December 15, The Third Sunday in Advent

Thank you to everyone who has so far:  Sent in their Annual Giving Pledge Card,Taken a Gift Card from the Hillsides Tree, Signed up for Altar Flowers for 2014, Signed up to give Christmas Decorations.   We are very grateful.

Hillsides Toy Drive for Christmas  Mission Giving

Thank you to everyone who has taken a gift card from the Christmas tree for The Hillsides Christmas Toy Drive   This is one of our regular Mission Giving activities.  This year, Hillsides has given us a list of generic, normal, regular, whatever word you like, toys so that you don’t have to be an engineer from MIT or spend all your time watching MTV to figure out what the gifts are.  The Christmas tree will be on the patio Sunday.  We collect the toys at the Children’s Christmas Eve Service.  There are still some gift cards on the tree which you can take the next two Sundays.

Annual Giving for 2014 underway

Thank you to everyone who has sent a Pledge Card for Annual Giving for 2014 

With All Saints we begin our Annual Giving Pledge drive for 2014.  We ask parishioners and friends to make a pledge to support the parish financially for the year to come.  Annual Giving Pledges fund the operation of the Parish.   .  With a  parish this size it is imperative that everyone participate.  Everyone’s gift matters.  Bill Woods tells us why. 

The generations that preceded ours built COA and held it in trust for the generations, like ours, that followed them.  We hold it in trust for the generations that follow us.  The best way to make sure that COA will be there for future generations as it has been there for us is to make sure that it is in at least as good a spot as the church we received from the generation that preceded us.  So how are we doing on that score?

COA's expenditures have declined from where they were before the Great Recession, and have stayed flat since then.  COA's Finance Committee reviewed COA's books for places where we could economize, and could find nothing of any size.   The revenues on which we rely to operate COA on a day-to-day basis (our contributions and the movie money) have fallen since the Great Recession.  The Great Recession contributed to this reduction in revenue, but it isn't the only reason.  COA has lost generous members to transitions out of the area and to death, and we have not yet replaced them.

Historically, COA paid its current expenses out of current revenues, and left its endowment for improvements and major items.  However, COA has spent about $30,000 more each year since 2008-2009 than it has taken in from our pledges and movie shoots.   We have paid for this shortfall out of COA's endowment because we didn't want to cut more from COA's mission than was appropriate.  COA's endowment can handle spending at this level.  But it means that we are taking from the patrimony left to us by the generations that preceded us to pay for our daily operations.  We are taking from COA's endowment not because we want to or because it's the right thing to do, but because we have to in order to continue to fund a very lean operation.

The Great Recession has ended for none of us, and continues to weigh heavily on many of us.  COA asks that each of us do for it only what we are comfortable doing.  However, please consider our stewardship of COA as you consider the pledge letter that is on its way.  

We are about half way through the Annual Giving Drive.  Please return your pledge card as soon as you can 

Altar Flowers 2014

Thank you to everyone who has signed up for giving Altar Flowers on the Sundays of 2014.  There are several dates still open.   You can email your date and memorial into the Church Office.  We’ll have the sign up sheet out again on Sunday. 

Open Dates for Altar Flowers 2014

January 19 & 26,  February 2, 16, & 23,  June 15 & 22, July 13, August 24 & 31, September 14, October 5 & 12, November 23 & 30, December 7, 14, 21 

Christmas Decorations for 2013

Thank you to everyone who has signed up for giving to the Christmas Decorations   There are still some offerings needed.  We need four more flower arrangements at $25.00 each.  There is also a need for poinsettias and there is no limit on the number.   You can email into the office for any of these or signup on the  poster with pictures of the decorations: wreaths, window arrangements, garlands, poinsettias, and the altar flowers.   The poster will be out this coming Sunday.  Please put your check in the envelope on the poster. 

Decorating the Church for Christmas

We will decorate the Church for Christmas on Saturday, December 21 at 9:00 a.m.  There is a lot to do and we need a lot of volunteers.  We’ll set up the Christmas trees in the Sanctuary and decorate them.  This is especially fun for children and young people.   We give the Church a good cleaning, put up the candles, the wreaths, and other decorations, and just make the place look fabulous.  We need people of all ages to come out and help.  It takes a couple of hours and is a lot of fun. 

Emmaus Road  Mondays 7:00 p.m.

Emmaus Road continues its annual reflections for Advent.  We are reading articles from the Advent/Christmas anthology Watch for the Light.   The readings are short but very poignant and a good way to enter into and observe the Advent season.  The readings for this coming Monday will be on the table outside Church on Sunday.   

Food For Thought

It is not hard for those who’ve been practicing Christians for a long time to loose touch with just how wonderful our Christian faith really is.  It is helpful every so often to consider the alternatives.  On the Food For Thought Table this Sunday will be an article about just one of the many alternatives out there.  The article comes from a recent issue of The New Republic, and is called, The Fall of the House of Moon.  You remember the Moonies don’t you?  I do, since they were all over Berkeley when I was seminary.  This article gives the history of the Unification Church and Rev. Moon and what has happened to his enterprise since his death.  As has been said, the problem with atheism is not that a person believes in nothing, but that a person will believe in anything!