January 2011

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PASTOR'S PAGE

Dear Members and Friends,

Welcome to Ordinary Time! This is the Liturgical season we are in following Christmas. The length of this season of the church year varies every year. It begins The Sunday following Epiphany but ends anywhere between the middle of February to the middle of March. Ordinary time ends with the beginning of Lent on Ash Wednesday. The length of Ordinary Time depends on when Easter is in a particular year. This year Ordinary Time is very long because Easter is very late, only one day before the latest day possible.

Every year it seems that there is a question about how the date of Easter is decided. This great celebration of the Church is on the first Sunday after the first full moon after spring begins. Therefore, this year Ordinary Time begins on January 9th and ends on March 9th, Ash Wednesday. Lent ends on April 24, Easter.

Again, welcome to Ordinary Time. It sounds rather dull. Welcome to the same thing, nothing new or exciting here. We will experience the ordinary, we can't expect anything extraordinary. But this is not what Ordinary means when used in this way. Rather than meaning "common" or "mundane," this term comes from the word "ordinal," which simply means counted time, which is a better way to think of this time of the year. The 33 or 34 Sundays of Ordinary Time are used to focus on various aspects of the Faith, especially the mission of the church in the world.

Again, welcome to Ordinary Time, when the New Testament readings throughout this season will come from the Gospel of Matthew and we will focus on how our faith impacts the world.

Each Sunday as we read about Jesus' life and ministry from Matthew's perspective we will be encouraged to think about our mission in the world. Rather than thinking of Ordinary Time as a time not to do anything extraordinary, we are called to be involved in mission in the world. Instead of doing the ordinary, let's think about what we could do that would be called extraordinary.

Rather than going through this Ordinary Time in an ordinary way, we could plan a mission trip, plan new landscaping for our church, see if it is possible to do a community garden on the college road property, plan a summer meal and activity program for children this summer, create new banners for our sanctuary, or begin a prayer shawl ministry. What extraordinary thing would you like to do during Ordinary Time?

Grace and Peace,

Reverend Linda Maconochie