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Sunday, October 8, 2017

Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost

8AM Rite I Holy Eucharist
9AM J2A & Rite 13 & YAC will meet
9AM Alpha - 9am in the Heritage Room
10AM Rite II Holy Eucharist & Sunday School
3PM Blessing of the Animals - Memorial Garden

Stewardship

Bring in the harvest on our journey to generosity. This is the season to

reflect on what St. Mark’s and our ministries mean to you. Where do you see Jesus at St. Mark’s? A huge thank you to Lea O’Shea for sharing her heartwarming story on giving and what St. Mark’s means to her. If you missed it, please see below.

This Sunday we’ll be hearing from Jack Licata as he tells us about his journey in faith at St. Mark’s.

By now you will have received your pledge form, please think and pray carefully over it. Thank you so much for all your wonderful support. Think about all we have accomplished at St. Mark’s and how we are moving forward. We would like to have all the pledge forms in by November 5 at the latest.

Save the date for our Stewardship Celebration Brunch in Advent on Sunday December 3. A time to celebrate and show our gratitude for all you do for St. Mark’s.

"Alpha" Coming to Father Rick's "Forum" this Fall

Beginning on October 8th and running through mid-December, we will introduce Alpha during the Sunday Forum sessions.

Alpha is a series of discussions exploring the Christian faith, typically run over eleven weeks, including a weekend retreat. Each session looks at a different question around faith and is designed to create conversation. Alpha has been attended by millions in countries all around the world, and anyone is welcome.

Sign Up Here.

Recovery Sunday - October 15th

The morning will begin with Michael Pitman speaking with the youth of the church and the community at 9 AM. As someone who grew up right here in Bernards Township, he will be sharing his journey of recovery.

The service at 10am will include a sermon by local resident, Mr. Nicholas Sant Foster, as well as special musical pieces by Miss Molly Cagno. Prayers will be offered for those in grateful recovery, those who are still sick and suffering from addiction as well as those who have lost their fight to the disease.

Altar Guild Members Needed

Currently our Altar Guild committee consists of only three people - very dedicated people, but still only three.

As a volunteer, you would be asked to show up on your scheduled Saturday to set up the altar for the 8am service on Sunday and then arrive on Sunday prior to the 10am to prepare it for the second service. After the 10am service, you will be expected to clean all vessels and take the linens home to wash and press. Anyone one of us would be very happy to talk you through the process of setting up the altar, the care of the linens, and other details.

We are an equal opportunity organization – everyone is welcome, men and woman alike.

Serving in the Altar Guild is a ministry that can only be carried out with a song in one's heart.

Please contact Jeanne Wyatt, Anne Post, or Lauren Walker for more info.

smARTS - 9/27 thru 11/15

Join the smARTS team on Wednesdays as we create craft and art toshare with the St. Mark's community and those in need of some love, guidanceand inspiration in their daily lives. Join us as we diligently work to createart full of faith and love for all to enjoy! No special skills are needed wewill help you find your creative niche!

See you there, 4:00 - 5:30 Wednesdays.

Giving Gardens at the Ross Farm

"We have now harvested 1800 lbs of fresh produce from our Ross Gardens, and our Fall plantings are thriving!
Looking ahead, please mark your calendars for St. Mark's next assigned week beginning October 21, and our church partners would welcome your help during their assigned weeks if you keep an eye out for notices of dates and times."

Buildings & Ground Projects

One of this year’s goals of the Buildings and Grounds commissions is to complete many items on our “to do” list. If you have not seen it yet, there is a poster on the Parish Hall wall near the kitchen that lists all the items that we are trying to complete. To complete these items, we need your help.

Each item has a rough estimate of what the cost would be to complete the item.
Some items need to be done by a contractor, some can be done by a work party, and some can be done either way.
Each item needs an owner to coordinate the parts of the item to completion. This could involve getting estimates from contractors and working with the contractor to complete the item. It could be getting the necessary materials to do the item and organizing a work party to complete the item.

What you can do:

You can volunteer to fund part or all an item.
You can volunteer to be the owner of an item to make sure it gets completed.
You can volunteer to help the owner of the item.

So please look at the list and let me know if you can help any of the above ways.

Best way to initially contact me is through email ngraff011@gmail.com. Then we can discuss details and your thoughts on the project.

Thanks,

Norm Graff

Art Studio

Come and join us for painting or other arts and crafts on a Tuesday in the Arts Studio downstairs. We usually arrive at around noon and finish by 4:00pm. Come for as long as you like. We work on our own paintings, have a great time together and help each other out. For more info contact Jenny Phillips 908-451-9638.

Box-Packing Day

On Sunday morning, October 22, our Sunday School kids and teens will once again work together on an Outreach issue. In April, we held Seed and Feed Day to work on activities focused on hunger in our community, followed by Community Hope Day in May, when we highlighted the challenges of homelessness in our local veterans community. With this third joint community service Sunday, we will focus on international relief, working together to fill “Christmas for Children” boxes for Samaritan’s Purse. These boxes travel all around the world to benefit kids in great need, so what a great message for our kids to think about as the holidays approach. How can you help?

We would welcome donations of toys (not war-themed), small pieces of new clothing, hygiene items, and crafts and school supplies, suitable for a girl or boy in these age ranges -- 2-4, 5-9, or 10-14 yrs old. All donations need to fit in shoe-sized boxes. Please do not donate liquids, chocolates or other perishables, breakables, fruits and drink mixes, or medicines and vitamins.

We would also appreciate monetary donations to purchase these items, so watch for our basket at our picnic and in the Narthex throughout September and early October.

Of course, if you would prefer to fill a box yourself, we have them available. Many thanks, as always, for your support of our kids and outreach programs!

Please click here to ready Lea O'Shea's stewardship message

Please click here to read this week's insert, "Living Within a Vision of God's Justice"

Dress for Success

Do you have new or gently-used business attire that you won’t be using? If so, please bring these garments to our St. Mark’s Link anytime during the first 2 weeks of October and hang them on the clothing rack or leave them in bags underneath. You’ll be helping many families get back on their feet and reenter the workforce. Lorri and Joe Layton will be collecting these items to donate to the Jersey City chapter of Dress For Success, as they have done for the past dozen years. Lorri describes their experience in this way: "We got involved with Dress for Success when someone moved and our boys were about 3 or 4 years old. Now they are 15! We have continued with this program because every time we deliver to the Dress for Success in Jersey City the staff always thanks us so profusely. Thanks to the generosity of St. Mark's people, we bring the largest load every year, averaging 350-400 articles of clothing. It's an amazing program that helps many women and men to be able to have the clothing necessary for job interviews."
Many thanks to Lorri and Joe!

Wreath Sale Fundraiser for Youth Groups

Order forms are available in the link for Christmas Wreaths, select 16" for $15 or 24"for $25. You may send your order via email to Laura at lutaylor100@gmail.com.