On November 30th, Dr. Cherian Verghese will be joining us to provide an informative presentation of Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), Alzheimer's Disease, and the state of research today, entitled “Aging & Forgetting: Current Trends.” You are cordially invited to attend. I initially met Dr. Verghese through Barbara Sorin, an Episcopal chaplain who has provided this congregation with pastoral care assistance from time to time. As Cherian and I got to know one another, I was fascinated by his faith story, and discovered that MCI and Alzheimer's is not just a scientific issue, but a very personal one as both of his parents suffered from this disease. Dr. Verghese currently serves as the

Friends, Over the last several weeks you have received letters and heard Sanctuary announcements about Consecration Sunday and the celebration luncheon. In the last two days I have heard stories of individuals who have felt guilty about their inability to give financially to God's work -- in one case I heard a very funny story of avoiding a home visit that was seeking a financial pledge to the church. That will not happen this year as part of our stewardship campaign. No one will visit you at home seeking a financial pledge. The focus of Consecration Sunday in general and my sermon this week comes to us from Paul's second letter to the church in Corinth. In very brief, we are invited to

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. - Matthew 9:34-36 There is an interesting trend across the world within Churches and mainstream culture. In both business and ministry, people are starting to abandon the old model of “Build it and they will come.” This old model was based off the idea that if you built a great building, business, or program people will be drawn to it, and after they are drawn in you build a relationship with them. Out of this mod

500 years ago there was a man who had doubts about the dominant power of his time. His name was Martin Luther and on October 31, 1517, he pinned a long creed on to the church door in Wittenberg, which was then a small and relatively obscure town in Saxony. The creed contained a list of 95 “theses” challenging the theology (and therefore the authority) of the then all-powerful Catholic church. This rebellious stunt by an obscure monk must have seemed, at the time, like a flea bite on an elephant. But it was the event that triggered a revolution in religious belief, undermined the authority of the Roman church, unleashed ferocious wars in Europe and shaped the world in which most of us (at l