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1 The Epistle – June/July 2020
The
Epi
stle
The monThly newsleTTer of
sT. maTThew’s Parish, Pacific Palisades, ca
Summer 2020Volume 48 No. 10
(Continued on Page 2)
Recently, author and comedian Maeve Higgins wrote an article for The Guardian entitled “Alongside the Paralyzing Fear of Covid-19, Something Else is Bubbling Up: Hope.” She writes, relatably, about the full-time job that worry and fear for herself and her family has taken on over the last four months. Yet, almost despite herself, she also looks at the acts of generosity and self-sacrifice coming from people all around her and feels hope. She writes, “Hope is not simply positive thinking. It’s not the naive instinct of the privileged that says things will surely just get better. Hope is action and, like fighting a virus, it works much better when we do it together.”
As followers of Jesus, we know much about this active hope that Higgins writes about. We know that hope has a way of popping up in the most unlikely and desperate of situations. We know that when we see this hope lived out in brilliant, creative ways it is the work of the Holy Spirit blowing through us.
You do not have to look very far to see examples of people rising above the fear of the pandemic to find novel ways to care for one another. This week I chatted with leaders from three inventive groups: St. Matthew’s Day Camp, Camp Stevens, and the St. Matthew’s alum-created organization, FarmLink.
This time of year, St. Matthew’s campus is usually filled with happy screams and the tell-tale trails of bright dots from melting popsicles. Though St. Matthew’s Day Camp is not happening on campus this year, its staff is volunteering their time to bring camp alive online. Camp Director, Erik Warren, affirms, “Even amidst a worldwide pandemic, these
GOD’S CREATIVITY – HOPE RISING UP AMID A CLIMATE OF FEARBY STEFANIE WILSON
2 The Epistle – June/July 2020
God’s Creativity, continuedyoung people feel called to serve with one another.” So far, counselors have created virtual World Day, encouraging camp-ers to create an internationally-themed activity at home, and a Tie-Dye Tuesday, inviting campers to wear their tie-dyed apparel from camp or make new tie-dyed creations at home. Every Monday night at 7pm, Charlotte Jones leads camp sing-alongs over Facebook live, while campers and alums eagerly type requests into the chat box (https://www.facebook.com/TheParishofStMatts/live_videos/). More fun is in the works. While the coming activities are all top secret for now, Assistant Camp Director Katie Powell confirms that counselors are very busy “creating a little camp magic for home.”
Camp Stevens, our diocesan summer camp in beautiful Julian, announced in March that its campus would be closed for retreat programs and then had to cancel summer sessions. Like Day Camp, this has not stopped their creative outreach to campers. As soon as closures were announced, Camp Staff got to work creating lesson plans and accompanying videos for schools that would usually come to learn about gardening and the environment on their campus. They posted videos of virtual hikes, visits with the chickens, and continue to host a camp sing along on Thursday nights at 5:30pm (https://www.facebook.com/campstevensjulian/).
In addition, with no guests, the camp suddenly found themselves with a garden full of fresh produce and relatively few people to feed. Recognizing the need in the town around them, the staff got to work creating fresh produce boxes to sell to local residents and donate to a nearby food bank. Most recently, as restrictions ease, the
camp has opened up their bucolic campus to day hikers, locals wanting to use their pool, and to newly-imagined family retreats. Over the 4th of July weekend, 20 people came to camp for a socially distanced family retreat. The camp took every precaution to distance families, yet still offered a taste of camp, even encouraging families to make small floats and costumes for a parade. Families can book their own weekend retreat here: http://campstevens.org/book-a-retreat/.
The FarmLink Project began as St. Matthew’s Parish School alums Max Goldman, Aidan Reilly, and James Kanoff were sent home from college due to COVID-19 and wondered with friends how they could help. In the wake of restaurants, hotels, and schools closing, they all began to see news reports of farmers across the country having to dispose of thousands of pounds of perfectly good produce as lines for food banks grew longer and longer. The students imagined ways to connect farmers directly to the food banks, tackling the issues of food waste and loss of income for farmers as well as hunger and food shortages in the economic downturn. The project started by raising money to transport 50,000 onions from Oregon to Los Angeles where they were delivered to hurting food banks. As of now, FarmLink estimates that they have delivered food for over 5,000,000 meals. Their team has also grown to almost 200 volunteers, most of whom are students home from the pandemic. When I asked Max Goldman what makes him get up every day to do this work, he said, “People from all over the country donate to us and want to volunteer. It gives me hope that we could get through this. People joined this movement without even knowing us and who we are. They want to solve a world-wide problem.” FarmLink is always looking for more people to get involved. They need volunteers willing to gather data and reach out to farmers. They also need donations to continue their vital work. In addition to visiting their website, https://thefarm-linkproject.org/, you can follow their impressive work on Insta-gram @farmlinkproject.
In the midst of this pandemic, there is much to worry about and fear, and still much to be grateful for and hopeful about. God’s infinite creativity is bubbling up as people right here band together to find local and global solutions to all kinds of problems. Thanks be to God.
Above: Family members make lemonade together at Camp Stevens. Photo courtesy of Camp Stevens.
Right: FarmLink volunteers loading milk on delivery trucks. Photo courtesy of FarmLink.
3 The Epistle – June/July 2020
Outreach N
ews
Huge THanks from HollygroveBY TRACY METZGER
A huge huge thank you from Hollygrove! Kathy Bitting recently made a donation from the St. Matthew’s kitchen freezer of about two dozen casseroles. In addition, Kathy, Heather Hilterbrand and Jocelyn Cortese donated food staples, toilet paper, diapers, cleaning supplies, art supplies, as well as homemade cookies from the Cortese Family. It was such a joy to be able to bring food and needed supplies from Sr Matthew’s to the families at Hollygrove. The staff is so grateful and happy and sends a huge thanks.
masks for sT. margareT’s CenTer
St. Margaret’s Center also shares its gratitude for homemade masks made by Kathy Bitting and delivered by Tracy Metzger. Thanks to the Outreach Commission for its outstanding support of our Outreach Partners and for inspiring the St. Matthew’s community to be involved.
Top Right: Kathy Bitting loads casseroles from the Parish Center kitchen into her car.
Right: One of Hollygrove’s staff members is delighted to receive donations from St. Matthew’s
Outreach Commission members.
Below: Tracy Metzger delivers hand-sewn face masks to St. Margaret’s Center.
an uplifTing updaTe from gaia
Good news comes from GAIA’s most recent newslet-ter! “While prevention of COVID-19 is extremely hard to measure, especially for a novel virus, we are thrilled to report that there have only been five confirmed cases in the districts we operate our mobile clinics (out of the 941 confirmed cases nation-wide.) And thanks to the full PPE and rigorous social distancing protocols, our mobile clinic teams have stayed virus free.”
Below: Joyce Jere, GAIA’s Country Director, shares a hand washing bucket and soap with GVH Matipwiri in a ceremoni-al exchange to kick off the distribution of COVID-19 preven-
tion supplies.
4 The Epistle – June/July 2020
Outreach ThanksThank you from NYA! On behalf of NYA, I want to extend heartfelt thanks to the St. Matthew’s community for insuring successful finishesto our 2019-2020 PERSONAL BEST and Scholarship programs, and for guaranteeing their continued viability in theacademic year ahead. Stay-at-Home Scholarship DinnerThank you for helping us meet and exceed our $100,000 Stay-at-Home Scholarship Dinner and scholarshipfundraising drive goal. We greatly appreciated everyone who Zoomed in to our events, visited our virtual fundraisersite, clicked on the “Donate Now” button, purchased virtual tickets to the dinner, bought teacher wish-list items atthe virtual Pop-Up-Store, sponsored the event or supported our scholarship program. Because of your enthusiasticand generous support, we were able to raise a record-breaking $112,275 for NYA, including $86,360 in scholarshipsfor our 23 deserving 2020 scholarship recipients, and a much-needed $25,915 for student services/agencyoperations. ScholarshipsOf the 24 scholarship awards presented at our Opening Zoom event on 5/9, St. Matthew’s helped finance seven,including six Tita Mann scholarships, funded by parishioners and other friends of NYA, and the Wayne and MaryMuller scholarship, subsidized by the St. Matthew’s Outreach Commission. I am looking forward to keeping you updated on the progress of the six inspiring 2020 Tita Mann Scholarshiprecipients, whom many of you supported with generous donations of all sizes: Itzel Aquino is a 2nd year Psychologymajor at San Francisco State University with a minor in Asian American Studies; Estefani Cruz is a graduate of AnimoVenice Charter High School attending UC Santa Cruz or University of Redlands with an interest in majoring inCreative Writing and Music; Raquel Gonzalez is in her second year at Cal State Monterey Bay on a pre-med trackwith a major in biology and a minor in Chemistry; Daniel Miguel is a third year Psychology major at Cal StateMonterey Bay with a minor in Music; Monica Nuñez is a fourth year Korean Culture major at UC Irvine; and AdrielValdez is in his third year of a Computer Engineering major at San Francisco State University. St. Matthew’s Outreach Commission’s generous gift of $2,500 for the Wayne and Mary Muller Scholarship willsupport Jocelyn Perez, a Venice High School graduate, as she pursues a computer-science major at UC Irvine. I haveno doubt we will be hearing positive news about Jocelyn, a straight-A student and STEM enthusiast, who receivedthis year’s NYA Academic Achievement Award. One-Time Emergency Grant and vital Outreach Commission GrantNYA’s scholarship program depends upon the foundation of a well-funded, well-administered PERSONAL BEST after-school program, and especially in these uncertain times, we are deeply grateful for parish patronage in this area. This spring, as NYA was dealing with the challenges of the pandemic which hit our low-income families hard, theParish Outreach Commission stepped in with a much-appreciated one-time Emergency $2,500 grant to help usbridge the digital divide and continue providing essential emotional and academic support to our students and theirfamilies. And last but certainly not least, NYA is indebted to the St. Matthew’s Outreach Commission for its generous $15,000grant towards our after-school programs and daily operations. Now more than ever, Parish support is vital. Withyour help, NYA will be able to carry out its vision of strengthening and empowering our local Latino community fromwithin, which will be essential to the future well-being of its members. From the bottom of my heart, thank you, St. Matthew’s, for joining with NYA to live out this year’s dinner theme,“Moving Together Towards a Bright Future.” I feel blessed to be partnering with you to carry out this holy ministry. with gratitude and love, Sarah
5 The Epistle – June/July 2020
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Kevin Fahy, Board Chair
Andrew Besser
James C. Birch
Odat Elsey
Deb Feinberg
Mark Freund
Christine Grella, PhD
Shawn Hezar
Stanley J. Janowiak
Dana J. Kelly, Jr.
Harry Nelson, J.D. Jeanne L. Obert, MFT, MSM Abhilash Patel
Dorothy Richards
Jeffery N. Wilkins, MD, FASAM, DFAPA
CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
Lisa Steele, PhD
June 12, 2020 The Parish of Saint Matthew C/O Jocelyn Cortese 1031 Bienveneda Ave PO Box 37 Paciifc Palisades, California 90272 Dear Jocelyn, Thank you for your generous gift of $15,000.00 to CLARE|MATRIX. On behalf of everyone we serve, and all the clinicians and staff in our programs, I want you to know that your gift is especially meaningful at this critical time. We truly appreciate the support we receive from our donors recognizing the challenges we face with COVID-19. The precautions necessary during this pandemic have meant increased costs as well as losses in revenue, as CLARE | MATRIX had to suspend group trainings for healthcare providers. We have more one-on-one instead of group therapies, we’ve begun telehealth treatments, engaged more nursing staff and put in place protective protocols and equipment to honor social distancing and best practices. From our humble beginnings passing out blankets on the beaches of Santa Monica more than fifty years ago, we’ve grown into a multi-site organization with treatment programs rooted in 12-step and evidence-based practices, invested in a continuum of care. But we have remained true to our mission: no one is turned away because of an inability to pay. Indeed, most of our participants are unhoused when they enter our program. As a supporter of CLARE | MATRIX, The Parish of Saint Matthew is a real partner in this work. Thank you again. With gratitude, Sarah Doering CLARE | MATRIX is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization Tax ID 23-7076166. All donations are tax-deductible.
6 The Epistle – June/July 2020
STA
FF D
IREC
TO
RY
&
CA
LEN
DA
RThe office is currently closed, so email is the
best way to reach us right now.
The Rev. Bruce A. Freeman, Rector (Ext. 130) [email protected]
The Rev. Christine F. Purcell, Associate Rector (Ext. 129) [email protected]
The Rev. Stefanie G. Wilson, Assistant Priest (Ext. 183) [email protected]
Ms. Missy Morain, Director of Program Minis-try; (Ext. 139) [email protected]
•Ms. Lyris Amador, Director of Administration
(Ext. 180) [email protected]. Andrea Bostick, Director of Development
(Ext. 182) [email protected]. Craig Ehlers, Chief Financial Officer (Ext.
126) [email protected]. Greg Heidt, Director of Facilities and Op-
erations (ext. 108) [email protected]. Jennifer McCarthy, Director of Communi-
cations (Ext. 128) [email protected]. Dwayne Milburn, Director of Music (Ext.
179) [email protected]. Jeremias Mendez, Special Projects Manager
(Ext. 133) [email protected]. Haesung Park, Parish Organist, hpark@
stmatthews.comMs. Shawn Silletti, Administrative Assistant
(Ext. 100) [email protected]
•The Rev. Kristin Barberia, School Chaplain
(Ext. 125) [email protected]. Edward Kim, SMPS Head of School (Ext.
146) [email protected]
MISSION STATEMENT
We are a Christian community, and
Welcome all, wherever they are in their journey,
Nourish all who seek unity with God and each other in Christ, and
Serve all, striving to do Christ’s work in the world.
Tune in to our programs via the Parish of St. Matthew
Facebook Page: www.stmatthews.com/live
Sundays9:00 am Sunday Worship
Mondays7:00 pm Day Camp Sing-Along
Wednesdays10:00 am Morning Prayer
Weekdays5:00 pm Music with Richard
Staff Directory
Online Services and Prayer Requests
Keep in Your praYers
Please pray for Carol Lanning, Sam Hill, Sean Mitchell, Lee, Ray, Jacob, Griselda, Dave Pierce, Manny, Wendy, Sherry, Alan, Mary, Clayton, Isabel, Kryan, Jon, John, Randy Smith, Charles Lanks, Linda, Trip Power, Janice Deneen, Carol, Bill, Sarah, Lori, Jin Park, and all affected by COVID-19.
We also remember those who have died in the hope of Christ’s resurrection: Mar Jennings and Kwan Seo. Please know that in addition to your praying for these persons, they are prayed for regularly throughout the week by clergy and by members of our Intercessory Prayer Group
If you would like to add, keep, or remove someone from this list, please call The Rev. Christine Purcell at 310/573-7787, ext. 129. Prayer requests will automatically be kept on the list for one month only.
