Three services of Holy Communion, one in each church in the grouping. I managed to work in a quote from Ozymandias into my sermon as a set-up for discussing the finitude of earthly treasure. So all-in-all just a regular glorious Sunday in rural Donegal.

A bunch of visitors and we sang the Godspell arrangement of All Good Gifts and talked about prophets. So good!

A great Sunday all around! Good worship, a great conversation with a long-time member at coffee hour, and later in the day went to a great cookout at a newish member’s house. Turnout at church was good and the cookout was packed!

I received some good news today about a potential call! So all and all, it was excellent.

Excellent! I arrived later than usual and found visitors in my usual seat, a great thing. Attendance at the 8am rite I spoken service has been growing this summer, and while the congregation does tend older, there are people under 40 and even kids in the pews every week.

Today was a virtual visit to my sending parish, wearing pajamas and sipping an oat milk latte. It's the last few weeks before classes and field ed start, and I'm savoring a bit of laziness.

Good! Cooler temps. Supply priest we hadn’t seen since Trinity Sunday (our Parish Chaplain aka long term supply had a previous commitment). Confusion at the start when we realized power outage during the week meant carillon clock was off—no bells at 9:30. Son sang a solo. LEM served for first time.

I read the Ecclesiastes passage. When I finished and said, "The word of the Lord," the reply, "Thanks be to God," was barely audible. 🕯☺️

The Canadian church follows the first readings, so we’ve had a blistering series of Amos and then Hosea. Likewise hard for people to hear and respond with joy!

First Sunday after a two-week vacation. Good to be back in the saddle, er, pulpit.

It was a full house today and had an amazing Mass

Had a guest that was supposed to do a 10 minute temple talk. 45 minutes later I scrapped the sermon. I had more thank you for not preaching than I normally get from preaching. #readtheroom

a/c is still not fixed but the cooler weather helped. I recruited one of the new people to join the choir. 🎼 the children's sermon audience was one kid and our music director (a big kid), and I had altar guild duty with one of my favorite people, all of which did my heart good.

I said goodbye to the parish I’ve served for the last eight years so … intense?

We welcomed two new members, prayed over a family about to welcome a new baby, and received a gift of sixty new hymnals! Also the sermon was 🔥, all about how the law is that hoarding treasure to guard against anxiety and death is folly and sin, but the gospel is that God’s grace is sufficient

I gave the sermon at a friend's church this morning. It was my first time preaching on a Sunday, to a large congregation. I felt incredibly nervous, but it was well-received!

I'm surprised that last week and this were at program-year levels of attendance. And for the children's homily I read this book - which I was given in third grade by my Sunday School teacher... and I still have it!

Actually attend for the first time in months given Summer services are at 930, which is Too Damn Early. Solid lectionary set except for crazy Paul and all his "new in Christ" nonsense that I have no idea what the hell is talking about.

Don’t worry, I think God knows how to make us new in Christ even if Colossians is confusing haha

I supervised a new acolyte serving as Subdeacon for the first time and no one died.

Assisted at (Choral) Morning Prayer at one of our Derry churches this morning, and was one of the readers at a Songs of Praise service in our Donegal church. The service (and lovely local art exhibition) was part of the local Summer Festival and was well attended 🙂

My family & I spent the weekend with others at our annual Parish Family Retreat at our diocesan camp and retreat center in the Rocky Mountains: cathedralridge.org. It was a weekend well spent, with the the Eucharist being celebrated in one of the outdoor chapels w/ our vocational deacon preaching.

Banger of a sermon on wealth, canted & got to start off the Lord’s Prayer bc the new rector is a bit shaky on the pitch, dirty looks from some old anglocatholics who maybe think only men should do that?, closed with Cwm Rhondda in my fave belting key, 8/10 churching would do again.

I had a visiting 4yo grandkid walk up to me for communion, look at me super skeptically, and when I smiled and said “would you like some bread?” he looked at me and said “no way” and then walked straight back to his seat.

Only had 2 in Children's Chapel, but we had a broad-ranging conversation that went from today's Gospel to the 10 plagues to Noah to Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world to of course, eschatology. It was...wild! Oh, had to assure a 4yo it's not really blood! You, David?

It was good and tiring. Both services still avoiding the summer slump. A new family stuck around for coffee hour. Our diocese put on a story telling event this evening, which I had a hand in some logistics for, that was very well attended!

Being a native West Virginian is so cool because I know so many folks in that photo!

That sounds fun!

It was good, thanks! We had a visiting archdeacon preach and lead a discussion about activism as ministry

Missed services bc we were diving back from Dallas. BUT I let my newly-permitted 15yo take the wheel for an hour which caused me to pray without ceasing.

It was a real emotional day - we were already crying at the opening welcome because it was the last time our rector would be saying it. The church was packed with people & so much love. I read Colossians & Prayers of the People, and we all read my “Collect for a Leavetaking” through our tears 🙏

AND THEN it was our Annual Picnic with MORE tears and laughter and joy and Great Thanks, which was the theme of the sermon today. Great Thanks was really the theme of the whole day. It will stick with us.

3 newcomers!

A baptism. Led my last Sermon on the Mount class where we read Bonhoeffer on a few Beatitudes. Rector is back from vacation. New associate rector's same-sex partner visited the parish for the very first time. A few kids and I teased each other about our least favorite fruits and shared big laughs.

The whole service God prodded me to meditate on Psalm 103 and I have to pray more on why He gave me that one in particular

Hmm. That one sticks for some reason. Gonna have to check in on that before I sleep.

Good worship with a decent crowd for the summer. Lots of questions to me about my plans after our rector announced he’s leaving a couple weeks ago. “I’m still the Assistant Rector” really covers a lot of concerns