Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82512159155
phone-in for (audio only) Phone Number: (646) 558-8656
Meeting ID: 825 1215 9155
Welcome/Theme: Forgiveness
Opening Song: Make Me A Channel of Your Peace by Lucia
https://youtu.be/yj0VRG0EmvU?si=anKq79SFPzkJ4jKX
Opening Prayer:
Holy One, you show your love for us every day. Help us to share your love with our family and friends every day, especially when we may be hurt or upset. At those times, let us reach out in forgiveness, or say we’re sorry if we have caused them to be hurt or upset. Through love and forgiveness we are following the way of life that you lived and taught. Amen.
First Reading: Segment of An Autumn Story by Denise Hackert-Stoner
Miranda is 10, and will be a fifth grader in the fall. Her summer has been filled with adventure, as she explored the woods behind her house looking for animal tracks, interesting plants and mushrooms, and insects. She remembers the exciting day that she found a family of young bunnies, hidden by their mother under a screen of fallen leaves and grasses. Miranda had carefully moved a few of the leaves aside, and looked carefully at the baby rabbits, noticing their tiny ears and pink noses. She carefully covered them back up before leaving.
After each of her summer outings Miranda would sit with her drawing pad under her favorite tree, a Locust that grew in the empty lot at the edge of town. She would carefully draw the wonders she had seen, sometimes coloring them in with her colored pencils. Now, as summer is nearing an end, Miranda sits under the Locust tree and looks through her drawing pad. Each drawing brings back beautiful memories of the wonders she discovered in her woods. The bunnies, the wild flowers, the dragonfly with its long blue body and bright wings, the beetles scurrying along the ground, the ants climbing up tree trunks, the bright red bird that landed on a small branch and sang to her, the blue jay with its loud, squawking call. And all the trees, with their leaves and needles, their branches and bark, nuts and cones. All the treasures of the woods are recorded in Miranda’s drawing pad, and in her memory, and in her heart, and she enjoys them today as she flips through her pictures while sitting under the tree.
“What are you doing, sitting in the dirt?” Miranda looks up when she hears the familiar voice. It’s Alice. Alice is beautiful. Alice is a fast runner, and every time the neighborhood children organize a kickball game Alice gets chosen first. Miranda is slow, and when she’s in the outfield her mind wanders, or she gets distracted by a bird flying overhead or by some wildflowers in the field. She always gets chosen last for the team. And one day in fourth grade Alice had looked at Miranda’s favorite sneakers and laughed at the small hole near Miranda’s pinky toe. And now Alice is asking her why she is sitting there in the dirt. Miranda feels afraid that Alice might laugh at her again, and still feels mad that Alice had laughed at her in fourth grade. She feels jealous of how pretty Alice is and how Alice always gets picked first for the kickball team while Miranda is always last. So Miranda ignores Alice. She just keeps looking at her drawing pad, pretending that Alice isn’t even there. Eventually Miranda looks up from her book. Alice is gone. Miranda picks up her pad and goes home.
Have you ever felt like Miranda in our story, hurt, jealous, angry? Has someone like Alice annoyed you or made you feel sad or angry? How have you dealt with those emotions? (open for responses)
I think we all have, at one time or another, felt like Miranda, and maybe even sometime, we’ve acted like Alice causing someone to feel hurt or sad. In both cases, afterward we don’t feel too good about it. Let’s listen to the rest of the story and see what happens between Miranda and Alice.
Second Reading: Segment from An Autumn Story by Denise Hackert-Stoner
Weeks go by. School starts tomorrow. Miranda sits under her favorite tree again, after another outing in the woods. This time she is drawing some of the first leaves of autumn. Maple leaves which she will color orange and red with her colored pencils, and beech leaves which she will color yellow and gold. She has been drawing for a long time, and puts down her pad and pencil to lean back against the comforting bark of the Locust tree. Looking up into its branches, she notices its beautiful orange leaflets, just beginning to fall. They are so pretty, almost dancing in the air as they gently come to the ground. Miranda is tired from her outing and her drawing, and she is so comfortable leaning back against the trunk of her favorite tree. She closes her eyes and soon she is asleep. Miranda dreams, and in her dream she sees the Locust tree. She sees the bunnies, all grown up now. She sees the dragonfly and all the other insects that now fill the pages of her drawing pad. She sees the wildflowers, birds and leaves and trees.
And in her dream they all love her as much as she loves them. And in her dream they all speak to her in one voice, “Be Love.” Waking up, Miranda shakes a few orange leaflets out of her hair, picks up her drawing pad and pencils, and stands up to head for home. But before leaving she looks up into the tree one last time, remembering the dream, and wondering about those words, “Be Love.”
The first week of fifth grade has been busy. Miranda loves her teacher, Mr. Glenn. He takes the class outside every day and leads them in a walk on the nature trail near the school. At recess she finds a quiet place to sit and draw while the kickball game is going on without her. When the weekend comes Miranda heads back into the woods. After exploring for hours, she takes out her drawing pad and sits under the Locust tree. It is a breezy day, and even more of the orange leaflets are falling. Miranda watches them fall, remembering again the words she heard in her dream last week, “Be Love.” And as she remembers, she hears another voice, this one all-too familiar. “Why do you sit under that tree?” Alice. Still so pretty, so fast. Still picked first in the kickball games. Miranda looks up into the beautiful branches of the tree, decorated with orange, spreading out above her head, offering her a comfortable place to sit and draw whenever she wants it. Once again she remembers the words in her dream, spoken by all of the trees, flowers, insects and animals together: “Be Love.” Miranda brings her eyes down from the high branches. She looks in the direction of the voice speaking now. She sees Alice. “I sit here because this is my favorite tree. I like to draw here.” “What do you draw?” asks Alice. Miranda thinks. Would Alice laugh at her again if Miranda tells her about how she likes to draw the creatures in the woods? Would she remind Miranda how slow she is in kickball? Miranda looks up into the branches again. “Be Love.” She opens her drawing book. “Do you want to see?” she asks. Alice sits next to Miranda under the tree, looking at her drawings as Miranda flips through the pages. Alice doesn’t laugh. She smiles. She smiles at the pictures, and looks up to smile at Miranda. “These are so beautiful!” she exclaims. “Do you see them all here under this tree?” So Miranda tells Alice about her treks through the woods and all the wonderful things she has found there. She tells Alice about the flowers, the red bird, the dragonflies. Miranda tells Alice all of it.
Alice listens. The two girls sit together. After a few minutes Miranda says “I’m sorry I ignored you when you came here in the summer. I was afraid because you made fun of my sneakers last year.” Alice looks down at her own sneakers. She says in a quiet voice “I’m sorry I was mean. I don’t know why I did that. I won’t ever make fun of you or your sneakers again.” Both girls are quiet, sitting next to one another under the great branches. Suddenly a strong breeze blows through those branches, sending hundreds of tiny Locust leaflets, some flaming orange, some deep golden, down onto and around the two girls. Beautiful leaflets fill the air, the girls’ hair, the folds of their sweaters, their laps as they sit. At that moment the world is transformed into a golden snow-globe, and the two new friends sit in the center of it. As Miranda sits next to this girl who is now her friend, and looks at the beauty all around her, and listens to the breeze in the branches which seems to be saying “Be Love,” she reaches out and takes Alice’s hand. “You can come to the woods with me next time if you want to,” she says. And Alice does.
These are inspired words by Denise Hackert-Stoner and we affirm them by saying, Amen.
Wow, Miranda receives a message in her dream, “Be Love”. Have you ever had a dream that is so real, that when you wake up you’re surprised it was just a dream? This happens a lot when we’re worried or scared about something, or trying to make an important decision. Dreams have a way, at times, of helping us see things more clearly.
When Alice shows up this time, the message Be Love helps Miranda forgive Alice and invite her to join her under the tree. When’s a time when you either forgave someone or were forgiven by someone? How did it make you feel? In the Gospel reading today, Jesus is asked how many times we should forgive others. His answer is 70 x 7, which basically means every time someone asks you to forgive them.
Did you notice how impressed Alice was with Miranda’s drawings? In the story Miranda was jealous of Alice’s gifts for playing kickball and being pretty, but by the end Alice is impressed with the gift of drawing that Miranda has. We all have gifts, but sometimes we overlook them because we’re looking at someone else’s giftedness. One way friendships are formed is when we accept both our gift or talent, as well as that of our friend(s). Do you have an example of a gift that you have and one that your friend has?
Alleluia: O Love, open my lips and my mouth will declare your praise.
Gospel: A reading from the ancient writings named the Gospel of Matthew (Mt. 18:21-22.
Peter came up and asked Jesus, “When a sister or brother wrongs me, how many times must I forgive? Seven times?” “No,” Jesus replied, “not seven times; I tell you seventy times seven.”
These are inspired words of from the Gospel attributed to Matthew, and we affirm them by saying, Amen.
Statement of Faith
We believe in the Holy One who is in everything we see
And even in everything we cannot see.
As far away as the most distant star and as near as the air we breathe.
The Holy One is there, creating everything out of Love.
We believe in Jesus, who showed us the Holy One
In how he lived his life,
He showed us that the Holy One is
In our lives too.
We believe that we are called to live like Jesus.
We are called to bring peace, and light, healing and kindness,
We are called to be brave and speak up, and help out when
Others are suffering or things are not right.
We believe that the Spirit of the Holy One
Lives in us and in all of creation.
We feel the Spirit in the wind, the warm sun,
The cold snow, and we see it in the faces of other people.
We believe that if we live in the Spirit of the Holy One,
If we remember to act with kindness and courage,
We will make the family of the Holy One larger and larger
Until the whole world is at peace.
Prayers of the Community
We pray now for the things we are grateful for and for the things that worry or concern us. As we bring these prayers today we begin with the words “I bring to the table my leaf, and what makes my friend a friend is ...”
Conclude with:
In love and gratitude, and in faith, we pray for all these things and for all the prayers we hold in our hearts.
LITURGY OF THE EUCHARIST
Now we will pray our great prayer of Thanksgiving, called our Eucharistic Prayer. The beginning of this prayer is a collection of all the things the children have told us they are grateful for. Let us give thanks for these and all the good gifts of our Beloved.
Holy One you have given us all good things. Every friend we meet is a gift from you. We are grateful for all of our friends. We thank you for our bodies, we wouldn’t be here without them. We are grateful for the moon because the sky wouldn’t be the same without it. We thank you for the sun, because it gives us heat and helps the plants make food. And we are thankful for love, Holy One; love that comes from you through the people in our lives. And so in thanksgiving, we sing:
Holy, Holy, Holy: Here in this Place – with lyrics – Christopher Grundy
https://youtu.be/uXyu57tR2gk?si=VrtPUsMtj-9xpRO9
(Invite children to join presiders at the table)
Holy One, we see around us all of your creation. The trees, flowers, birds, animals and insects sing with joy for your creative power. We are your creation too, and we thank you for our lives.
We thank you for sending Jesus, our brother, to show us how to live so that your love can show through in the world. We thank you for your Spirit, which showers your love and wisdom on the earth like rain, and which opens our eyes in wonder.
Please hold your hands out like this… (demonstrate) as we bless the bread and juice.
Holy One, you blessed the grain in this bread and the fruit in this juice as they grew on the earth. The people who baked the bread and made the juice blessed them with their work. Today, with your Spirit, we bless them again, as they become gifts of love, light and truth and remind us that we too are blessed with your Spirit.
Jesus gathered his friends around a table like this. He took the bread, and said a prayer of thanksgiving. Then he broke the bread and shared it with his friends, saying, “Take and eat this bread. It is my very self.”
After the meal, Jesus took the cup of blessing. He said another prayer of thanks, and then he offered his friends the cup saying
“Take and drink of the loving agreement
Made new again through my life in you.
Whenever you remember me like this,
I am among you.”
We are one today with all people who have ever lived, all the people and animals we have loved. With them we ask you, Holy One, for the wisdom to know what is right and the courage to do what is right.
- Help us to be kind to one another.
- Help us to take care of the earth.
- Help us to reach out to people who need our help.
And as we grow, help us to see where your Spirit leads us as our lives unfold in this world of pain and beauty so that we may become wise co-creators of the future.
Like Jesus, we will open up wide all that has been closed about us, and we will live loving lives, for it is through living as Jesus lived, that we awaken to your Light within.
Amen.
We will pass the plate around the circle. When the plate comes to you please take a piece of bread and eat it. As you receive Communion remember the words, You are a Divine Gift
Communion Meditation: Be A Light by Thomas Rhett
Jesus taught us how to love and care for one another and all of creation. We are grateful for our brother, Jesus, who taught us how to pray.
Let us pray like Jesus taught us:
Great Spirit,
You are within, around and among us,
We know you by many names:
Beloved, Holy One, Great Mystery….
May we be wise.
May we live as you want us to live.
Each day you give us all we need.
You guide us and support us in our power.
For you dwell within us,
and we celebrate you now and forever. Amen.
BLESSING
All: AMEN
Closing Song: Show Me Your Smile by Joe Wise
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