The Episcopal Church in Almaden

Your ECA Senior Ministry is planning a resource event for Tuesday, June 5 from 11:00-1:00 in the Fellowship Hall. Staff from the Council on Aging will present information about their agency as well as services in Santa Clara County for the senior population. They will be available to answer questions following their presentation, which starts at 11 am. We will stay for lunch and a discussion among ourselves about how we can most effectively reach those in our congregation who could benefit from assistance. Please join us on June 5 for this lively and important meeting, so that our Senior Ministry can grow and prosper! Contact the office to RSVP: office@eca-sj.org.

It has been a few years since a confirmation class was offered at ECA, and it is high time we do so again! Our bishop will be at ECA on October 28, and I would like to prepare youth and adults for confirmation and reception on that date.

I’d like to gather a group of youth who are nearly 16 or over 16 to talk about basics of the faith and the Episcopal Church, with the option of electing for confirmation at the end. I invite all parents and youth to an informational meeting on Sunday, June 3 after the 11:00 service. We will share some refreshments and look at a possible schedule for the class, as well as an overview of topics to be covered. Talk to Kate Flexer if you can come, or if you have questions.

Adults can also be confirmed or received into the Episcopal Church, or reaffirm their baptismal vows. If you would like to prepare to be confirmed, received, or to reaffirm your baptism, please talk to Kate Flexer.

Bishop Greg Rickel of the Diocese of Olympia is presenting a one-day workshop at St Paul’s, Salinas on Saturday, May 19, called “’Walking the Way’ with our Money, a Workshop on Stewardship” Bishop Rickel is known for his passion about stewardship, and is a gifted presenter. A small group from ECA is attending and will carpool together. A sign-up sheet is next to the flyer posted on the vestry bulletin board at church – or email kflexer@eca-sj.org. I hope you will consider attending! This is a unique opportunity to hear from one of our national church leaders. 10:00-3:30, including lunch. Cost is $25 (ask Kate for help if needed). You can register online at www.edecr.org.

On Friday, May 11th, join us for a free Baseball Game at San Jose Municipal Stadium – San Jose Giants vs. Visalia Rawhides. There are 20 free tickets, sign up on the sign-up sheet in Fellowship Hall. Gate opens at 5:30, game starts at 7:00. When we have the sign-up filled, we’ll decide if we tailgate, have dinner at the park, or…?

Please support Gloria Ashdown in her efforts to find a cure for her son Jason. Gloria recently joined The Nephcure Foundation, the only organization solely committed to seeking a cause and cure for patients affected by Nephrotic Syndrome & Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis (FSGS). On June 2nd they will be having a Nephcure Walk-a-Thon at Wallenberg Park in Willow Glen (Curtner & Cottle). Your help would be greatly appreciated. Sponsorship can be through any means (e.g., money, products, and raffle prizes). Thank you for any support to help find a treatment & cure for the thousands of patients suffering from Nephrotic Syndrome. For more information, please visit the Nephcure website at www.nephcure.org or contact Gloria Ashdown.

We are Easter People. We are people changed by what Christ did for us just as our Lord’s disciples in His day were changed by His resurrection. Look at what is planned for our Sunday School children in the weeks ahead:

May 6 Everyone loves to be a “chef” and with our guest teacher, Phyllis Chai, our Cooking Learning Center will offer a tasty treat for all to sample.

May 13 Mother’s Day will be a special Art Center Day with our our Christian Ed Director, Susie Ferguson, who will bring something very creative and fun to capture the interest of our children around our Sunday School unit.

May 20 Our Games Learning Center with our guest teacher, Kelly Yamanishi, will bring a conclusion to our Easter People unit for our children, as the following Sunday will be a sharing opportunity at our joint Pentecost Service.

Visiting children aged 4 through 5th grade are more than welcome to join us at 10:10 AM for all the fun. Children may come as early as 10AM to explore many areas in our classroom. Everyone is always invited to bring a friend. Middle School and High School youth who would like to be here during our Sunday School hour (10-11 AM) are invited to be classroom helpers. Contact Susie Ferguson, christianed@jointventurechurches.org, if you have any questions or need further information.

Youth groups will be seeing the movie “Bully” on Sunday April 22. BULLY is a beautifully cinematic, character-driven documentary. At its heart are those with huge stakes in this issue whose stories each represent a different facet of America’s bullying crisis. Filmed over the course of the 2009/2010 school year, BULLY opens a window onto the pained and often endangered lives of bullied kids, revealing a problem that transcends geographic, racial, ethnic and economic borders. It documents the responses of teachers and administrators to aggressive behaviors that defy “kids will be kids” clichés, and it captures a growing movement among parents and youths to change how bullying is handled in schools, in communities and in society as a whole.

Parents play a vital role in supporting their kids, promoting upstander rather than bystander behavior, and teaching and modeling empathy in the home.

Meet at church for lunch at 1:00, and we will drive to the Pruneyard to see the 2:20 show. Parents and other interested adults are welcome to join us. And youth, bring a friend! Thank you, Inge

We will be holding Sunday School on Easter Sunday. We have some very special activities planned all around Easter Eggs. Visiting children aged 4 through 5th grade are more than welcome to join us at 10:10 AM for all the fun. Everyone is always invited to bring a friend. Middle School and High School youth who would like to be here during our Sunday School hour (10-11 AM) are invited to be classroom helpers. Please contact Susie Ferguson, christianed@jointventurechurches.org, if you have any questions or need further information.

The third in our series of parenting talks is coming up! ’21st Century Discipline’ with Beth Proudfoot will be offered on Tuesday, April 24. Come for dinner at 6:00 and stay for the talk. Childcare is provided. Free; donations for childcare/food are welcome. Please contact parentingclass@eca-sj.org to RSVP.

March 14 was the first pick-up for the High Ground Organics Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program! High Ground Organics is a farm near Watsonville; subscribers can sign up for 9 weeks at a time, or for the whole season. You can sign up at any time. Go to www.highgroundorganics.com to sign up (you can also try a 4-week intro), and pick the ‘San Jose Camden Ave.’ site as your pick-up location. Deliveries are weekly on Wednesdays. Talk to Kate Flexer for more information!

ECA member, author and licensed therapist Beth Proudfoot leads a free talk for all Almaden Valley parents on dealing constructively with sibling rivalry. Members of the public are welcome. The talk begins at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 24, preceded by a free dinner at 6:00 p.m. Free childcare is provided. Past talks in the series have been well attended so be sure to RSVP with the number of attendees and the ages of children requiring childcare to parentingclass@eca-sj.org. 6581 Camden Ave. Information: 408-268-0243. To learn more about upcoming talks in the series join our Meetup group: www.meetup.com/san-jose-parenting-class

Help rebuild the Episcopal cathedral in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti! The Episcopal Church of the United States of America has set a goal of raising $20 million to rebuild Holy Trinity Cathedral, which was destroyed in the Jan. 12, 2010 earthquake. ECA members can take part by purchasing bricks for $10 each that will be used to restore this vital center of worship and community life. We hope to donate at least 100 bricks. So far 65 have been purchased already! To donate, make checks out to ECA and put Haiti on the memo line. Thank you to all who have already responded! For more information watch this short video.

Several issues later, a new ADA-compliant lift is on order and will be installed in the same shaft as the current one. It will be early March before we have a new lift installed and functional. Please, if you or someone you love needs help getting up the stairs and you plan on attending worship over the next few months, contact the office and/or arrive early enough that we can assist you.

STEWARDSHIP INGATHERING Thank you to all who have contributed to the future of ECA! If you have not yet returned your pledges of time, talent, and treasure, please send or bring those cards this week. We will use the information as we begin to create our budget and plan ministries for 2012. Thank you for sharing your self and your gifts in our community!

Last year, 2010, ECA received $555.80 in contributions from E-scrip. Thank you to everyone who participated! This year to date we have already received $555.17. E-scrip is a program whereby merchants contribute a percentage of the purchases we make to them back to our church ECA. When we shop at Safeway or Macy’s, or when we buy Kraft, Frito-Lay, General Mills, Barilla, or Nabisco products, these are all merchants who donate a small percentage back to us, and there are even more. The best way to participate is to make sure your grocery club cards as well as credit/debit cards are registered. After you register, you can generally forget about it. To sign-up visit www.escrip.com. If you have questions contact Mary McPherson.