de Dios con lo que tenemos. Nuestros dones son de amor mutuo y nuestro objetivo es compartir ese amor con la comunidad en general. Muchos de nuestros feligreses hablan solamente español. Hay miembros que son monolingües en español, algunos que son bilingües en español e inglés y algunos que son predominantemente angloparlantes. Algunas de las parroquias participan con una despensa de alimentos para ayudar a los necesitados de la comunidad. Muchos de nuestros feligreses son personas de clase trabajadora que intentan llegar a fin de mes teniendo comida y alojamiento. Algunos trabajan muchas horas para intentar lograrlo. La barrera del idioma se supera cuando los eventos diocesanos cuentan con traductores del inglés al español y cuando las comunicaciones en los medios sociales y electrónicos se brindan en español. Abre las puertas a la comunidad y les permite participar.
Hay muchas ciudades y pueblos en Connecticut donde puede haber una presencia episcopal dentro de la comunidad latina, lo cual es una gran oportunidad de crecimiento. La iglesia siempre ha sido la fuente número uno de disfrute social para la mayoría de las familias. Generalmente es la base que obtenemos como niños desde nuestras primeras lecciones educativas, comenzando por aprender nuestras oraciones. Es donde se nos enseña a tener esperanza de curación y refugio médico y psicológico. La religión abarca todas las facetas de nuestras vidas, como se encuentra en el arte y la filosofía. La iglesia juega un papel vital en cada comunidad.
A medida que las necesidades de la comunidad cambian, nuestra esperanza es que la iglesia pueda enfrentar estos nuevos desafíos. Estamos buscando líderes potenciales en nuestra comunidad para que vengan a trabajar con nosotros y reconozcan a aquellos que quieran discernir en el liderazgo laico y las órdenes sagradas, especialmente en el diaconado. Actualmente hay un diácono latino, un diácono de transición latino y cinco sacerdotes latinos: un sacerdote haitiano hispanohablante y dos sacerdotes blancos que hablan español que sirven en las ocho parroquias, ministrando a la comunidad latina.
En medio de los desafíos que tenemos por delante, tratamos de encontrar tiempo para celebrar todo lo que Dios nos ha dado a través de nuestras diversas culturas en música, bailes, disfraces, cantos y, por supuesto, comida. Nuestra música es rítmica a través de nuestras influencias españolas, indígenas y africanas. Nuestra comida habla de una invitación abierta a la mesa, con toda su variedad cultural. Nuestros disfraces reflejan nuestra música: brillante, colorida y divertida.
Formas de interactuar con la comunidad: para involucrar a la comunidad, debemos envolvernos en la vida de los residentes. Debemos invertir en la Comunidad Latina con acciones tangibles implementando y ofreciendo…
• Colectas de alimentos frente a las tiendas de comestibles locales
• Talleres educativos en línea vía Zoom
• Participar en cuestiones comunitarias: personas sin hogar, violencia doméstica, atención médica, etc.
• Diálogo Abierto en espacios seguros más allá del domingo para la misa
• Compartir recursos
•Servicios de traducción
Lo invitamos formalmente a conectarse con sus comunidades locales y visitar nuestra comunidad con preguntas, voluntarios y ministerio. Tenemos ansiedad de conectarnos con la comunidad ECCT más ampliamente y queremos intercambiar ideas y recursos. ¡Esta carta no es solo una oportunidad para que usted nos conozca, sino también una invitación para que nos conectemos a un nivel más profundo mientras continuamos participando en la misión de Dios!
Contacto principal de la Red Ministerial
Rev. Dcn. Félix Rivera
Correo electrónico
felix5312003@yahoo.com
¡Conectémonos, planifiquemos y hagamos una lluvia de ideas!
Identidad cultural
No existe una sola América Latina, ni una cultura latina o latinoamericana. A menudo escuchamos que los términos hispano y latino se usan indistintamente; sin embargo, cada término tiene un matiz cultural distinto.
• Hispano: se refiere a personas que hablan español como su primer idioma. Por lo general, son de España o de un país que ha sido colonizado por los españoles.
• Latino/a/x: se refiere a personas con raíces/herencia latinoamericana. Este término se puede aplicar a quienes hablan un idioma de base latina, como el español. Habitualmente viven en territorios como Sudamérica, Centroamérica y el Caribe.
La herencia de América Latina combina pueblos, lenguas y tradiciones culturales indígenas, europeas, africanas y asiáticas. Por lo tanto, es posible que aquellos dentro de esta comunidad sean considerados blancos, criollos, negros o indígenas en función de su linaje ancestral único del que provienen términos como afrolatino.
¿Qué pasa en Connecticut?
La comunidad latina/hispana en Connecticut constituye aproximadamente el 18% de la población.
Una comunidad multicultural y multirracial con orígenes principalmente de Centroamérica, Sudamérica y el Caribe.
Composición racial:
Blanco (63%)
Negro o afroamericano (12%)
Indígena, nativo de Alaska (1%)
Asiático (3%)
Mixto también conocido como criollo o criollo (pronunciado cree-oyo) entre blancos, negros e indígenas) (3%)
Hispano/Latino (18%)
La mayor concentración de latinos (más del 30%) se encuentra en las siguientes ciudades/pueblos de Connecticut:
“What’s your idea of a perfect day?” I quietly scanned the question, tracing the black font typed on a small strip of white paper that was neatly unfolded & laced between my fingers. The weight of this question was disproportionate to the thin sliver of paper it was printed on; so light that even a feather could outweigh it. Yet, there I was, calculating the formula for my perfect day that could fit in the span of 24 hours.
What do I like to do? What makes me happy… like really happy? What does “perfect” even look like? That heavy question on the thin piece of paper, gentle in its gaze, seemed to beam up at me, wide-eyed like an inquisitive child, eagerly waiting for my answer. With a few deep breaths, all the superficial things that once clouded my head, dissipated and the things that brought true joy to my soul shined bright like the sun.
So what did my perfect day look like?
Well, it was the ease of waking up to the absence of an alarm clock, a long hug from a loved one, putting my playlist on shuffle and every song being as good as the last, no skips required. It was getting a random compliment, not the kind of compliment that strokes an ego, but the kind of compliment that makes your inner light feel seen & appreciated. It was getting an extra donut free of charge at the drive-thru, meeting a kind stranger, finding the $20 bill you forgot about, deeply tucked into your wallet that your mom advised you to do in case of emergencies. Then it hit me, mom. It’s her, my dad, brother, grandmother, and every family member by blood or chosen that pours love into me.
At first, a perfect day was an accumulation of small simple moments that warmed my heart and grounded me in gratitude. However, the more granulated it became, I realized that it always led to sharing moments with the ones I loved most.
The above sentiment reigned true for the Karimi’s, a refugee family of seven, whom tightly held onto the notion that family was the most important remedy for turning even the most imperfect of days into something perfect.
“Jesus was born in a makeshift shelter, too — A place not really meant for human dwelling — And yet it was there that he met us, in the lowliest refuge. Two thousand years later, it’s good to remember That Christ is still being born, here and now, Most especially in places we’d rather not go, Places from which we’d rather look away. God of illumination and incarnation, Open not only our eyes, but our hearts, That we may open, too, our hands And make generous offerings of love, As your holy light reflects from nylon tent flaps, Your holy song rises from a crackling campfire, Lit against the cold, against the night. Amen.”
–Prayer Written by Cameron Bellm -Art Created by Kelly Latimore
We all know the Nativity story but as we explore diversified sacred images in our upcoming Annual Convention, we’re able to identify & reframe that story for what it truly is: a refugee story. Mary with child (Jesus) and Joseph were forced to flee, escaping persecution, from their homeland, a place that held everything they knew, but much like the Karimi’s, not everything they loved.
The Holy Family is still among us currently, in the faces of the refugee, the migrant, the immigrant, the poor and the oppressed. Many individuals are often in need of more clothing, blankets, food and better shelter; and much like the stable, Holy Advent, Clinton, opened their hearts and doors to a family seeking refuge.
The Karimi Family’s Journey, like tens of thousands of Afghans, began with the urgency to flee out of fear of persecution and escape from the Taliban, an Islamic fundamentalist group whom took over Afghanistan in August 2021 after waging a twenty-year insurgency. For families like the Karimi’s, The Taliban targeted those who worked for the original government structure. After being badly beaten and hospitalized, the patriarch of the Karimi family, Mohammad Karimi, decided to find refuge, leaving the only home he has known.
The family escaped to Brazil, managing to live in a church basement for 3-4 months, then trekked to Tijuana, crossed into California, only to be arrested and placed in a ‘camp’ there. Unlike many refugees, the Karimi family was blessed to have contacts within the states, Saba and Mahdj, who opened their home to the Karimis. Without acquaintances who have gone before them and offered aid, there is a likely chance that the family would still be in that camp today.
Fast forward to December 2022, the Sunday before Christmas, the Karimi family attended a church service at Holy Advent, Clinton. From that point on their lives were forever changed:
Want to Help?
Help Financially: Checks can be written to Holy Advent Church, with ‘Refugee/ Asylum Seekers’ clearly written in the memo line. All funds received will go directly to the Karimi Family.
Employment Opportunities (must be in Clinton or Remote): Please contact jrwagner04@gmail.com or maryetwagner@gmail.com
Interviewed by Caela Collins feat. The Rev. George Roberts, Rector of St. James, Farmington
What does it mean to be a church that has lasted 150 years and is continuing to last, through so many different changes throughout time? and What is unique to your parish that you feel has aided in being able to have such longevity?
There is a real weight and I mean that in the very best sense. A weight to responsibility maybe is privilege to be living into the reality of what started in 1873 October of that year, and that the life of this community that has grown, expanded, ebbed, and flowed over 150 years, holding that responsibility in 2023. To me it is a real privilege and blessing.
What has helped us endure for all those years is, and I think, is probably true for any church that’s been around for a really long time is our people themselves. They are incredibly spirit filled and dedicated people who have in various ways channeled the hope, the expectancy, the love of Jesus through the generations of this church. Through the extension of hospitality, primarily to be in the place where we stand still, are a vibrant community that is a real period of energy and growth.
Can you tell me about the history of St. James?
We had at one time in this church, four generations of the founding family or one of them, of the parish, The Mason family. Henry Hall Mason and his father, Charles Mason, were the primary architects and builders of the initial church sanctuary, which is still our worship space.Charles was an immigrant from England, who came to the Farmington valley in the 1850s, I think, and he and his son have built this church from native stone and lumber mainly from this mountain. They hauled it with a horse and cart to this site, and did a lot of the work themselves with of course with other people.
When I first arrived, Henry Mason’s grandson, another Henry, was an aging member of this parish, and his son, Henry, who we call “Skip,” is a member of our choir, an active member of our church, a member of the vestry. He came on this year, partly to help us usher in this 150th. Henry’s daughter, Anne Marie is a member of this parish, and his grandchildren were both baptized in this parish during my time here, and so there is still a living, active legacy of the father and son who built and helped begin this worshiping community 150 years ago, and started the construction of this church in 1898. And so, we’ve been in this physical space for 125 years this year.
How would you describe the Spiritual Atmosphere of St. James?
There’s all this legacy and you can feel it, really, when you go into the worship space. There are these echoes of nurturing, and welcome and invitation and love, that really permeates the fibers of the pews and the walls of the church and the altar, which was installed in 1910 by Henry Mason, who built it, and it was dedicated in that year. So there are all these really wonderful reminders of a distant past, but it’s not so distant that we don’t still feel connected to it.
What we are trying to do to honor that legacy of Eucharistic and congregational blessing is to continue that history and legacy of welcome. Everyone really who comes to me, and has decided to join St. James over the last 10 or 11 years, they just feel welcome here. They felt like this was home for them spiritually, and they were seeking, they were looking, and they found a home here because they felt that blessing of welcome here. It’s a really welcoming church physically and spiritually. That’s a legacy that was established long before I came here. It’s one that we want to continue to honor by the way that we conduct ourselves and the way that we open ourselves up to the people who come to us.
Can you just tell me a little bit about the welcoming energy of your church? Like if you had to put it into words, what aspects about your church, make it both physically and spiritually welcoming?
Physically, it feels like a welcoming place, which I know is hard to describe. But I came here from serving as an associate at a large, brand new worship space in Columbia, South Carolina, and kind of pristine, stained glass filled church that was beautiful acoustically, and just a physically beautiful church. I quickly discovered that this very simple New England style Episcopal Church just had a physical warmth that you feel when you come into the worship space. All the dark wood, and the carved very simple, detail to the lectern, and the pulpit, and the altar, and all of it has a very kind of homey sort of feel to it, a personal feel. So is there is that welcome that you feel from the physical space when you come into it. I believe we’ve worked really hard over the years, and certainly, since I came here, to be a church of noticing, so we notice people andsayings; so when people come into our space, we kind of gravitate toward them. I’d like to think in the best possible sense not overwhelming them, but noticing that they’re they that they’re here.
Let’s dive deeper into a culture of “Noticing” Can you explore that in more detail?
This isn’t just me, it’s from the ushers to the people in the pews, noticing that someone is new, noticing that someone is seeking, and coming to that person and talking to them. The same is true for lemonade on the lawn in the summer or coffee hour during the program year. That not having people come in and just kind of be feeling disconnected and wandering around but really noticing that they’re here and connecting with them in what I believe is a warm and inviting way, channeling the Spirit of Christ’s Welcome to people as they come through our doors.
When I had the opportunity to have one-on-one conversations with them in person, they’ve all mentioned how welcome they feel here, how invited and blessed they feel here; not in some kind of a generic sense, but they really feel a real spiritual, Christ centered connection. Feeling really connected to that open welcome that I think Jesus intends for all of us to experience in our worship communities.
Outside of the immediate Episcopal community how do you/ or do you connect with your local community, the neighborhood that the parish resides in?
Yes, we are in kind of a village, a primarily residential area and we’re surrounded by the boarding school, Miss Porter’s school, that is the girl school that’s right down the street from us, and has existed since before we did. We have a real what for us, and I think for them, too, is a really important connection. When COVID Initially came about, they asked us if we maybe had some space that they might be able to use, they were just trying to spread out, more social distancing, etc. So we invited them to use our parish hall during the week for classes. They were live streaming the class via video to the girls who were learning from home who had decided not to come back to campus, at least at that time.
We’ve had lots of connective energy, like that we had this past year, for the whole year, we’ve had Porter’s, intern; they have an intern program for juniors and seniors, where they can do real work in the community and learn something. One of the girls in the fall and two of them in the spring, working on specific projects related to our 150th. There was a girl in the fall, who designed our logo for the 150th in conjunction with our 150th committee. Then we had two girls in the spring that worked with me and created a video that is now on our main page. Really wonderful, kind of professional looking video, where they interviewed members of the parish about what they loved about St. James.
We’ve talked about doing like a Women’s Summit that would be hosted here, but essentially run by Porter’s that would do empowerment seminars for young women. And we always have a faculty member or two from Porter’s that are part of our community who’ve worked on those kinds of projects in the past.
I am the chaplain for the fire department fire houses. We have some church members from the Fire and Rescue Service in Farmington. We have cooperatively done first aid treatment days, CPR classes, we’re going to do another one of those in the fall that we host here but are actually done by members of the first responder community in Farmington.
The elementary school across the street, we’ve done some volunteering as story readers, etc. there and they have participated in our Thanksgiving basket collection that we do for the town of Farmington at Thanksgiving every year. Usually a kindergarten class will bring over one basket worth of stuff, and they’ll pull it over with a little wagon, and the whole class will come over and pull it over here.
We’re also involved heavily involved in New Britain with the Friendship Service Center, which is a full service. Homeless and substance abuse Center that provides residential treatment, residential housing, job counseling and coaching and then segue into apartments.
In regards to community engagement you’ve mentioned embracing failure through trial and error: Do you have any advice for other parishes who have had a failure, and trying to reorganize or create something new?
Yeah, I think that there has to be lay buy in, a group of people in your congregation, meeting with the leadership of any entity that you want to, in an area where you think you might want to exert some energy, and seeing what they need and asking them what they need, and how they envision a partnership working. So we got involved in the beginning in the area where they felt they had the greatest need, and as we got more involved, we realized there were other needs that they had as they were growing and expanding and we tried to be flexible and meet those needs, while at the same time continuing to come back to our community and saying, is this meeting our needs? And it’s okay to say okay, we believe this is part of our mission and ministry. And this is an area where we want to exert energy in. It’s alsoexploring what are the organizations that are doing this kind of work, and being willing if an organization no longer we feel is it is meeting that need that we have to exert energy. It’s being willing to pull back regroup, and say, Okay, do we need to explore other organizations and areas, that might be a better fit for this ministry?
Communication is tremendously important; and when it’s absent or lacking, it makes it hard to do the things that we need to do. So, openness, communication, being true to your mission, and being willing to reevaluate, I think those are the primary things that has been successful for us just in this one particular instance. But I think in all of the other things we’re involved in as well.
With the support of Bishop Diocesan, The Rt. Rev Jeffrey W. Mello, on Tuesday, June 20, the Racial Healing, Justice & Reconciliation Network and the Office of Mission Advocacy, Racial Justice, and Reconciliation created an Art Exhibition (on display until Convention; all are welcome to come and view) at The Commons, Meriden which diversifies sacred images as an embodiment of our collective spirituality followed by a lecture with artist, Kelly Latimore.
Kelly Latimore is one of the most celebrated artists of contemporary religious icons, that’s dedicated to prayerfully creating art depicting “God in plain sight.” Latimore’s modern take on the centuries-old practice of iconography in recent years fuses bible imagery and modern cultural resets. He substitutes well-known biblical figures for those who represent the marginalized and oppressed. For instance his piece, “Mama,” a pietà icon, which represents the 13th station: ‘Jesus is taken down from the cross’. In this image, Jesus is depicted as the late George Floyd, an image that was carried by Black Lives Matter marchers.
The below artwork was purchased by ECCT in June 2023
Mama
Kelly Latimore
St. Joseph
Kelly Latimore
Artist Statement:
“As an artist, I’m entering into this improvisation or this dialogue, which I think doesn’t happen in a lot of artists’ work. Working on this artwork with churches can be very hard. But what is so gratifying and is a gift to me is that part of the work: the communality, the conversations about images that mean something to them and that want to push them toward communities and push them toward new ways of being in the world and new ways of relating to one another. I wouldn’t be able to enter into that if I wasn’t doing this work specifically, so I think it’s just about receiving those gifts and doing the best I can to translate that gift [of commonality] into the work.“
“We are just constantly inundated with images. What happens, especially with the social media world, TikTok, Instagram, whatever, is that we can be so quick to speak about something. I hope my art has the potential to teach us not to speak into something but to learn how to observe, to be still, and observe something. And that’s my hope for these images, that they can potentially create dialogue. Not only an internal dialogue but also a dialogue between each other. And that just observing and not speaking into something, I think, is the first part of connecting to the piece of art, whether it’s art in churches, in this iconography, or elsewhere.” -Kelly Latimore
Food for Thought
“What is our church art for? Is it glorified wallpaper, or can it be something that can help us see each other, see in new ways and see God in new ways?”
