St. Joe's Dispatch | February 19th, 2025
*** A Weather Related Update***
In response to some winter weather, St. Joe’s is moving our Wednesday Evening Prayer online. Please join us this evening at 6:00 pm by following this Zoom link. The Vestry Meeting has also been moved online.
Community Breakfast will continue, rain or shine, in person tomorrow and every weekday. As always, please prioritize safety when making travel decisions.
I. From the Desk of the Associate Vicar and Breakfast Minister
Dearest St. Joseph’s,
Two Sundays ago, we reintroduced the Prayer of Humble Access to our Sunday Liturgy. You may be familiar with this prayer from Rite I (traditional language) services or from its Roman Catholic counterpart which shares much of the same language — at St. Joe’s, we most recently prayer the prayer last Lent.
The Prayer of Humble Access is part of the oldest Anglican prayer books, but many of its phrases are even older. It draws on the fourth-century Liturgy of St. Basil and the writing of Thomas Aquinas. And many of our prayers, the text takes much of its language from Scriptures, specifically Jesus’s conversations with the Syro-phoenician woman (Mark 7:26-30) and the Roman centurion (Matthew 8:8), and the “bread of life” passages in John’s Gospel (6:56). The version we’ll be praying through Lent reads
We do not presume, to come to your table, merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in your manifold and great mercies. We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under your table. But you are the same Lord whose property is always to have mercy. Grant us, therefore, gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of your dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink his blood, that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us. Amen.
I find that many people have one of two reactions to the Prayer of Humble Access, depending on where they place the emphasis: on “humble” or on “access.”
The first – in my opinion, less productive – reading foregrounds the prayer’s sense of human undeserving. It highlights the phrases “we are not worthy,” and “we do not presume.” This interpretation understands the prayer to be primarily about human beings. In this reading, the saying the Prayer of Humble Access is something like an act of verbal self-flagellation.
The other interpretation places the emphasis not on human unworthiness but the greatness of God’s gift. What we receive at Communion – God’s flesh and blood hidden among the elements of bread and wine – is a gift so lavish, so abundant, that human worthiness doesn’t really enter the equation. The gift on the altar is the “the food of man’s immortal being” (Henry Vaughan); the “refreshment of holy souls” (Bonaventure); that which allows us each to take hold of the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit (John of Ruusbroec); that which, “while we are pilgrims in this life,” prevents us from “collaps[ing] in our weariness” (Catherine of Siena). In this reading, the Prayer of Humble access is less about human being and more about the grace of God, “whose property is always to have mercy.”
(Of course, our realization of our own propensity to inflict harm, to miss the mark, to fall short — that is, to sin — is often occasioned by a recognition of God’s abundant goodness. As a friend-of-St. Joe’s, Jake Webb, preached a couple Sundays ago about the story of the calling of Andrew and Peter, “it is not a word of condemnation that allows us to fully recognize our sin, but the [abundant] saving word revealed in Jesus.” In other words, “humble” and “access” go together).
The past couple weeks, St. Josephites have been gathering to discuss Gary Anderson’s book, Charity. It is challenging, theologically rich, Scripture-saturated little tome. One of Anderson’s primary arguments is that almsgiving – giving money to the poor – is a theological act. Generosity with one’s neighbors mirrors the generosity with which God made the world. Giving money away thus shows the world what one believes about God: that God is generous, and merciful, and trustworthy.
Further, in Anderson’s account being generous with one’s neighbors not only reflects God’s generosity, it also instantiates, also participates in God’s generosity. For Anderson, charity is sacramental in nature. Charity is one way in which God employs material means – in this case, money – to become especially present in the world.
Anderson shows how, for much of Christian history, acts of charitable generosity towards the poor have been patterned with God’s act of generous availability through the Eucharist. Communion and almsgiving are two ways in which God’s graceful generosity are made manifest in the world.
Reading and discussing Charity, I have found myself thinking about our Breakfast Community. There is a compelling symmetry between what we gather for on Sundays and what happens every weekday in our Parish Hall: the hungry are fed, bonds of community forged, and grace discovered. The abundant Communion table is expanded to the abundant tables of Community Breakfast.
In the coming weeks, we will begin fundraising to support the next twelve months of Breakfast. We ask congregants and community members to sponsor one day of breakfast for $193 (or multiple days, if means allow, or a partial day, if they do not).
We also ask you, the congregation of St. Joe’s, to help us solicit donations by writing to your friends and family and inviting them to sponsor a day. Throughout Lent, we’ll hold a series of “letter writing parties” for that purpose. We’ll provide everything: email scripts, physical letters, and images you can post on social media. All you have to do is to bring your address book. We ask that you write to local friends, to distant aunts, to friends across the Triangle and across the globe, and invite them to help feed the hungry people in our midst.
As I described at the Annual Meeting, the need is immense. We are likely to serve some 18,000 meals in 2025. And these are no sack lunches, either. We serve a hot, delicious meal, all-you-can-eat: eggs, casseroles, bacon, grits, quiche, fruit, cereal, pie, pigs-in-a-blanket, coffee, and juice.
Our abundant breakfast table, I’ve come to see, is an icon of God’s abundance. It is an expansion of our Eucharistic feast and a mysterious participation in the generosity with which God made the world. And it is an outward and visible sign of the “manifold and great mercies” God shows to all creation.
Your friend at God’s abundant table,
Fr. Lachlan
II. Announcements
Breakfast Fundraiser Letter Writing * When you come to a gathering, bring names and addresses (snail mail or email) of people who might want to support this ministry. We’ll supply you with a letter, an envelope, and a stamp. We’ll take down all the information we need to let you know if those from whom you have solicited give so that you can join us in thanking them.
We’ll have three opportunities to gather and write letters together:
Monday, March 3, from 6:00-7:30 pm at Fr. Lachlan’s home.
Thursday, March 13, from 5:30-7:00 pm (come have dinner at our March parish potluck and also stay for letter writing) in the Parish House.
Sunday, March 30, beginning 10 minutes after coffee hour in the Parish House and also at 4:30 pm at Dains on Ninth Street (first beverage of your choice on Fr. Lachlan).
If you cannot attend a gathering but wish to participate in fundraising (or have any questions), email Hannah Flack and she will be happy to provide you with letter materials and all the information you need to involve your friends and family in supporting our breakfasts.
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Friends of Fred Hawkins, a longtime member of St. Joe’s, will gather at Bullock’s BBQ this Friday, February 21 at 5:30 pm for food and fellowship to remember Fred. Please email Jamie Kennedy if can attend or with any questions.
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Advocacy Day postcards and guidelines are available in the back of the church. Please take as many as you would like and return them to the basket by Sunday, March 1. This year’s areas of focus with the NC General Assembly are affordable housing, gun violence prevention, immigration/refugees, prison reform, and the environment. Questions? Email Deacon Jan.
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Parish Workday * This Saturday, February 22, 10:00 am-2:00 pm * Join us to prune, plant, sweep, and scrub our campus. Questions? Email Isaac Lund.
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Ash Wednesday * Wednesday, March 5, join us for Morning Prayer at 8:15 am or for Eucharist at 6:00 pm in the church to receive ashes. Following Eucharist, we will host a casserole baking for our breakfast ministry beginning at 6:30 pm in the Parish House. Questions? Email Fr. Lachlan.
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Joel Marcus, a Saint Joe’s parishioner and Emeritus Professor of New Testament and Christian Origins at Duke Divinity School, will be giving the Kenneth W. Clark Lectures at the Divinity School which have been rescheduled to March 5 and March 7 from 12:40 to 1:45 p.m. in 0012 Westbrook at Duke Divinity School. The topic will be: “Jews For (And Against) Jesus: Joseph Klausner and Claude Montefiore.” The public (and especially St. Joe’s parishioners) are cordially invited. Questions? Email Joel.
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Altar Guild training * Sunday, March 9, immediately after the 10:30 am service in the nave. Interested in joining this group or have questions? Email Fr. Lachlan.
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Confirmation/Reception Classes * Fr. Lachlan has sent an email scheduling Confirmation/Reception Classes in advance of the Bishop’s June 15th visitation. If you have not received that email but would like to join the classes, please email him as soon as possible.
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Durham CAN listening sessions * Sunday, March 16 at 11:45 am after the 10:30 am worship in the parish hall and Wednesday, March 19 at 6:30 pm, after evening prayer in the parish hall. These listening sessions are an opportunity for you to share your stories, concerns, and experiences about issues that matter most to you and the St. Joe’s community. Information gathered from St. Joe’s and other Durham CAN member organizations helps organizers understand community priorities and shape future organizing efforts. Questions? Contact Doug Merrill at 919-724-3022.
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Song in a Weary Throat discussion * Monday, March 17 from 6:00-7:30 pm at Fr. Lachlan’s home. We will discuss chapters 2, 3, 12, 13, and 14 - plus one chapter from Jane Crow by Rosalind Rosenberg (which will be made available at church this coming Sunday and the Sundays that follow). This is a two-part series and will meet again on Monday, April 7. Come to one or both discussions. Questions? Email Fr. Lachlan.
III. Art
a. Music
In honor of last Sunday’s Gospel reading, listen to Estonian composer Arvo Part’s setting of the Beatitudes. Find it here on Youtube or on Spotify. Use of headphones or a stereo system is recommended.
b. Visual Art
IV. Community Events
Durham Community Fridges has a variety of weekly volunteer opportunities (cleaning, food pick up/delivery, carpentry) learn more about how to get involved and how you can see live updates about the community fridge at St. Joe’s. Learn more here.
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Duke Chapel Evensong Singers * Sunday, February 23 from 4:00-4:45 pm in Duke Chapel. The Chapel's Evensong Singers present this concert with the theme of Light. With the title “Lux Aeterna-Eternal Light,” the performance features pieces by a variety of composers and accompaniment by Organ Scholar (and St. Joe’s Breakfast Associate), Katherine Johnson.