epiScope

Cash crunch jeopardizes Katrina relief network

4,600 families remain on waiting list for help
By Bruce Nolan
New Orleans (LA) Times-Picayune
March 19, 2008

A network of private relief workers that helped thousands of battered families put their lives together after Hurricane Katrina has begun unraveling with thousands of families still on waiting lists, even as its managers cast about for new sources of money to keep it going at a reduced level.

As the network shrinks, about 4,600 families will have to wait longer for help, officials of the network said. Some might become entangled in more red tape -- and face longer waits -- as their files are shifted from laid-off workers into new hands.

Members of the network are sorting through their cases, trying to prioritize which families need immediate help before the program shuts down March 31 and their cases are transferred, said Tom Costanza, a local Catholic Charities relief executive who leads the board of the Greater New Orleans Disaster Recovery Partnership, a coalition of private relief groups.

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Making a difference

Uganda mission trip subject of presentation
By Angela E. Lackey
Midland (MI) Daily News
03/08/2008

    They went there to make a difference. They returned changed inside.

    The 2008 Uganda Mission Team will talk about their work and experiences at 6:30 p.m. Sunday at Memorial Presbyterian Church. The public presentation will be in the church's fellowship hall and begin with a potluck supper at 6 p.m. There will be pictures, examples of Ugandan handcrafted baskets and bead jewelry for purchase and information on orphan sponsorship.

    Team leader Sue Waechter said team members will talk about the mission's purpose and projects. They also will talk about their impressions and how the trip impacted them.

    The mission trip was Jan. 29 through February 13. The group went to the Muko sub-county in Uganda's southwest Kabale District. Waechter said the mission had three major purposes -- to develop an orphan sponsorship program, to build a new medical clinic and install a solar-powered vaccine refrigerator, and to organize village women with HIV/AIDS to sell their handicrafts.

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Benedict's Rule
Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal
By Galen Holley
3/8/2008

ABERDEEN - A couple of years ago, 25-year-old CJ Meaders was anything but quiet, playing his guitar in coffee houses and bars in Mississippi college towns. These days, he and his two house mates pass hours in quiet contemplation.

Meaders lives in an "intentional community" of three. Together with his house mates - Bailey Ward, 24, of West Point, and Watson Lamb, 22, of Greenwood - they comprise the Bishop's Mission Corps, a project of the Episcopal Diocese of Mississippi designed to help twenty-somethings become leaders in the church.

Men in black

In its present incarnation, the Corps - a nine-month commitment, this time with only three males - grew out of a 40-day co-ed retreat, the first of which was two years ago at Camp Bratton-Green in Canton. It was conceived by Bishop Duncan Gray III, with the help of the Rev. Tim Jones, formerly of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Corinth, as a way for young people to step back from contemporary culture. Although the Corps operates under the auspices of the Episcopal Church, it is open to all people of faith.

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Church members help rebuild Mississippi
KARI C.BARLOW
Northwest Florida Daily News
March 8th, 2008

FORT WALTON BEACH – Imagine a place where people from different states gather to rebuild the houses of complete strangers.

They pay out of their own pockets for the opportunity to install drywall, hang sheetrock and yank out window frames.

The hours are long, but smiles, hugs and home cooked food are abundant.

That place is Camp Coast Care in Longbeach, Miss., a ministry of Lutheran Episcopal Services.

Located in the heart of Hurricane Katrina’s devastation, the ministry has a simple mission – renovating and rebuilding storm-ravaged homes.

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HOUSING HURDLES

A City Hall program that provides builders with cheap vacant lots seized for back taxes has shut down even as volunteers are plentiful
By Bruce Nolan
New Orleans (LA) Times-Picayune
February 25, 2008

Working between torrential rainstorms last week, more than a hundred volunteers -- from Massachusetts high school students to Amish and Mennonite couples from rural Indiana -- helped build seven new homes in Katrina-ravaged Central City, evidence that New Orleans' needs are still felt by workers from far away.

But there's the prospect that one day willing hands might have to go idle.

The City Hall program that provided builders cheap vacant lots seized for back taxes has shut down, at least for a while, even as volunteers are plentiful, according to a major faith-based housing agency that uses the lots.

The shutdown is part of a larger plan to make an agency outside City Hall, the New Orleans Redevelopment Authority, the single disburser of all land -- however acquired -- for redevelopment in post-Katrina New Orleans. But NORA is still gearing up.

"We're hungry for more property," said Brad Powers of Jericho Road, a post-Katrina housing initiative launched by the Episcopal Diocese of Louisiana. "But the whole process appears to have stalled out."

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Holy ground

Biloxi begins search for new landmarks
The Associated Press
Feb. 13, 2008
…
The Episcopal Church of the Redeemer sanctuary and its bell tower, both on Biloxi's list of landmarks, also were lost to Katrina.

However, because both were so significant to the city's rich history, and because a Hurricane Camille memorial remains at that location, the new landmark ordinance proposal before the City Council would designate the entire property as a landmark site.

The Rev. Harold F. Roberts said whether the word landmark is associated with the Church of the Redeemer really doesn't matter.

"This is holy ground. And it will continue to be holy ground," he said.

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Purple, gold and green return

Parade Returns, and New Orleans’s Heart Rejoices
By LESLIE EATON
New York Times
February 2, 2008

NEW ORLEANS — Amid the riot of purple, gold and green — the flowers, the bunting, the flags, the tinsel, the masks and the wreaths outside the Negrottos’ house on Orleans Avenue near City Park — there is a new addition to the holiday décor: A big banner proclaiming, “Welcome Home Endymion.”

Each float rider spends hundreds of dollars on beads, balls and gee-gaws that are thrown to the crowd along the parade route.

Endymion is the krewe of merrymakers that puts on the biggest and most lavish Mardi Gras parade in this Mardi Gras-crazy town, the only parade that traditionally rolls through the decidedly nontouristy neighborhood known as Mid-City.

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The work of ministry

Beachfront churches rebuild along the Mississippi Coast
By Jean Prescott
McClatchy Newspapers
January 25, 2008

BILOXI, Miss. -- Up, down and around the Mississippi Coast, rebuilding lags, no more certainly than along U.S. 90, aka Beach Boulevard, the scenic drive.

Notably absent are many of the churches that once dotted this thoroughfare. Evidence of them either has been hauled away or is overgrown. Some areas, mostly west of Gulfport, Miss., but a couple of pockets in Biloxi, Miss., too, are so changed as to make locating even the site of a razed church -- or business or historic home -- impossible. On a recent drive the breadth of 90 in Harrison County, we couldn't find where St. Patrick Episcopal Church had stood in Long Beach.

The pastor of that congregation, the Rev. David Knight, was not surprised by that observation. His congregation continues to worship at Camp Coast Care in a community building right behind Coast Episcopal School.

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Children make a prayer quilt
Nogales (AZ) International
January 25, 2008

A colorful prayer quilt adorns the parish hall at St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Nogales. It was made by children for children at the Episcopal Diocese of Arizona's annual convention in Phoenix recently.

More than 50 children saw the St. Andrew's Children's Clinic video and decided to send a prayer quilt. It was blessed by the bishop and given to delegates from St. Andrew's Church to present to the clinic's patients.

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Teen elected president of churchwomen's group
By ERIN SMITH
Pueblo (CO) Chieftain - Star Journal
January 26, 2008

ALAMOSA - A 16-year-old Alamosa High School sophomore has been elected president of the Episcopal Churchwomen at St. Thomas the Apostle Episcopal Church here.

Samantha Sparrow, daughter of Linda Sparrow, was unanimously elected this month to the post traditionally reserved for the graying set. It is believed she is the youngest woman to be elected to the position in parish's history.

She replaces her grandmother, Mary Sparrow.

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New sites, new rites

RETURNING TO BEACHFRONT SITES CAN BE DIFFICULT FOR MANY CHURCHES
By JEAN PRESCOTT
Gulfport (MS) Sun Herald
Jan. 11, 2008

Up, down and around the Mississippi Coast rebuilding lags, no more certainly than along U.S. 90, aka Beach Boulevard, the scenic drive.

Notably absent are many of the churches that once dotted this thoroughfare. Evidence of them either has been hauled away or is overgrown. Some areas, mostly west of Gulfport but a couple of pockets in Biloxi, too, are so changed as to make locating even the site of a razed church - or business or historic home - impossible. On a recent drive the breadth of 90 in Harrison County, we couldn't find where St. Patrick Episcopal Church had stood in Long Beach.

The pastor of that congregation, the Rev. David Knight, was not surprised by that observation. His congregation continues to worship at Camp Coast Care in a community building right behind Coast Episcopal School.

And St. Patrick will not be one of the churches returning to the beachfront. "We were meticulous, careful and prayerful about where to go," he said earlier in the week, "and the people of our parish decided they didn't want to have to rebuild again," having lost the church twice - to Camille in 1969 and to Katrina.

What of the others?

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New Light Service focuses on family
Good Shepherd Episcopal Church service is popular
By HARRY WILLIAMSON
Houston Chronicle
Jan. 7, 2008, 2:15PM

The family-oriented New Light Service, started several months ago at Good Shepherd Episcopal Church in Kingwood, has proven to be highly popular, especially among the kids.

"We now have some children who are waking up their parents on Sunday morning just to go to church," said the Rev. Bob Goolsby, assistant pastor, who conducts the services.

The service is definitely user-friendly for young people.

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Progress

Home for the holidays takes on new meaning
Gulfport (MS) Sun-Herald
Nov. 23, 2007

It's looking good. It's looking really, really good.

My church's rebuilding is coming along well. Every morning when a friend and I walk, I get to see a little more of what's going on at St. Peter's by-the-Sea Episcopal Church's beachfront site.

For the past two years, we've jokingly called ourselves St. Peter's in-the-Sea. Bishop Duncan Gray calls us St. Peter's by-K-Mart because the kind folks at Handsboro Presbyterian Church are letting us borrow their building when they're not using it.

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Deal leaves debris at curb

Despite contract, gutting trash won't get picked up
By Michelle Krupa
New Orleans (LA) Times-Picayune
November 01, 2007

The mound of rotted drywall and moldy planks piled recently outside the wrecked house in Algiers looked more or less identical to the countless heaps that have littered the New Orleans landscape since Hurricane Katrina.

But as volunteers with the Episcopal Diocese's disaster response team soon learned, this batch of gutted debris bore one important difference: Unlike the piles they had tirelessly deposited on curbsides across town during the past two years, a trash crew would not be coming to pick up this one.

The heap festered for days as complaints rolled in from neighbors, including a mom who said her toddler had tried to jump into the garbage, said Katie Mears, director of the church's recovery office.

The diocese ended up paying $600 to have the pile hauled away, a considerable sum for a charity whose work also includes rehabbing houses.

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Lending a hand

In New Orleans, Rebuilding With Faith
By NEELA BANERJEE
The New York Times
October 26, 2007
…
It is unclear exactly how much housing religiously affiliated groups and churches have built since last year, when most began their efforts. But interviews with five of the groups — Providence Community Housing, Habitat for Humanity, Volunteers of America, the Episcopal Diocese of New Orleans Jericho Road Project and First Evangelist Baptist Church — showed that since 2006, about 350 housing units have come onto the market, a pace officers at the groups said should accelerate as they acquire more property and line up financing.

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Residents want to help
Donations come in from San Gabriel Valley
By Robert S. Hong
San Gabriel Valley (CA) Tribune
10/26/2007

PASADENA - With fires raging throughout Southern California and reports of more than 500,000 people displaced from their homes, efforts to bring aid to disaster survivors have started trickling into the San Gabriel Valley, officials said Wednesday.
…
Officials at All Saints Episcopal Church of Pasadena also were joining the assistance effort, planning a collection of monetary donations this Sunday on the church lawn.

"We are urging our congregation to be generous," said the Rev. Susan Russell. "We have the Episcopal Relief and Development on the ground in San Diego and they are giving direct relief."

Episcopal Relief and Development is a worldwide agency that provides emergency assistance.

Adding fuel to the flame of their efforts is the fact that a fellow Episcopalian priest was one of the victims of the fire, Russell said.

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Peace...and justice

Concert For Peace At National Cathedral
Fundraiser Celebrating Congressional Medal For Dalai Lama
CBS News
Oct. 17, 2007

(CBS/AP) The National Cathedral in Washington - home to so many momentous ceremonies over the years, including state funerals - was host to another kind of event Tuesday: an interfaith Pray for Peace service, followed by a Pray for Peace Concert.

Both were organized not so much in reaction to Iraq, but more to pray for an end to all wars, and also to honor the Dalai Lama, who has embraced non-violence throughout his some 50 years of exile from Tibet and is to receive a Congressional Gold Medal on Wednesday.
…
Looking around the huge sanctuary before the concert, David Crosby acknowledged that it was an unusual venue for him.

"I have a lot of trouble with organized religions," said Crosby, in an interview with the Washington Post, adding that his faith has been renewed by Episcopal Bishop John Bryson Chane, who also happens to be a musician. "He's got real courage, to say war is not the answer. I feel comfortable here."

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Residents rally against poverty in downtown Escondido
Local event part of worldwide awareness effort
By: DAVID GARRICK
North County (CA) Times
October 17, 2007

ESCONDIDO -- Carrying handmade signs and chanting together, 60 residents from across North County staged a peaceful rally against worldwide poverty Tuesday night outside Escondido City Hall.

Organizers said the goal of the rally was to raise awareness about the root causes of poverty and inequality, and to inform people that poverty can easily be eradicated if world leaders make it a priority.

Similar rallies were held around the globe on Tuesday, but there were no others in San Diego County. The rallies were coordinated by Stand Up and Speak Out, an anti-poverty group that hopes to break the world record for greatest number of people rallying against poverty in one day.

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Canada honor students help in rebuilding New Orleans home
San Mateo County (CA) Times
10/16/2007

FOUR Canada College honor students spent two days helping to rebuild a New Orleans house destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

Rene Rivera, Denise Pincomb, Mandi McIntosh and Carson Conner-Collado last month joined other students from an Alabama community college in an effort organized by the Episcopal Diocese of New Orleans.

The group shoveled sand, erected support beams, installed insulation and laid flooring.

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Power tools

Local church donates tools to New Orleans Diocese
By KIMBERLY LONG
The Fulton (MO) Sun

Penny Phillips is a strong-minded woman. When she decides to do something, nothing can stand in her way.

Phillips, 57, is a member of St. Alban's Episcopal Church in Fulton, to which she commutes every Sunday from Jefferson City.

While remodeling her 1930's home recently, she suffered an injury to her hands that required a surgery that pretty much ended her renovation plans.

Doctors told her if she continued using the power tools and machinery that she had purchased for the refurbishing project, she would ruin her hands permanently.

Determined to make the most of the bad news, Phillips began thinking of what she could do with her abundance of tools that were too expensive to just lie around and collect dust.

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Answering God's call

Priest's journey answers call of need
By Michael Paulson
The Boston Globe
September 24, 2007

BILOXI, Miss. - The Rev. Jane Bearden has lived in Massachusetts for 23 years, but when Hurricane Katrina swept through the region of her birth, she felt the tug of her childhood home.

So earlier this year, Bearden sold her house in Georgetown, bid farewell to the parish in Methuen she had been overseeing, and moved to Biloxi to attempt an unusual experiment in hurricane relief - the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts is employing her for at least two years to work as a priest at a historic parish whose seaside building was one of six Episcopal churches along the Mississippi coast that were demolished by the devastating storm of August 2005.

Bearden's move is the most visible sign of an intensive effort by the Massachusetts diocese to pour resources into this region; the diocese says it has sent several hundred volunteers to work repairing houses here, it has raised $250,000 for the region, and a Boston-based bishop, Roy F. "Bud" Cederholm Jr., has visited six times. One Massachusetts parish, in Winchester, held a shrimp boil to raise money for the hurting shrimping industry here; others have purchased Home Depot and Wal-Mart gift cards to send to people trying to rebuild their homes; and the Massachusetts diocese has launched an organization, Samaritans Now, made up of healthcare workers to provide medical relief.

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There's no rushing God's work
Deacon of Buckeystown church to be ordained
Frederick (MD) News Post    
September 24, 2007

The Rev. Anjel Scarborough believes God's work takes time, but is worth the wait.

In February, Scarborough, deacon of Gathered by Christ Episcopal Church in Buckeystown, will be ordained an Episcopal priest. She has been preparing for the ceremony and this honor much of her life.

"Trust in the slow work of God," she said. "If you're impatient, you don't see the big picture. God's work is slow, gentle."

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Ground-breaking news

Trinity Episcopal Church In Pass Christian Breaks Ground On New Church
WLOX-Gulfport (MS)
Sep 22, 2007

The Trinity Episcopal Church broke ground on a new church Saturday morning.  But, members of the church say this ground breaking isn't just about constructing a new church building.

"These buildings are not just about religion.  They're about identity.  They're about home.  They're about community," says Father Christopher Colby, Trinity Episcopal Church Pastor. 

"I was baptized in this church, married in this church, baptized my children and married some of my children in this church.  I've been here 67 years," says Alice Russell, Trinity Episcopal Church.

After waiting for nearly two years, work will begin on a new 10 to 15 thousand square foot church in November.

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Trinity Episcopal to break ground
Gulfport SUN HERALD
Sep 22, 2007

PASS CHRISTIAN --The clergy, vestry and congregation of Trinity Episcopal Church in Pass Christian will make it official Saturday with an 11 a.m. groundbreaking at the site of the Katrina-ravaged church.

The hurricane blew out walls and virtually destroyed the sanctuary and auxiliary buildings at Church and St. Louis streets. Saturday's ceremony will kick off a long anticipated Hurricane Katrina Recovery Construction Program with a formal presentation, refreshments, fellowship and a viewing of the building plans.

The Rt. Rev. Duncan Gray III, Episcopal bishop of Mississippi, will be present as will other religious, political and community dignitaries.

It’s all here …and congratulations to Trinity! Your editor was pleased to be among the congregation on this historic occasion.

Good news from New Orleans

Episcopalian church relocates
Diana Chandler
New Orleans (LA) Times-Picayune
September 13, 2007

As Episcopalians address Gulf Coast recovery and other issues during the 2007 House of Bishops fall meeting in New Orleans next week, the Episcopal Church of All Souls in the Lower Ninth Ward will celebrate a major move encouraging the neighborhood's rebirth.

The small church began in a garage after Katrina and now meets at the Greater Little Zion Baptist Church at 5130 Chartres St. The congregation will move into the former Walgreens store at 5500 St. Claude Ave. on Sept. 22 , with a church fair from 3:30-5:30 p.m. Music, games for children, food and a bishop's blessing will highlight the fair, which is free to the public. Visiting bishops are expected to attend.

The new church will house a community center and day care.

It’s all here … and watch for video coverage on Episcopal Life Online...

Sanctuary

Teens travel to Louisiana to help rebuild post-Katrina New Orleans
By John Fenuccio
Westborough (MA) News
Sep 06, 2007

While most teenagers were spending their August either vacationing, working or preparing to go to college, a group of Westborough teenagers traveled to New Orleans to help in the continued rebuilding efforts after Hurricane Katrina.

Accompanied by chaperones Melanie Daniels and Wendy Scharen from St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church, three teenagers - Alex Boyer, Melissa Brady and Ross Scharen - spent their first week in August helping New Orleans residents get back on their feet.
"The biggest thing that surprised me was that it was two years ago and it’s still very devastated down there and the houses are torn apart with a lot of people not able to rebuild yet," said eighteen-year-old Alex Boyer.

Besides the initial shock of seeing a once booming and lively city reduced to one just trying to survive, the group was surprised to not see as many volunteers as they initially expected.

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Local Fund-Raiser for Sudanese Children
Beverly Cohn
Santa Monica Mirror    
September 6, 2007

Anyone fortunate enough to be living the privileged “Westside” lifestyle would be hard-pressed to imagine their three-year-old son or grandson, together with his six-year-old brother, fleeing for their lives.  Locals, who drive their precious children around in SUV’s, BMW’s or Mercedes-Benz’s, could not possibly contemplate them walking over 1,000 extremely dangerous miles without adult supervision, until they reached the temporary safety of a refugee camp.   
…
Today, the continuing work of resettling these orphans is being carried on by Rev. Jerry Drino, Director of Hope With Sudan located in San Jose.  The organization was founded in 2004 by 70 young Sudanese adults in an effort to raise funds to provide tuition and living expenses for their younger siblings and other orphans that remained in exile in Africa.  Today, San Jose and San Diego are home to nearly 4,000 Sudanese refugees, many of whom are the once-called “Lost Boys/Girls of Sudan.”  Less than 100 girls have been resettled in America due to the politics of the State Department.

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Church welcomes mom who faces deportation
UCC backs its controversial stance with action
By Darleen Principe
Simi Valley (CA) Acorn

After spending three months living in a Long Beach office building, an undocumented Oxnard woman has finally found refuge in a Simi Valley church that's closer to her home and family.

Last week, 29-year-old Liliana, who wouldn't disclose her last name for fear of repercussions to her family, became the first undocumented immigrant to be officially welcomed by United Church of Christ in Simi Valley- the only church in Ventura County to act as a sanctuary congregation for illegal immigrants.

She now lives with her 6monthold son, Pablo, in a four bedroom house on the church grounds. Her husband and three children are all U.S. citizens.

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Simple justice and the unimaginable

'So much of what we remember is now different'
By WAYNE WRIGHT
Wilmington (DE) News Journal
September 2, 2007

The unimaginable was happening. While sitting in my easy chair, the devastation unfolded a thousand miles away. As non-stop, tragic images flickered on the television screen, Hurricane Katrina swept across the Gulf Coast.

Surrounded by floodwaters, a frightened man atop his own house held up a sign: "Save Me!" A decaying corpse barely covered by a black plastic bag lay in the deep Southern heat. Bawling babies lay in their frantic mothers' arms, hungry, hot and tired. Scavenging dogs searched for food in overflowing urban gutters.

The president of the United States complimented his staff. "Heckuva job," he said, "heckuva job."

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Before Katrina, there was Camille
By Phil Hearn
Hattiesburg (MS) American

Dawn along the Mississippi Gulf Coast on the morning of Aug. 18, 1969, was accompanied by a clear sky, billowing white clouds, blustery winds and a subsiding sea.

But the sunrise revealed horrors beyond description.

The dazed and disoriented caretaker of 120-year-old Trinity Episcopal Church, Paul Williams, helped gather the bodies of his wife, 11 of his children and one grandchild and lay them along a walkway on the historic beachfront grounds in Pass Christian.

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S. River youth group aids those still reeling from Katrina
By JOHN MAJESKI
Central Jersey (NJ) Home News Tribune
Sunday, September 2, 2007

SOUTH RIVER — Tyler Picone couldn't forget the Gulf Coast if he tried.

The 15-year-old was among a group of teens from the Episcopal Youth Club at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church who recently returned from a mission trip to rebuild homes for those devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

The crew got its hands dirty, Tyler said. But it received a lot in return.

It’s all here …

Bishop Jenkins tells it like it is

It's not yet published outside the blogosphere. But in our considered opinion, it should be.

What I Would Like To Say To President Bush
The Rt. Rev. Charles Jenkins
Episcopal Bishop of Louisiana

Today the President of the United States of America is arriving in New Orleans for the occasion of the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. I do not know his itinerary, but I am glad he has chosen to join us here where the grief, guilt, anger, and frustration of a nation is gathering.

The country knows that the death of this American city, and many who live in it, could occur any day. According to National Geographic, “The Gulf Coast faces 50-50 odds of being hit by a Katrina-size storm this summer.” Presumably, the President is also aware of this fact.

Recognizing our vulnerability, not to terrorism, but to the deadly force of severe weather, I would like to ask the President how he plans to clearly demonstrate his calculation of our people’s worth and his government’s commitment to our safety? The question is one that Providence has put to this President, and it is one of those tests all human beings dread – the kind that determines who you really are

It's all here ...

Mission and ministry

Clergy in New Orleans Need Counseling
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
August 31, 2007

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Clergymen struggling to comfort the afflicted in New Orleans are finding they, too, need someone to listen to their troubles.

The sight of misery all around them -- and the combined burden of helping others put their lives back together while repairing their own homes and places of worship -- are taking a spiritual and psychological toll on the city's ministers, priests and rabbis, many of whom are in counseling two years after Hurricane Katrina.

Almost every local Episcopal minister is in counseling, including Bishop Charles Jenkins himself, who has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Jenkins, whose home in suburban Slidell was so badly damaged by Katrina that it was 10 months before he and his wife could move back in, said he has suffered from depression, faulty short-term memory, and difficulty concentrating or sleeping.

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Becoming a priest: an occupation and a calling
by Vickie Evans-Nash
Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder
8/29/2007

Local woman recounts her road to ministry

Mildred Cox came to the Twin Cities in 1966 after her husband received a job transfer while working with the Red Cross. They brought their family for what was intended to be a two-year stay. Now, almost 40 years later, they have become permanent fixtures to the Twin Cities area. On June 1, Cox completed a doctoral program at Seabury-Western Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois and became an ordained priest.

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Deacon: Walk on my prayer path
by DENISE FORD-MITCHELL
The Saginaw (MI) News
August 31, 2007

Donna L. Kusky has a prayer labyrinth in the backyard of her Birch Run Township home, and she's inviting guests to check it out.

Kusky said she designed the seven-circle Kusky Labyrinth to enlighten, not to confuse.

The 64-year-old is a deacon at St. Mark Episcopal Church, 3060 Williamson in Bridgeport Township.

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Oakerhater Center dedication set for Sept. 8 in Watonga
Oakerhater Episcopal Center dedication, honor dance
By Carla Hinton
The Oklahoman
September 1, 2007

WATONGA — St. David Pendleton Oakerhater's beloved Whirlwind Church and Mission will soon get a new, permanent home.

Despite some wind damage from recent storms, Oklahoma Episcopal leaders are moving forward with the planned dedication of the Oakerhater Episcopal Center in Watonga.

The center, named after the revered Cheyenne Indian Episcopal clergyman, is to be dedicated at 2 p.m. Sept. 8.

The Rev. Jim Kee-Rees said activities will include a dinner and the Whirlwind Church's annual honor dance in recognition of Oakerhater. In 1895, Oakerhater (1847-1931) became the first American Indian to be recognized in the Calendar of Saints of the Episcopal Church.

It’s all here …

Two years on

Pass Christian residents praise Katrina housing program
The Clarion-Ledger
August 29, 2007

Larry and Bernice Johnson are celebrating their return home in Pass Christian today, the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.

The home at 319 Hiern Ave. is the first Hallelujah House constructed through the Hallelujah Housing Program, a partnership between Episcopal Relief and Development, the Episcopal Diocese of Mississippi and the Hope Community Credit Union.

Plans call for an additional 400 homes to be built by 2015, with 100 for single mothers by 2009, in the coastal Mississippi counties of Hancock, Harrison and Jackson.

It’s all here …

Crowd turns out early to welcome Robin Roberts
'GMA' live from the Pass
By TAMMY SMITH and KATE MAGANDY
Gulfport (MS) SUN HERALD
Aug. 30, 2007

PASS CHRISTIAN --There is no doubt: The people of Pass Christian - and the rest of the Coast - love Robin Roberts.

Dozens of South Mississippians and volunteers turned out before the sun came up Wednesday to welcome ABC's "Good Morning America" and co-anchor Roberts back to the town she calls home. Roberts, who has been an advocate for the Mississippi Gulf Coast's recovery since immediately after the storm, told participants outside Trinity Episcopal Church how much she appreciated them.

"I can't tell you how many people in New York say they have seen you," she said to the crowd prior to the "GMA" live broadcast, "and say how impressed they are, how many volunteers have come, and they're impressed with your spirit.

"I want to say thank you for how you represent. You make me proud," Roberts said.

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Lakeview residents remember; focus on the positive
Gulfport (MS) Sun-Herald
August 29, 2007

A crowd of about 60 gathered at 9:15 a.m. Wednesday in Lakeview at the corner of Fleur De Lis Drive and Old Hammond Highway, near the site of the 17th Street Canal breach, to commemorate the storm with bell-ringing, prayers and poetry.

Leaders of the Beacon of Hope recovery organization, New Orleans City Councilwoman Shelley Midura, business owners and students from St. Paul's Episcopal and St. Pius X School took part in the ceremony, which included a balloon release.

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Names of victims fill church's 'murder board'
By Randi Kaye and Jason White
CNN

NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (CNN) -- Father Bill Terry of St. Anna's Episcopal Church in New Orleans wants everyone to know what's happening in New Orleans: too many murders with too few people held accountable.
Murder

The "murder board" records the names of murder victims in New Orleans.

He keeps track of the slayings on what he calls the "murder board," a plastic board that hangs outside his church. He started listing murder victims earlier this year to humanize the headlines.

At first, the names were neatly typed by a printer. But as the killings continued at a rampant pace, he says, he resorted to adding victims' names by hand with permanent marker.

"Numbers are very easy to deal with emotionally. When it becomes a human being, then we start to personalize and it's harder to deal with. I want people to squirm. I want people to feel uncomfortable about the murders going on in the city," Father Bill told CNN.

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Remembering 8/29

Massive demonstration to mark Katrina observance
The Louisiana Weekly
August 27, 2007

Appalled by the lack of progress in the Gulf, a group of prominent business, civic and entertainment organizations have joined forces to mobilize Americans to converge upon New Orleans on August 29, the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The event, "8/29, A Day of Presence," will take place on Wednesday, August 29, from 10 a.m. to 4 pm. at the Ernest N. Morial Conventional Center and is intended to force the government to act swiftly to create a Marshall Plan to restore New Orleans and the Gulf Coast region.

Those being invited to speak include Susan L. Taylor, Essence magazine; Marc Morial, National Urban League; Thomas W. Dortch, Jr., 100 Black Men of America; Melanie L. Campbell, National Coalition on Black Civic Participation; author and professor Michael Eric Dyson; Rev. Al Sharpton, National Action Network; as well as all presidential candidates. "Enough is enough!" said Taylor, during the Essence Music Festival in New Orleans. "It's the shame of the nation," she said before tens of thousands gathered in the Superdome, "that the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast have been abandoned and are suffering without the most basic necessary supports while our tax dollars are directed toward war."

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You can be part of 'Good Morning America'
By KAT BERGERON
Gulfport (MS) Sun Herald
Aug. 28, 2007

ABC's "Good Morning America" will be live from Trinity Episcopal Church in Pass Christian on Wednesday, and the public is encouraged by Mayor Chipper McDermott to be in the audience.

"We're informing the whole Coast that Robin Roberts and 'Good Morning America' is live at 6 a.m., and people are welcome to join us," said McDermott. "They did the same thing last year with a broadcast from our Memorial Park.

"There were a whole lot of people from across the Coast last time, and we're hoping for that again."

The church dates to the 1800s. After Katrina, the Trinity sanctuary that resembled the original one destroyed in Camille still had a roof and enough of the structure and floor for parishioners to put up plywood and space-age plastic to hold immediate services. The church is located at West Second and Church streets, one block off U.S. 90.

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Area agencies, residents contribute to book drive for New Orleans library
Canton (IL) Daily Ledger
August 27, 2007

Fulton County agencies and residents have been contributing to a book drive to help a New Orleans neighborhood library re-establish itself.

While working in New Orleans, Phil Fleming, a deacon at St. Peter's Episcopal Church of Canton and a member of Canton Rotary Club, learned of efforts to re-open the Rosa Keller Center and Children's Library in the Broadmoor neighborhood of New Orleans. The library had been under water for three weeks after Hurricane Katrina, and all the holdings were lost.

With help from Barbara Love and the Farmington Library, as well as donations from members of Canton Rotary Club, and members of St. Peter's Church and others, over 2,000 books have been donated locally.

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