Summer News Summer TranScript 2016

Our own dynamic duo of Karen

Facen, Director of the Altar

Guild, and Ruby Brackett, Chair

of the Annual Altar Guild Tea,

learning to run the technology

From food to vendors to poetry readings to

saxophonists to the Simply Divine Fashion

Show—-The 2016 Altar Guild Tea was wonderful.

Leah and Jason did the Avon Walk in Chicago and want to

thank Transfiguration for helping to support their ministry.

Youth Leadership Team

Wednesdays, 6 PM for Dinner to…

Plan for the Kids’ Crossing Event

Youth Inspired and LedKids’ Crossing

June 28-309-2

$25 per familyRegistration through July 19

The Youth Leadership Team is planning a

summer camp for the elementary school

aged children of the parish and their

friends. The themes of the three days are

Courage, Welcoming the Outcast, and Hope

in Knowing Who You Are. They are

combining Bible Stories with Disney stories

and having skits, crafts, games, and music

to round out the week. Please sign up by

July 19.

The Greater Colesv i l le Cit izens Associat ion (GCCA) serves approxi-mately 3500 households in the Colesville area of eastern Montgomery County, Maryland. We are a civic organization made up of homeown-ers and local business people who actively par-ticipate in the issues that affect the quality of life in our area and sometimes the entire coun-ty. We collectively decide what position to take on issues and then advocate that position primarily with the county government but sometimes on the state level. Everyone is encouraged to attend our monthly meetings where issues are discussed. These meetings are a good way to meet new people, learn what is going on and express your views. We meet on the second Tuesday of each month at 7:30 pm in the Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration, 13925 New Hampshire Ave. More details can be found at www.greatercolesville.org

ECW cordially inv ites you to:

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Taking Soup to the Streets: Church of Our Saviour, Hillandale Delivers

Soup-to-Go is a lay-led ministry.

“It just started about a year-and-a-half ago, and delightfully, I had nothing to do with the beginning, the middle or what is happening right now,” says the Rev. Dr. Robert William Harvey, rector of Church of Our Saviour. “It is so lay led; it is wonderful.”

The idea for the program began when parishioner Olivette Guy-Williams attended a weekday service on a bitter cold March day in 2014. While there she ran into a regular visitor to the church’s food pantry, where volunteers distribute canned goods to those in need.

“I said at the time, with this weather, all he needs is warm bowl of soup,” says Guy-Williams, who de-scribes herself as a retired, stay-at-home grandmother who cares for her grandchildren. “I asked the volunteer at the pantry, ‘When you give canned food, how do they open it? For people like that, how can they warm the beans?’

“So I said, ‘All these people need is a warm bowl of soup. I will talk to the rector and assistant rector and see what they think about it.’”

So began Soup-to-Go, a name that Guy-Williams modeled after the church’s annual Ashes-to-Go event. Located in the Hillandale neighborhood of Silver Spring, the Church of Our Saviour is just two blocks north of the New Hampshire Avenue exit of the Capital Beltway. Every day people without homes can be seen seeking donations while standing on traffic islands, on street corners, under bypasses.

Initially, Guy-Williams thought those in need would come to the church for the soup. For two weeks she made soup and offered it on a table on the church grounds. No one came.

Guy-Williams realized that many of those who needed a meal were busy seeking donations on street corners and couldn’t afford to leave their posts, so she changed tactics and decided to take the soup to them. Since then, a group of two to four parishioners meet every Thursday morning in Our Saviour’s kitchen to prepare homemade soup and then deliver it to about 40 homeless people in the area. In fall, winter and spring they distribute a pint of soup and a bread roll. In the summer they distribute a sand-wich, chips and a bottle of water.

“Most soup kitchens expect people to come to the soup kitchen itself,” Harvey says. “So many of these folks can’t take the time. This is quite literally taking soup to people standing on the street corner.

“It is basically things we have in our food pantry, and then folks donate chicken or ham hocks, or some kind of meat. They put it in a container, get a bun, and take it out to the streets.” Tucked in with the food is a sticker identifying Our Saviour as the source of the food.

“They drive up as far north as Randolph Road and as far south as Langley Park, handing a cup of soup to people asking for money,” Harvey says of the volunteers. “The need is there for a whole lot more; the need far outweighs what we can reasonably do. We give the five loaves and two fish that we have.”

In a related ministry, Church of Our Saviour recently opened Maryland’s first satellite office of Samaritan Ministry of Greater Washington, a program that works with more than 1,000 people who are homeless or in need.

“David Wolf (executive director of Samaritan Ministry) has been targeting Our Saviour because we are right on the beltway,” says Harvey, who has long wanted his parish to get involved with the program. From 9 a. m. to 1 p. m. every Tuesday, volunteers from Our Saviour provide ser-vices include help with immigration issues, résumé building and providing computer and inter-net access.

Guy-Williams also volunteers with Samaritan Ministry.

“When I hand out soup, I tell them to go to Church of Our Saviour on Tuesdays if they need any help,” she says. “With the soup we have a sticker with the church’s name and address on it, and in the brown paper bag, we put the Samaritan Ministry brochure. Some of them do come.”

“Some of the people who come live right under the beltway, and those are the folks who get the soup first,” Harvey says. “It does go quickly. I went twice, and I was quite shocked by how quickly it went.”

Our Saviour Hillandale is one of the branches of The Episcopal

Church in Central Montgomery County. If you would like to help

with this ministry, please give that church a call. Thanks.

opportunitieS to Serve

Sign up on Bulletin Board to Teach

Summer Sunday School

Contact Michael Betteridge

mbetteridge@wthu.org / 301-384-0833

To Teach Sunday School Fall 2016

2016 Camp EDOW ( Episcopal Diocese of Washington) Dates:

Junior Camp (rising 4th-6th graders) July 24 - 29, 2016 Middle Camp (rising 7th-9th graders) July 31 - August 5, 2016 For more information contact: Lynn Chernick, Camp EDOW Ad-ministrator (202) 537-6529 or camp@edow.org.

Registration above.

Canoeing below. Ropes course above.

Swimming below.

Mark Your Calendars Now

October 89 AM

Sacred Grounds PlantingBring work gloves and water hoses