LENTEN RESOURCES 2024

The season of Lent (the 40 days before Easter) is upon us—starting February 14 this year. We like observing these seasons because they offer an alternative approach to time than modern life offers. In the Christian tradition, Lent is a community-wide retreat—a time to form a new prayer habit, challenge long-held biases, and focus on Jesus.

Ash Wednesday Service

On Ash Wednesday, Feb 14 at 12:00pm (noon) EST, Magda Zarin (neé Pecsenye) and Emily are hosting a twenty-minute online service with imposition of ashes. Everyone’s invited. You’ll need to provide your own ashes*, dust, or dirt to put the mark on your own forehead. Probably not legally binding for traditional Catholics, but it’s good for everyone else. (Ashes are optional, and you’re still welcome to join the service.)  A zoom link was sent out by Emily in a special Lent email. If you missed it, contact the office.

*Note from Magda: If you really want to use ashes, you could write a prayer of something you’d like God to help you with on a small piece of paper, burn the paper in a metal dish, and save the ashes to use on Ash Wednesday. Dust from the top of your file cabinet or dirt from a houseplant or outside totally works, too. Do not use a marker, even a dry erase one, because it won’t seem like such a good idea the next day.

Bowl of Prayers

During Lent we will gather 3 times per week for 20 minutes of online prayer on the dates and times below, starting Friday, Feb 16 (since the Ash Wednesday service is on Feb 14):

• Monday Evening “Vespers” at 7pm ET (6pm ET | 4pm PT)
• Wednesday Midday at 2pm ET (1pm ET | 11am PT)
• Friday Morning at 9am ET (8am CT | 6am PT)

Join for as many or as few as you’d like. The prayer times will be hosted by a variety of people, using a variety of fixed-hour prayer resources. Contact the office for the Zoom link if you’d like to join.

Lenten Soup Groups

A variety of hosts will provide a simple Lenten dinner 1–3 times during Lent for about 90 minutes in the evening. Sign ups will be available at church on Sunday, Feb 11.

Rooting Antisemitism Out of Christianity Class

Sundays at 12:10pm—Feb 18 & 25, Mar 3, 17, & 24 (includes lunch and childcare)

We’ll join members of St. Clare’s Episcopal after our Sunday service, from 12:10–2pm, for lunch and a class that helps us weed antisemitic beliefs out of our faith tradition. The class will include prominent scholars teaching us via Zoom, Q&A, discussion, and some practical work toward the end of the course (i.e., what to watch out for in Sunday School lessons). The class will be available to Zoomies, with Ken Wilson helping moderate breakout discussions.

Sign up using the signup sheet in the church sanctuary, or via an online form that will be sent out the week of Feb 5. Suggested donation for the five-part class is $20 total, which includes meals for all 5 weeks, and can be paid via our church’s giving site: https://app.easytithe.com/App/Giving/blueocean. (If you’re joining the class online, no donation is needed.)

Select the “One-time” tab and change the fund (using the drop-down menu) to “Class: Weeding Antisemitism Out of Christianity” when you donate. If money is prohibitive, skip the donation portion. If you’d be willing to sponsor an attendee for whom money is prohibitive, simply give a little extra. 

Back Door Food Pantry Donations

Blue Ocean is helping to collect donations for the Back Door Food Pantry. The food pantry is operated out of the shared property where we worship, and is a joint operation between St. Clare’s, Temple Beth Emeth, and the Islamic Center of A2. 

Needed Items:

• Shelf Stable Quarts of Non Dairy Beverages: all varieties, such as soy, rice, oat, almond
• Granola and Snack Bars, including some gluten-free and non dairy
• Non-religious 2024 Calendars
• Regular and travel-size toiletries: unscented or very mildly scented
• Ground and freeze dried coffee: regular and decaf
  

Donations should be unopened, unexpired, and still in the original packaging that lists contents, ingredients, allergens, and expiration dates. We’ll have a donation bin in the sanctuary for a few Sundays.

EASTER SUNDAY

We’ll have baptisms as part of our Easter Sunday service on Mar 31 (see Emily or Caroline K. if you’d like to be baptized), and an Egg Hunt for kids 5th grade and under following our service. More details to come!