Mark your calendars!  We’re inviting the Bloomie community to Holy Trinity for a 5pm runners blessing on Saturday, May 3rd, followed by an Italian carb-load supper in the parish hall.  We’ve lined up a local jazz group to play the supper, and funds raised will go to support Anna Ogden Hall.

Dinner will be served beginning at 6pm and will include a two-hour swing dance from 7-9pm.  Bring your dancing shoes!

Suggested donation for this benefit dinner is $15/adult and $5/child — and folks may also donate at the $25 saints’ level or the $50 angels level.

We’re also encouraging HT folks to get involved on Bloomsday Sunday, either by participating in Bloomsday as a runner or walker, or by hosting an HT presence at the corner of Broadway & Elm (along the Bloomsday route).

**Please note, regular Sunday services (10am & 7pm) will be cancelled on Bloomsday.

Interested in dinner set-up and take-down?  Ready to serve as a host or hostess?  Want to connect with other HT Bloomies?  Contact Fr. Paul at 509.263.7793 or paul@trinityspokane.org.

Click to get your up-to-date ht news. If you’d like to receive the weekly ht e-letter, please contact Fr. Paul at paul@trinityspokane.org and he’ll add you to the list.

Get the most recent diocesan goodstuff here. If you’d like to receive the monthly diocesan goodstuff, please contact the Rev. Canon Kristi Philip at kristip@spokanediocese.org and she’ll add you to the list.

The Church of England today is a weak institution with a strong leader. Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, though given few official powers, uses his office and voice in efforts to hold together the polarized eighty-million-member Anglican Communion. He is also a first-rate theologian and respected moral philosopher. So when he speaks, many pay attention. He spoke this month and many listened and reacted. As is well known, on February 7 he made a statement which some found outrageous, others merely provocative, still others realistic, and still still others a well-intended effort to reduce religious tensions in Britain. Was he “throwing in the towel” in the face of a growing and sometimes militant Islamic presence there, or reaching out as people in the biblical tradition should to “the stranger in their midst”? continue reading » »

Join us to celebrate Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem and to recall the events of his last week, culminating in the ultimate victory of life over death. Participate in the timeless drama of light seeking its rightful place in a dark world. As often as we say ‘no’ to God, God says ‘yes’ to us — to the point of risking God’s own self to be near the world he holds so dear. Come see how this sordid love affair rings true for you and your own experience of God. Have you responded positively to God’s overtures toward you? Or has that love gone unrequited?

Come share the story with us — and see how it’s very much your story, too!

Palm Sunday (3/16) — service of palms @ 10am and 7pm; services begin in parish hall
Maundy Thursday (3/20) — greek agape supper in parish hall @ 6pm; worship @ 7pm
Good Friday (3/21) — good friday liturgy @ 12noon; tenebrae @ 8pm
Holy Saturday (3/22) — service of first light @ 9pm w/ procession through neighborhood
Easter Day (3/23) — sunrise vigil w/ baptisms @ 6am; easter breakfast @ 8am; easter liturgy @ 10am followed by festive reception w/ easter egg hunt for kids

Questions about holy week events? Want to get involved? Contact Fr. Paul at 509.263.7793 or paul@trinityspokane.org.

**Please RSVP to Fr. Paul for the Maundy Thursday dinner.

WASHINGTON — More than a quarter of adult Americans have left the faith of their childhood to join another religion or no religion, according to a new survey of religious affiliation by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

The report, titled “U.S. Religious Landscape Survey,” depicts a highly fluid and diverse national religious life. If shifts among Protestant denominations are included, then it appears that 44 percent of Americans have switched religious affiliations.

See the rest of the story here.

Presiding Bishop says ‘gathering will be diminished by their absence’

By Matthew Davies (Episcopal Life On-line)

[Episcopal News Service] Five Anglican Primates, four from Africa and one
from south America, have publicized their intentions to boycott the 2008
Lambeth Conference in a letter responding to a group of English bishops who
had urged them to attend the once-a-decade gathering.

Archbishops Peter Akinola of Nigeria, Emmanuel Kolini of Rwanda, Benjamin
Nzimbi of Kenya, Henry Orombi of Uganda, and Gregory Venables of the
Southern Cone — who make up five of the 38 Anglican Primates — told the 21
English bishops that they would not attend Lambeth in protest to the
invitations extended by the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Episcopal
Church’s bishops. Akinola, Kolini and Orombi had all previously announced
that they intended to boycott the conference.

Neva Rae Fox, the Episcopal Church’s public affairs officer, noted that
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori is saddened by the primates’
decision not to attend Lambeth.

“The gathering will be diminished by their absence, and I imagine that they
themselves will miss a gift they might have otherwise received,” the
Presiding Bishop said. “None of us is called to ‘feel at home’ except in the
full and immediate presence of God. It is our searching, especially with
those we find most ‘other,’ that is likely to lead us into the fuller
experience of the body of Christ. Fear of the other is an invitation to seek
the face of God, not a threat to be avoided.”

Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/79901_94975_ENG_HTM.htm

A great story on npr today from Laura Lorson (Kansas Public Radio) about politics and democracy and the role of the individual therein.  Great analogy to the church, and the natural give-and-take we must expect of each other if we’re to stay together.  As you listen, ask yourself, ‘what am I willing to let go of for the greater good?’

Get the story here.

Traditionally people have given up things for Lent. Last year in the Diocese of Liverpool many parishes took part in a Carbon Fast. Through it we were able to focus on God’s Earth and its poorest people in whom, Jesus said, we were to find him.

This year, in Lent 2008, we invite as many as can to join us in a Carbon Fast.  See the rest of the story and the daily practices here.

Join other young couples from Holy Trinity and St. John’s Cathedral for a night out on the town this Saturday, February 9th, in honor of Valentine’s Day. Dinner is scheduled for 6:30 pm at the Italian Kitchen (113 N. Bernard), followed by dancing and cavorting at the Big Easy. Couples with children are asked to find their own childcare. To RSVP and get more information, call Diane Southworth at 509.230.7658.

While the Kendall Yards project has received most of the publicity for it’s commercial and residential development along Bridge Street in the West Central neighborhood, there are also other publicly funded community development projects slated for the year ahead, most notably a community development block grant (cdbg) comprised of both state and federal dollars. The project will focus on Broadway between Maple and Oak streets and may, funds permitting, stretch further west toward Walnut street in the future.

The neighborhood is currently without any decent business core that attracts both people and dollars — like the Garland District to our north and the Cannon/Pacific block in Browne’s Addition to our south. There are several social hotspots closer to the Broadway/Monroe block, which serve many of the folks who pass through the County facilities, but commercial space west of the civil district is primarily loaded with legal service offices. Diversifying the business climate west of Maple will add West Central to the Spokane map as a must-see district, rather than a must-avoid district, as its rather unfair and ruthless moniker “felony flats” implies.

A new day is dawning for Spokane’s West Central neighborhood, and this combination of private (kendall) and public (broadway) projects is, indeed, an outward and physical sign of an inward and spiritual reality — or, as the church would say, a ’sacrament.’ Add to that business mix the very proactive culture of neighborly care and concern in West Central, and you’ve got a fairly good recipe for responsible community development. The churches, public schools, and social service agencies are all at the table together, thoughtfully considering the cost/benefit ratios of development in the area — asking the basic question, “how can the future of West Central be good for everyone?”

Read the whole story on the Broadway project here.
Read more about the Kendall Yards project here.
Read more about the West Central neighborhood here.