Category: Pastoral Letters

Staffing Changes - Fall 2024

10/24/2024

Dear Friends of Saints James and Andrew,

This past spring, we hired Deb Parker as our Facilities staff to address our cleaning, event, security, on call, and other facility needs. She has done great work for us, including making several efficiencies. This fall Deb’s schedule changed, and we came to the mutual decision that her time with us would conclude on November 23, following the Mistletoe Mart & Craft Faire. Please join me in thanking Deb for a job well done.

We’ve spent the last two years experimenting, analyzing and learning about our staffing needs. As the Vestry looked to the future, we decided to go in a new direction. We have hired our current Office Administrator, Aaron McMurray, as our new Parish Administrator, effective November 1. Aaron has a background in supporting churches administratively, as well as, in a facilities management role. Aaron will continue to be responsible for all of their current tasks around parish administration and communication, property use, plus event set up/take down, property on call, security, minor repairs, liaising with the Property Committee around meeting contractors and keeping up certifications. Moving forward, Aaron will have the overall responsibility, being the point person, for the day to day operation of our spaces.

We believe this change:

Reflects our current reality, and will lead to improved efficiencies.
Expands the time and capacity of the position to match the current needs of our property use program.
Fills many of the gaps that have been in limbo since our Sexton retired this past spring, and that they have the skill set and experience to do so.

We are also entertaining the notion and weighing the pros and cons of hiring a staff person v. hiring a cleaning service. We have learned from other churches with large, active facilities how helpful it was to make such a shift. We are currently collecting the information from cleaning services, but we believe it is worth the Vestry’s serious consideration. We hope to make a decision within the next couple of weeks.

Another staffing change relates to our Missioner, the Rev. Jimmy Pickett. We hired Rev. Jimmy to serve as our Missioner for Formation, Community, and Mission as part of a two year holy experiment with our diocese and St. John’s, Athol. The position was ⅔ time, with ⅓ time in each parish, and Rev. Jimmy supplemented this work with agricultural work. He has done excellent work building a community on Wednesday mornings with those who gather for Holy Eucharist, as well as his work with our young families ministry. As we looked back on the first year together, we realized his work was heavily under the umbrella of formation. We’ve changed his title to Missioner for Formation and his work for the second year will be focused primarily on continuing the great work he has already begun. This is a time specific job, and Rev. Jimmy will conclude his time with us in late 2025. Meanwhile, St. John’s, Athol, have increased his time to ½ time, allowing him to focus more fully on parish ministry and take a step back from agricultural work.

As the young families ministry has experimented and grown this last year, we made the decision to shift to some Sunday morning programming a couple of times a month starting in Advent. This ministry will be run by parents, caregivers, and other parishioners excited with engaging our young parishioners. Rev. Jimmy is currently overseeing the hiring process so we might pay for a second adult to help manage childcare (kids who need to be brought to the restrooms or require a bit of support in listening or engaging with the programming). If you know anyone who would be a good fit for this role who is over 18, please contact Rev. Jimmy at [email protected]. Likewise, if you are excited to potentially work with our young kids on a rota of other volunteers, please speak to Rev. Jimmy or myself.

Thank you for your ongoing love, care, and support for the James and Andrew community, and your faithfulness to the mission and ministry God has called our parish into during this chapter. May God continue to bless the work happening here, and may all we do be to the glory of God.

Peace,
Rev. Heather J. Blais,
on behalf of Clergy & Vestry

Covid-19 Protocols Rescinded; Reflect on the Practice of Communion

4/5/2024

Dear Friends of Saints James and Andrew,

The Vestry recently met to discuss our remaining local Covid-19 era protocols; all diocesan protocols having previously been rescinded. It was concluded that we will rescind such protocols, but we want to invite the community to reflect on the practice of communion.

We will no longer require windows and doors to be open for worship. When the weather allows, we will open them for fresh air to circulate. Ushers will collaborate with the Rector on Sunday mornings, or the Wardens, in her absence.

We will continue to use a Flexible Masking Policy as a way to reduce respiratory virus transmission. While the policy was created as a result of the Covid-19 Pandemic, we’ve learned it's a healthy practice in general. With regard to masks, the Celebrant and Lay Eucharistic Ministers will no longer be required to mask for distribution of communion and healing prayers. Moving forward it will be a personal decision for each person.

With regard to communion:

The Church has long held that if you take only one form of Communion (either the bread or the wine) you are fully communed; thus no one should ever feel pressured to receive the wine.

For those who would like to receive the wine, there have historically been two ways: drinking from the common cup and intinction (the dipping of the bread into the common cup). When we resumed communion in 2022, drinking from the common cup was permitted, but intinction was not.

Effective immediately, we will permit intinction, though the practice is discouraged for two reasons.

First, intinction has a complex social and theological history. Here is a brief history of intinction, largely gathered from Daniel Sack’s Whitebread Protestants: Food and Religion in American Culture:

In the Eastern Church, intinction has long been, and remains, the standard practice.

In the Western church, intinction was practiced “...intermittently in special situations, most often in the case of the dying, until it was banned by the Council of London in 1375, possibly because such dipping echoed the morsel of sopped bread Jesus offered Judas.”*
Intinction began to return to the Western church through Anglicanism, when in the 19th century some wanted to restore worship practices from the Middle Ages.*

As scholar Daniel Sack notes: “Partly in response to sanitary concerns, the 1948 Lambeth conference of Anglican bishops passed resolutions permitting the use of intinction. The General Convention of the Episcopal Church of America in 1949 allowed churches to use intinction, subject to the approval of the bishop.”

This was during the same period in American history when segregation was fiercely on the rise, peaking around 1960, meaning for some the shift to intinction was a response grounded in systemic racism. Read more about the sanitary reform movement and the rise of individual communion cups in an article by Episcopal priest, Hilary Bogert Winkler here.

During the AIDS epidemic, the practice of intinction rose again. Sacks writes, “The Episcopal Bishop of California pledged to continue drinking from the cup himself but encouraged those anxious about the disease, and those persons with AIDS concerned about opportunistic infections, to take only the bread at communion.” Yet in many other dioceses, intinction became a compromise that aimed to respond to people’s fears.

Most importantly, intinction is a shift away from the symbolism of the body of Christ drinking from a shared common cup.

Second, science has much to tell us about the common cup and the practice of intinction. The Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts summarized this science well in a letter from Bishop Gates, found here:

Intinction has long been discouraged by medical authorities due to its own risk potential. Clergy and chalice bearers [LEMs] will testify to the frequency with which an individual who intincts will inadvertently extend their fingertips into the wine. Thus, intinction becomes a higher risk activity than drinking from the chalice, because the fingertips and fingernails are a repository for pathogens not found in saliva.

A global public health coalition concluded that:

Currently available data do not provide any support for the suggestion that the practice of sharing a common communion cup can contribute to the spread of COVID-19 because SARS-CoV-2 transmission from a patient with COVID-19 or asymptomatic carrier to other people has not been reported.

Likewise, an epidemiological study written for the Anglican Church of Canada concluded that:

While it's true a shared cup could transmit infection through saliva, the risk is extremely low, with no documented cases of any disease ever being spread that way. In the case of COVID-19 the risk is even lower because it's spread by aerosols and droplets: the fact is, the risk of catching COVID is far greater from breathing air exhaled by an infectious person next to you than from sharing a common cup.

We would like to invite each of us to reflect on our own practice of receiving communion. Why do we abstain, intinct, or drink from the common cup? Is it because a caregiver or priest once told us ‘this is the way’? What practice draws us closer to God and the community we worship alongside? What helps us to grow in faith? There is no ‘wrong’ answer, particularly if we are making our decision with intention and care.

We welcome your reflections and thoughts. Please do not hesitate to be in touch with our clergy and vestry leaders.

Peace,
Rev. Heather J. Blais,
Rector
On behalf of Saints James and Andrew Vestry

Priest Associates

3/1/2024

Dear Friends of Saints James and Andrew,

I am delighted to introduce two familiar faces, who will be serving our community in new ways. Effective March 1, the Rev. Ted Thornton and the Rev. Dr. Molly Scherm will be serving Saints James and Andrew as Priest Associates.

What is a Priest Associate?
These are clergy who serve in the ministry of the parish at the discretion of the Rector in a non-stipendiary role. They donate their time and talent, as their life and interests allow, to support parish life by sharing their unique gifts. The Rector will typically ask these priests to serve as supply in her absence, and to support special liturgies or educational opportunities.

In the instance of the Rev. Ted Thornton, this new title acknowledges an important ministry that already exists. Rev. Ted administers communion on the second Sunday of the month, to allow me to offer healing prayers. He has offered supply at Sunday worship and a funeral for a longtime member in my absence. He shares his particular gift of teaching through one or two teaching sermons each year, and in a gathering this fall he offered an opportunity for the parish to further understand the unfolding events in the Middle East.

In the instance of the Rev. Dr. Molly Scherm, this new title acknowledges a new chapter in her role with our parish. After serving as our Associate Rector (a one third time, paid position), Rev. Molly retired from that role to serve in an even more part time role at St. Mary’s in the Mountains in Wilmington, Vermont. She will continue to serve as their Priest-in-Charge until such time she may choose to retire or serve another community. Rev. Molly serving as Priest Associate means that we are her home parish, the community she worships with when she is not serving elsewhere. You may recall we had an intentional period of separation, to help all of us acclimate to this shift in clergy leadership. We will now begin to see Rev. Molly for some special worship services, such as Holy Tuesday, for occasional Sunday supply in my absence (in May), and with time she may offer her teaching gifts with our parish in ways we will discern in the months to come. She has remained the compensated facilitator of the Caregiver Support Group, and she will continue in this role.

While both of these priests might be occasionally able to aid in a pastoral emergency, they are not part of the regular pastoral care ministry. Should you have a pastoral concern, please contact Kathryn Aubry-McAvoy, our Pastoral Care Chair, or myself.

Our new Priest Associates serve as an act of love for this community, and as a way of living into their ordained ministry during this chapter of their lives. We are blessed by their experience, wisdom, and unique gifts for teaching. They love this community, and I know we love them. I hope you will give them a warm welcome as you see them in these new roles.

If you have questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to be in touch.

Peace,
Rev. Heather Blais,
Rector

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