Although it's been four months since I left Newtownards and moved to the Parish of St Peter and St James, there are a couple of things that keep bringing me back to 'Ards, more often than even I expected. In September while Ken, my boss from 'Ards, was on leave I covered pastoral emergencies in the parish. Unfortunately I was called into action on a few occasions. As well as this, I was involved in a number of community organisations and this work has been ongoing.
I represented St Mark's on the Board of Governors of West Winds Primary School, and for a while yet will continue to do so. WWPS is a small (ish) school on the West Winds Estate in the town. It's the most amazing place - there is a fantastic atmosphere among the staff and we've been delighted to note an increasing level of parental invovlement over the past few years. West Winds Estate is one of a number of residential estates in the town, and to a greater or lesser degree these estates all have involvement from those who would have been part of the loyalist paramilitary scene at some point. But West Winds is leading the way in the town in community development and the school is proud to be connected to the estate and involved in helping build good relationships.
I also served during my curacy as the representative of the local clergy on the Board of Directors of The Link Family and Community Centre. The Link is a Christian Community Group at work in th etown, with a particular vision to share God's love with the marginalised of the town. We work with young people from the estates, with members of the different ethnic communities in the town and with addicts, often some whom the system has written off. I was delighted when I was asked to continue as a member of the Board in my own right and not just representing the clergy of the town, in part because when I finished Queen's the first time round I had a job working in Poleglass with marginalised young people and so I have a community work background.
The Link is one of the most exciting things I encountered in Newtownards. The group stands alongside the community when churches can't, or sometimes won't, do so themselves. The Link in Newtownards has a transformative effect on the lives of so many people - whether their 16 staff, who work and work and work, or their over 60 volunteers, to say nothing of the dozens if not hundreds of youth, elderly, members of ethnic minorities and addicts who see their lives changed by the work of the Link Family and Community Centre. I remain very proud to be associated with The Link, especially when sometimes the community is challenged by the work we do. One of my favourite passages of scripture is in Luke 4, when Jesus quotes Isaiah and says that he has been anointed by the Spirit of God to free the prisoners, restore sight to the blind and to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour. This is what the Church should do, and tries to. It's what the Link does.
Sunday, 25 October 2009
Sunday, 2 August 2009
Time for the guys to take over the blog and fill you in on what has been happening over the past few days.
On Wednesday we had a slip and slide in the afternoon, and the English counsellors decided to gang up on Tara, with Danny and Clare combining to drop her on it, making a hospital trip necessary to get her back checked out. Luckily no serious damage was caused, although she did need to rest for a while.
That afternoon the rest of us paid a visit to the nuns to get a tour of the convent. The nuns were keen for Soraya to keep a leaflet about becoming a nun - she was considerably less eager!
In the evening there was a healing service that all the overnight campers went to, ironically Tara missed it as she was at the hospital.
On Thursday we managed to have the campfire this week as the weather stayed good, Andrew gave his best Brokeback Mountain impression with his choice of outfit (cowboy hat and checked shirt) and we had hard work getting everyone enthusiastic about singing campfire songs on the other hand everyone was very keen to get s'mores.
On Friday we woke to heavy rain which caused some alterations to the day's itinerary for both overnight camp and day camp. In addition to the rain Tyler Slade cut his hand on the bus window meaning Father Joel had to step in to do Christian Ed for the overnight camp. He gave a pretty hard-hitting message that a lot of the campers seemed challenged by, which was a good way to end the Christian Ed for the week.
In the afternoon everyone got into fancy dress - the girls took a superhero theme, and the guys formed an elite ninja squad, 'The Sim Squad' in honour of one of the councilors who had had to leave camp early for his brother's stag do. There was then a performance by a magician/comedian Mr Twisty, who got a lot of laughs, and a considerable amount of awe for his tricks.
After that we had "The Messy Olympics" which involved relay races with all sorts of messy food products like jello(jam), flour and chocolate spread, during which everyone got pretty dirty. Then the fire brigade turned up to give everyone the most extreme (and cold!) power shower know to man.
In the evening we had a pretty evenful Talent Show. Soraya and Andrew teamed up with another councillor, Tanya, to preform an animated routeen from grease. The results (especially Andrew's greased back hair and sunglasses which really looked the part) have to be seen to be believed! Fortunately video evidence has been captured...
There was also an inspiring preformance by some of the campers with a preformance of the song "im yours" by jason mraz. Of cousre we all joined in using whatever we could to help i.e. Instraments, singing and very interesting dancing.
Saturday saw many of the campers leave, and another leaving BBQ. In the afternoon we headed off to see a ValleyCats baseball game during which Danny and Andrew swapped national football shirts - Andrew felt everyone hated him while he had the England shirt on, and Danny thought everyone loved him in the NI shirt (although both both were pained by the experience). Afterwards we stopped at Megan's (one of the daycamp staff) for pizza and ice-cream. After we got back some of us headed up to a gazebo that looked out over the entire campsite and sat up watching stars. Some of us saw shooting stars, others were a bit distracted...
Today (Sunday) was our last day at camp, which was quite emotional saying goodbye to everyone. During the drive to New York most people took the chance to catch up on sleep, which had been lacking over the past few days. It was a long drive, but eventually we arrived and after getting checked into our hotel headed out to take a look at the city. Stopping to get a meal at TJI Fridays then moving on to get a quick feelng for city life. Tomorrow we'll be doing some more sight seeing as we unwind after a busy couple of weeks of camp, and hopefully manage to take in a show in the evening.
On Wednesday we had a slip and slide in the afternoon, and the English counsellors decided to gang up on Tara, with Danny and Clare combining to drop her on it, making a hospital trip necessary to get her back checked out. Luckily no serious damage was caused, although she did need to rest for a while.
That afternoon the rest of us paid a visit to the nuns to get a tour of the convent. The nuns were keen for Soraya to keep a leaflet about becoming a nun - she was considerably less eager!
In the evening there was a healing service that all the overnight campers went to, ironically Tara missed it as she was at the hospital.
On Thursday we managed to have the campfire this week as the weather stayed good, Andrew gave his best Brokeback Mountain impression with his choice of outfit (cowboy hat and checked shirt) and we had hard work getting everyone enthusiastic about singing campfire songs on the other hand everyone was very keen to get s'mores.
On Friday we woke to heavy rain which caused some alterations to the day's itinerary for both overnight camp and day camp. In addition to the rain Tyler Slade cut his hand on the bus window meaning Father Joel had to step in to do Christian Ed for the overnight camp. He gave a pretty hard-hitting message that a lot of the campers seemed challenged by, which was a good way to end the Christian Ed for the week.
In the afternoon everyone got into fancy dress - the girls took a superhero theme, and the guys formed an elite ninja squad, 'The Sim Squad' in honour of one of the councilors who had had to leave camp early for his brother's stag do. There was then a performance by a magician/comedian Mr Twisty, who got a lot of laughs, and a considerable amount of awe for his tricks.
After that we had "The Messy Olympics" which involved relay races with all sorts of messy food products like jello(jam), flour and chocolate spread, during which everyone got pretty dirty. Then the fire brigade turned up to give everyone the most extreme (and cold!) power shower know to man.
In the evening we had a pretty evenful Talent Show. Soraya and Andrew teamed up with another councillor, Tanya, to preform an animated routeen from grease. The results (especially Andrew's greased back hair and sunglasses which really looked the part) have to be seen to be believed! Fortunately video evidence has been captured...
There was also an inspiring preformance by some of the campers with a preformance of the song "im yours" by jason mraz. Of cousre we all joined in using whatever we could to help i.e. Instraments, singing and very interesting dancing.
Saturday saw many of the campers leave, and another leaving BBQ. In the afternoon we headed off to see a ValleyCats baseball game during which Danny and Andrew swapped national football shirts - Andrew felt everyone hated him while he had the England shirt on, and Danny thought everyone loved him in the NI shirt (although both both were pained by the experience). Afterwards we stopped at Megan's (one of the daycamp staff) for pizza and ice-cream. After we got back some of us headed up to a gazebo that looked out over the entire campsite and sat up watching stars. Some of us saw shooting stars, others were a bit distracted...
Today (Sunday) was our last day at camp, which was quite emotional saying goodbye to everyone. During the drive to New York most people took the chance to catch up on sleep, which had been lacking over the past few days. It was a long drive, but eventually we arrived and after getting checked into our hotel headed out to take a look at the city. Stopping to get a meal at TJI Fridays then moving on to get a quick feelng for city life. Tomorrow we'll be doing some more sight seeing as we unwind after a busy couple of weeks of camp, and hopefully manage to take in a show in the evening.
Wednesday, 29 July 2009
Rachel's ointment...
Hey! Adrian here blogging today...sorry things have gone quiet for a few days. It's all still going really well so don't worry...silence in this case is a good thing as it means that we're doing lots and working hard!
After a relaxing, but busy, weekend which included visits to Lake George and Saratoga, a new week of overnight camp began on Sunday and a new week of daycamp on Monday. The overnight camp for the next two weeks is made up of high school students - maybe 13-17 years old. That's a very different dynamic to middle school...indeed, some of our team and some of the Beaver Cross Counsellors are around the same age as the older kids. They are adapting really well though. There are three lodges for young people, each with two cabins in them. One lodge is for boys and the other two for girls. This means that the boys cabins are full to the brim. Andrew and Peter have therefore moved to the staff lodge, but they remain as helpers with the overnighters. Both boys are clearly making an impact...they have connected well with young people in both weeks and are popular with the counsellors.
Tara, who had been on daycamp has swapped with Ashleigh, although Ashleigh is sleeping in a cabin with some other counsellors at night. Jennifer, who despite having been under the weather at the end of last week, has been nothing short of brilliant with the day campers, has chosen to remain in daycamp this week...although Jen has been involved in evening activities, remaining with daycamp allows her the option of resting in the evenings if need be. It should also be noted that Windy, the Director of Day Camp, has singled Jennifer out for high praise after watching her work with Nick and Nattie, the two blind children our team is looking after. On Thursday, Soraya and Ash will swap for a day to give Ash another taste of overnight camp and to give Soraya a taste of daycamp. It is easier to swap the girls between daycamp and overnight as the boys would be leaving overnight with bodies short where as with the girls it's a straight swap. I can't tell you how proud I am of the team...they are all engaging really well and while I think this trip is stretching all of us in different ways, it's been a real blessing so far.
Two popular campwide games we played this week were Goldrush and Clue (Cluedo!!). On Monday, some of the staff spent much of the day spraying rocks and dead brances (and trash!) gold. The lodge which collected the most gold would be declared the winner but teams of counsellors armed with water guns were onside to both assist and impede the capture of said gold. A well timed warning from a charitable American allowed me the chance to escape before a mutiny would have seen me drenched...thanks team! A campwide game of clue is pretty special too...each councellor took the part of a character, dressing up and so on, and each had clues to offer campers. Of course, the campers had to work through various forfeits and tasks before getting the clues and figuring out who the bad guy was. What amazed me about both these games is how simple they were...no technology of any account was involved, nor any elaborate ideas. But these sophisticated older children loved it. Almost as much as the staff!
Today we're going to visit the nuns on site. ST Mary's Convent is a community of Episcopal Nuns based on site. I think it will be a really good experience for the team to visit them for afternoon tea because it's something that simply doesn't exist in the Anglican context in Ireland. Last week, as you know, we visited Bishop Bill in Moosehaven. This was a brilliant night but it meant we missed the healing service at camp. Luckily, the second of only two all summer at beaver cross, happens tonight. This is led by Father Nigel Mumford, who is the Director of the healing centre here at CtK...it's a very emotional experience and offers a chance to be really challenged by what God can do in the world today. I think the team is really looking forward to this.
So, about the jock itch...Rachel has a foot fungus. She's been given an ointment for it which is also applicable for jock itch, athlete's foot and ringworm. Sometimes it's probably better not to read the packet...
After a relaxing, but busy, weekend which included visits to Lake George and Saratoga, a new week of overnight camp began on Sunday and a new week of daycamp on Monday. The overnight camp for the next two weeks is made up of high school students - maybe 13-17 years old. That's a very different dynamic to middle school...indeed, some of our team and some of the Beaver Cross Counsellors are around the same age as the older kids. They are adapting really well though. There are three lodges for young people, each with two cabins in them. One lodge is for boys and the other two for girls. This means that the boys cabins are full to the brim. Andrew and Peter have therefore moved to the staff lodge, but they remain as helpers with the overnighters. Both boys are clearly making an impact...they have connected well with young people in both weeks and are popular with the counsellors.
Tara, who had been on daycamp has swapped with Ashleigh, although Ashleigh is sleeping in a cabin with some other counsellors at night. Jennifer, who despite having been under the weather at the end of last week, has been nothing short of brilliant with the day campers, has chosen to remain in daycamp this week...although Jen has been involved in evening activities, remaining with daycamp allows her the option of resting in the evenings if need be. It should also be noted that Windy, the Director of Day Camp, has singled Jennifer out for high praise after watching her work with Nick and Nattie, the two blind children our team is looking after. On Thursday, Soraya and Ash will swap for a day to give Ash another taste of overnight camp and to give Soraya a taste of daycamp. It is easier to swap the girls between daycamp and overnight as the boys would be leaving overnight with bodies short where as with the girls it's a straight swap. I can't tell you how proud I am of the team...they are all engaging really well and while I think this trip is stretching all of us in different ways, it's been a real blessing so far.
Two popular campwide games we played this week were Goldrush and Clue (Cluedo!!). On Monday, some of the staff spent much of the day spraying rocks and dead brances (and trash!) gold. The lodge which collected the most gold would be declared the winner but teams of counsellors armed with water guns were onside to both assist and impede the capture of said gold. A well timed warning from a charitable American allowed me the chance to escape before a mutiny would have seen me drenched...thanks team! A campwide game of clue is pretty special too...each councellor took the part of a character, dressing up and so on, and each had clues to offer campers. Of course, the campers had to work through various forfeits and tasks before getting the clues and figuring out who the bad guy was. What amazed me about both these games is how simple they were...no technology of any account was involved, nor any elaborate ideas. But these sophisticated older children loved it. Almost as much as the staff!
Today we're going to visit the nuns on site. ST Mary's Convent is a community of Episcopal Nuns based on site. I think it will be a really good experience for the team to visit them for afternoon tea because it's something that simply doesn't exist in the Anglican context in Ireland. Last week, as you know, we visited Bishop Bill in Moosehaven. This was a brilliant night but it meant we missed the healing service at camp. Luckily, the second of only two all summer at beaver cross, happens tonight. This is led by Father Nigel Mumford, who is the Director of the healing centre here at CtK...it's a very emotional experience and offers a chance to be really challenged by what God can do in the world today. I think the team is really looking forward to this.
So, about the jock itch...Rachel has a foot fungus. She's been given an ointment for it which is also applicable for jock itch, athlete's foot and ringworm. Sometimes it's probably better not to read the packet...
Sunday, 26 July 2009
These t-shirts are five for $20 ..... let's all get one!
You join us on a gloriously hot Sunday evening ... our first chance to sit down and chillax after a busy weekend.
Our middle schoolers have flown the Beaver Cross nest, but not before providing us with a very entertaining talent show on Friday night, where almost all of the Cabins, a number of counsellors and a bunch of crazy Irish folk all put in super performances. The DDYC contingent will now contemplate either entering Britain's Got Talent or Eurovision after their rousing choruses of Ireland's Call & Tell Me Ma (and we look forward with anticipation to Adrians performance as Stavros Flatley/Susan Boyle this week!) Performance anxiety does not exist at Beaver Cross and each camper thoroughly enjoyed their 15 minutes of fame, before receiving their Cabin Awards. Saturday morning saw clean cabins all round..a first for the week! Parents joined us for the closing ceremony where we showed them everything we had learned in Christian Ed.
After saying our goodbyes an air of excitement filled the staff cabin...it was time...for a Pirate Adventure aaaarrrrrgh! The pirate fleet set sail communicating via walkie talkies and managing to lose each other within 5 minutes of leaving camp! Cap'n Steve with his trusty parrot kept the shipmates (and hairy bikers) hearty with a supply of ice pops and we were good to go!
Half of our fleet went to Pirates Golf whilst the Irish amongst us headed into Lake George on a super hot Saturday. Lake george is 34 miles long and 3 miles wide and is very prettiful...or a Bronagh likened it..Portrush without the Ocean...and Barry's. We strolled the boardwalk, dipped our toes in the lake, checked out the touristy shops and made a pit stop at Ben & Jerry's mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...
Canon Matt and the pirates joined us for an absolutely delicious dinner at the Adirondack Bar & Grill where we were deeply intrigued by the 'Bear Naked' etching on our glasses! We had some retail therapy on the way back, stopping at an outlet centre and parting with a few dollars. Later some of the team headed to the cinema for Harry Potter whilst the rest stayed back to rest their wallets.
This morning we had a much needed lie in..and a Dunkin Donuts breakfast! We made our way to the morning service at the Church on site. The Episcopal Church is a little different to what we have at home. It's a lot more high church..a lot more serious at times and yet very relaxed, last week we witnessed the baptism of a man who had converted from Judaism which was particularly special. Adrian has been assisting with the distribution of Communion, which is also a little different - we have little paper wafers rather than bread.
The Irish made an escape this afternoon for a little more retail therapy at Wilton Mall. I believe significant dents have been made in everyones wallets but we fashionistically better off, Adrian in particular, with his 4 new pairs of shoes. The girls got lost in Target (ridiculously big hypermarket) and we all enjoyed dinner in Panera Bread before making our way back to camp. It was all a bit too much shopping for Andre to take and he fell asleep in the car on the way back..there will be photos to follow :)
Adrian drove us today. What one might have thought could be an horrific experience was actually very pleasant and Adrians first experience of driving was a huge success so we anticipate an increase in trips to K-Mart & Hannaford to stock up on Mountain Dew, Lucky Charms and Hershey Kisses!
Our high schoolers have arrived and we are all looking forward to the week ahead. Some of the team members have swapped their roles but we'll keep y'all in check with that. Please continue to pray for the team as we work out here, that we would all bond with our new cabin groups, that we would continue to work well with the other counsellors, that we would continue to have fun and that we would have the energy to allow us to work to the best of our ability.
Thats all folks,
Ash-a-lee x
P.S. Today we all went to church wearing our Happy Camper Lake George tshirts which Canon Matt bought us yesterday..a sight to behold!
Our middle schoolers have flown the Beaver Cross nest, but not before providing us with a very entertaining talent show on Friday night, where almost all of the Cabins, a number of counsellors and a bunch of crazy Irish folk all put in super performances. The DDYC contingent will now contemplate either entering Britain's Got Talent or Eurovision after their rousing choruses of Ireland's Call & Tell Me Ma (and we look forward with anticipation to Adrians performance as Stavros Flatley/Susan Boyle this week!) Performance anxiety does not exist at Beaver Cross and each camper thoroughly enjoyed their 15 minutes of fame, before receiving their Cabin Awards. Saturday morning saw clean cabins all round..a first for the week! Parents joined us for the closing ceremony where we showed them everything we had learned in Christian Ed.
After saying our goodbyes an air of excitement filled the staff cabin...it was time...for a Pirate Adventure aaaarrrrrgh! The pirate fleet set sail communicating via walkie talkies and managing to lose each other within 5 minutes of leaving camp! Cap'n Steve with his trusty parrot kept the shipmates (and hairy bikers) hearty with a supply of ice pops and we were good to go!
Half of our fleet went to Pirates Golf whilst the Irish amongst us headed into Lake George on a super hot Saturday. Lake george is 34 miles long and 3 miles wide and is very prettiful...or a Bronagh likened it..Portrush without the Ocean...and Barry's. We strolled the boardwalk, dipped our toes in the lake, checked out the touristy shops and made a pit stop at Ben & Jerry's mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...
Canon Matt and the pirates joined us for an absolutely delicious dinner at the Adirondack Bar & Grill where we were deeply intrigued by the 'Bear Naked' etching on our glasses! We had some retail therapy on the way back, stopping at an outlet centre and parting with a few dollars. Later some of the team headed to the cinema for Harry Potter whilst the rest stayed back to rest their wallets.
This morning we had a much needed lie in..and a Dunkin Donuts breakfast! We made our way to the morning service at the Church on site. The Episcopal Church is a little different to what we have at home. It's a lot more high church..a lot more serious at times and yet very relaxed, last week we witnessed the baptism of a man who had converted from Judaism which was particularly special. Adrian has been assisting with the distribution of Communion, which is also a little different - we have little paper wafers rather than bread.
The Irish made an escape this afternoon for a little more retail therapy at Wilton Mall. I believe significant dents have been made in everyones wallets but we fashionistically better off, Adrian in particular, with his 4 new pairs of shoes. The girls got lost in Target (ridiculously big hypermarket) and we all enjoyed dinner in Panera Bread before making our way back to camp. It was all a bit too much shopping for Andre to take and he fell asleep in the car on the way back..there will be photos to follow :)
Adrian drove us today. What one might have thought could be an horrific experience was actually very pleasant and Adrians first experience of driving was a huge success so we anticipate an increase in trips to K-Mart & Hannaford to stock up on Mountain Dew, Lucky Charms and Hershey Kisses!
Our high schoolers have arrived and we are all looking forward to the week ahead. Some of the team members have swapped their roles but we'll keep y'all in check with that. Please continue to pray for the team as we work out here, that we would all bond with our new cabin groups, that we would continue to work well with the other counsellors, that we would continue to have fun and that we would have the energy to allow us to work to the best of our ability.
Thats all folks,
Ash-a-lee x
P.S. Today we all went to church wearing our Happy Camper Lake George tshirts which Canon Matt bought us yesterday..a sight to behold!
Saturday, 25 July 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
