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SCC Newsletter - February 2013
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Monthly Community Suppers The 15th of every month
Free to All
5:00 pm – 6:30 pm
Call/email for reservations
A monthly publication of the Somers Congregational Church, UCC February, 2013 Gathered in Somers, Connecticut, March 15, AD 1727 Volume 286 Number 2
The Reverend Dr. Barry Cass, Pastor
The First Sunday of each month is
Name Badge Sunday!
Be known! Wear your Name Badge.
No matter who you are or where you are on life's journey, you are welcome here.
Lent 2013 begins on Ash Wednesday, February 13
Worship 7 P.M. in Bugbee Chapel
Copies of the Lenten Devotion Booklet, Followers of the Cross by Martin E. Marty
will be available.
Lenten Study Developing an Adult Faith
meeting on five Thursday Evenings beginning
February 21, in room 213 at 7 P.M.
Palm Sunday, March 24 Celebratory Worship
with a Procession of the Palms at the 10 o’clock
service at the Johnson Memorial Medical Center
Community Education building
Maundy Thursday, March 28, 6:30 P.M.
Supper, Communion and Service of Tenebrae
At the church facility – 599 Main Street
Easter, March 31
Sunrise Service on Soap Stone Mountain
Traditional Worship at JMMC Community
Education Building
Church Email Addresses:
Barry Cass - [email protected] Church Office [email protected] Liz Scanlon - [email protected] Jacqueline Nappi - [email protected] Barbara Anderson - [email protected]
Website:
www.somerscongregational.org
I regularly have the opportunity to spend some time with my
grandson, Weston. It has been quite a while since his dad and uncle
were 8 months old and there is a lot I have forgotten about the stages
of development and progress made during a child’s first year. I love
the way Weston responds to me, the way he laughs and the hugs he
gives. There is something very hopeful about his young life and all
the possibilities it holds.
The other day I had played with Weston, given him a bottle and reluctantly given him back to his folks when I
noticed that even though it was after five in the afternoon, it was still light outside! The sun had set, but there
was still plenty of light. At the end of January this seemed to me to be another reason to feel hopeful and to
think about the possibilities around us.
As I write this it is bitterly cold outside, the coldest day of the season. I can hear the sound of equipment as
work on the new Meeting House continues. I think they are backfilling the foundation today and things are
ready for the concrete that will become the front steps and the floor of the dining room. These too are signs of
the possibilities that surround us and reason to feel hopeful.
In the middle of February we will mark the beginning of Lent. We know it as a time of solemn reflection and a
time for being a bit more serious about our faith. The tradition is that we banish “Alleluia!” from our
vocabulary and try to give up something in order to remind ourselves of the great sacrifice Christ made for us
on the cross. We focus on repentance and confession. Most of us have no shortage of things for which we are
sorry and a long list of things we ought to be trying to be better about.
The confession and repentance of Lent are also reasons for hope because we have the promise of God in Christ
that new life is possible. It may be difficult to confront the failures and shortcomings in our lives (“sins” is not
a popular word in the twenty-first century), and confession can be challenging, but confronting the sin and
confessing it mark the beginning of the story and not the end. Forgiveness follows confession. Renewal
follows repentance.
The story we are called to be a part of during Lent leads us through the final days of Jesus’ ministry and life
inviting us to be a part of journey that led him to build community with sinful people. It is a story that brings
Jesus into contact with all the worst things about humanity, all the worst things about our individual lives, but it
does not stop there.
The journey leads us to recognize how far we can be from one another and from God, and then shows us how
close God is to us, always. There is reason for hopefulness in the fact that god does not leave us alone, ever. I
am counting on each of you to be part of the Lenten journey this year, counting on you to be present as the
community remembers the story of our faith and helps each of us find our place in God’s realm. The hope is
sweeter when we realize that it is a gift from God.
Peace – Barry
Lent 2013
Ash Wednesday, February 13 – Bugbee Chapel – 599 Main Street – Meditative service of the Word
with the celebration of Holy Communion setting the tone for another Lenten Season.
Lenten Devotion Booklet Available – Followers of the Cross by Martin E. Marty – will be available for
members and friends of the church to use during the Lenten Season. Martin E. Marty is one of the most
prominent interpreters of religion and culture. In this series of daily devotions Marty explores the
meaning and relationship between us and Christ implicit in the phrase, “Followers of Christ.” The
passages will help readers come to know more fully how people of the past drew closer to Christ
through the cross and how they, too, can follow the cross more closely in their daily walk. Pick up a
free copy of this devotion guide at the Ash Wednesday service, at church on Sunday, or in the church
office.
5 Session Lenten Study on Developing an Adult Faith
Thursdays -- February 21, 28 March 7, 14 and 21 – 7 P.M. Author and Bible scholar Marcus Borg invites us to join him in revisiting Christianity's most
fundamental questions: Who is God? What does salvation mean? What place does Jesus hold in
contemporary Christian faith? In this five-session, faith-formation resource, participants enjoy the rare
privilege of witnessing Marcus in dialogue with a small, diverse group of adults as they honestly -- and
sometimes painfully -- confront the big questions and work together toward authentic answers. Each
session includes a 10-minute presentation by Marcus Borg followed by interaction with the group. The
program print resources are designed to help your small group "join the dialogue" in your own setting.
The study addresses fundamental questions that adults struggle with as faith matures. It can be used as a
resource for personal reflection as well as small group experience.
The five sessions include:
* God
* Jesus
* Salvation
* Community
* Practice
Palm Sunday, March 24 – Procession of Palms at the beginning of the 10 o’clock worship service to be
held at the JMMC Community Education Center.
Maundy Thursday, March 28 – Our traditional Maundy Thursday observance will be held in room 206
at 599 Main Street. We will begin at 6:30 P.M. with soup and bread supper, followed by the Celebration
of Holy Communion around the tables and ending with the Service of Tenebrae. During the Service of
Tenebrae the Passion Narrative is read and the lights are extinguished until there is darkness. This very
moving service is not recommended for young children.
BOOK GROUP
Tuesday, February 12 – 7 P.M. -- Open to EVERYONE!
February's book is The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
Renee is the concierge of a grand Parisian apartment building, home to members of
the great and the good. Over the years she has maintained her carefully constructed
persona as someone reliable but totally uncultivated, in keeping, she feels, with
society's expectations of what a concierge should be. But beneath this facade lies
the real Renee: passionate about culture and the arts, and more knowledgeable in many ways than her
employers with their outwardly successful but emotionally void lives. Down in her lodge, apart from weekly
visits by her one friend Manuela, Renee lives resigned to her lonely lot with only her cat for company.
Meanwhile, several floors up, twelve-year-old Paloma Josse is determined to avoid the pampered and vacuous
future laid out for her, and decides to end her life on her thirteenth birthday. But unknown to them both, the
sudden death of one of their privileged neighbors will dramatically alter their lives forever. By turn moving and
hilarious, this unusual novel became the top-selling book in France in 2007.
Once again this year Our Annual Report Booklets were printed
by Jim and Donna Popham
At New England Blue Print Paper Company FOR Many Thanks
to them for their generosity!
Altar Flowers for the Month of February
February 3 Altar Flowers this morning are given by Sandy and Malcolm Keery in
memory of loved ones
February 10 OPEN
February 17 Altar Flowers this morning are given by The Bothwell Family with fond
memories of Michael Ganley and Barbara Howe
February 24 OPEN
It is our custom that altar flowers are donated in memory of or in honor of loved ones.
Arrangements can be bought or hand-done. An individual or a group of individuals can donate them.
There can be more than one bouquet on any given Sunday.
Sunday School Calendar
Feb. 3 Sunday School / Communion (Grades 6-8 stay in Church)
February 10 Sunday School
February 17 Sunday School
February 24 Sunday School
The next teacher’s meeting will be on
Sunday, February 10 at 9:15 AM in one of the classrooms at
JMMC.
Liz Scanlon, Christian Education Director
Vacation Bible School 2013 ~ Kingdom Rock ~ June 24 – 28
American Veterans ~ Men and Women ~ Our Neighbors ~ They
Fought For Our Freedoms ~ They Need Our Help
A New Year's Mission Support “Soldier On”
February 3rd
LAST MINUTE Sunday
It's not too late...Missions will accept any items you can donate.
February 10th LOVE OUR SOLDIERS Weekend
Missions will deliver items to the VA home in Leeds, MA.
The Fight Doesn't End When They Get Home
Contact: Kim Kelley, 860-265-2098 with comments or questions www.wesoldieron.org
VA Homeless Shelter, Leeds, Massachusetts
THANK YOUR NOTES …
Thank you for the beautiful Poinsettia Plant. It is so thoughtful of you to think of
me. Thanks again, Grace Horka
Thank you so much for the beautiful Poinsettia. It is real pretty in my picture
window. I really enjoy it. Love & God Bless You,
Jeninne Petkis
Somers Church in the Civil War As 2013 is the 150
th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation and with
the movie “Lincoln” so popular, I thought we might look at how the
members of our town and church took part in the Civil War.
In a Memorial Day address May 28, 1922, our pastor Rev. John Curtis listed
the Civil War soldiers from Somers - 77 in the infantry and 9 in the cavalry.
Davis and Davis in their book “Somers, The History of a Connecticut Town” say that in Sept. 1862, Edwin Davis and his
cousins, Merritt, Albert and Henry along with a dozen more Somers men, enlisted in Company K of the Twenty-Second
Regiment. They were ”mustered into the service of the United States at Camp Halleck, Hartford, to serve for the period
of Nine Months, unless sooner discharged.” Less than two weeks later they were off to Virginia.
“Others served in the First Artillery, the Second Heavy Artillery, the First and Second Cavalry and the Fifth, Sixth,
Eighth, Tenth, Eleventh, Fourteenth and Twenty-first infantry Regiments.”
“Other individuals in more or less elevated positions were Henry Root, who was born on what is now Root Road, who
became private secretary to General Sheridan. Drs. T.E. Hamilton and Loren M. Pease were 2nd
Assistant Surgeons of the
Eighth and Tenth Infantry regiments respectively.”
Following are excerpts from our archive copies of letters written by two prominent Somers men who served in the
Twenty-Fifth Regiment, Rev. George Oviatt, our pastor at that time who served as regiment chaplain, and by Dr. William
Woods who served as regiment surgeon.
Jan. 21 1863 Dr. Woods from Louisiana to his wife; “I have been quite unwell from overwork and the aspects of the
climate together with poor living. I never lived so poor in all my life as I have since I came here. The country is a poor
and miserable place to live in. In short, it has been cleaned out.”
Jan. 27 1863 from Dr. Woods; “Mr. Oviatt has been unwell for some time past. He says he shall go home in the Spring.
I hope he will not go till I do.”
April 12 1863 letter from Mrs. Woods to Dr. Woods; “Mr. Oviatt arrived home safely with his servant. I went up to see
him the next morning. I thought he looked quite smart at first but found before I left he was not as well as he looked. He
soon got tired. He sent for the Doctor yesterday morn and has kept to his bed ever since. I am afraid he will never get
over it.”
May 5 1863 “It is a shame for the government to treat the men so shabby. The men have not received a cent for eight
months. They have not even a change of clothing and are very filthy and lousey.”
May 29 1863 from General Hospital for the Wounded near Port Hudson (just north of Baton Rouge LA) “Skirmishing
and hard fighting until now five days and nights. We have kept continually at it and the place is not taken yet. We have
lost a great many men killed and wounded.” “After remaining in the field for two days, the new director assigned me to
take charge of the general hospital for all the sick and wounded. I am now seated in said hospital about three miles from
the scene of action surrounded by some 150 or more sick and wounded.” “I am sorry to say that the Twenty-Fifth
regiment has played out from loss and exhaustion, from exposure and hard duty. It has now been reduced to 96 men in
the field.”
July 21 1863 “If you could see me with my sleeves rolled up and knife in hand you would think me some other person. I
have cut all the arms, legs and fingers off I wish to.”
Letter to Dr. Woods’ daughters Mary, Katie, Hattie and Alice; “The fact is my time is so much occupied that I can’t
think of anything but what relates to my business. If I ever get home I do not want to see a sick person for six months at
least. My hair is turning grey and my front teeth are all gone.
I want you, Katie and Hattie, to make the very best improvement of your time and opportunity for improving your mind
and habits for usefulness. I want you to attend to your music and be able to appear respectably when called upon to play
or sing in company.
Alice, you must be careful when the snow comes not to get your feet wet sliding down hill on your sled for fear you may
get sick.”
July 4 1863 letter from Dr. Woods; “The heat is very oppressive and debilitating. Every breath seems to make one feel
faint and weak. A great profusion of the wounded men will die on account of the hot weather or can’t get ice to put upon
the wounds and they will mortify.”
July 21 1863 letter from Mr. Oviatt to Dr. Woods; “When last Sabbath I remembered you particularly in common
prayer the whole congregation was deeply moved. I do hope and pray that you may live to return to your dear home and
friends here.” “I received many letters from those who had lost friends in the 25th and in the other regiments in General
Banks’ army. How much you must all suffer. But at last you have come off victorious and Port Hudson is in your
hands.”
Dr. Woods was mustered out of the service Aug. 26, 1863 and returned home to Somers where he lived with his family on
Main Street where Carole Kennett now lives. He died aged 88.
Mr. Oviatt remained as our pastor until 1867. He died in 1887, aged 76.
+ + + + + + + +
Worship at Blair Manor On the Second Tuesday of each month our church is responsible for a worship
service at Blair Manor. Led by our pastor, worship begins at 10:30 A.M. and lasts
about a half hour. We are fortunate that Anne Larson accompanies the group in
singing two hymns most months. Other members and friends of the church are more
than welcome to join us, to be a part of the service and to add voices to the singing.
If you have any questions, talk to Barry.
The next Blair Manor worship service will be Tuesday, February 12 at 10:30 A.M.
This Month Champ's Place, our church's food pantry, is seeking donation of
nonperishable food, and is especially in need of Jelly of call kinds for
making sandwiches and Juice boxes that can be put in the snack packs for
kids. Kathy Moulton and Kit Devlin, Champ’s Place coordinators, also
remind us that monetary donations are always welcome. The money
donated can go a long way in purchasing needed items at Foodshare. For
instance, $120 at Foodshare can buy 1,400 lbs. of food! Our money used at
Foodshare has more purchasing power than it does when we make our own
purchases locally for Champ’s Place. Checks made out to "Somers
Congregational Church" with "Champ's Place" on the memo line can be sent to the church or dropped in the
offering plate any week. Food can be brought to worship on Sunday or dropped off at the office during open
hours. Thanks for being a part of this important ministry of our church!
SNOW IS FALLING AND HELP IS NEEDED! YOU can help!
There is a lot less shoveling to be done around the church facility while construction
is going on, but what needs to be done is vital! We have to keep the paths to the
office and Champ’s Place clear -- so we need as many of US as possible to volunteer
some time to clear the snow away.
If signing up for an entire week is too much, we have a solution! You can sign up
for any day of the week you want! If you have a day off during the week or perhaps
weekends are the only time you have free, you can sign up for the one day each week during February that you
could shovel our paths. There might be several people signed up for a day which is okay ………. many hands
make a job easier. Sign up today.
We have our own snow thrower and 6 snow shovels that you can use!!!
Contact the House and Grounds Committee or look for the sign-up sheet at church.
Weekly Scripture Readings for February 2013
February 3 (Communion Sunday) Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Jeremiah 1:4-10 Psalm 71:1-6 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 Luke 4:21-30
February 10 Last Sunday after Epiphany
Exodus 34:29-35 Psalm 99 2 Corinthians 3:12-42 Luke 9:28-43
WEDNESDAY February 13 Ash Wednesday
Joel 2:1-2, 12-17 Psalm 51:1-17 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10 Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
February 17 First Sunday in Lent
Deuteronomy 26:1-11 Psalm 91”: 1-2, 9-16 Romans 10:8b-13 Luke 4:1-13
February 24 Second Sunday in Lent
Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18 Psalm 27 Philippians 3:17-4:1 Luke 13:31-35
From the Nominating Committee Thanks to all of those who have volunteered for 2013 committees, especially those who answered the call and
filled 4 slots at the Annual Meeting! The following are the remaining open positions – 2 Deacons, 2
Stewardship Committee, 2 Caring ministry Board, 1 Christian Education Board, 1 Flower Committee and 2
Representatives to the Connecticut Conference spring and fall meetings. Please contact Kelly Anderson 860-
763-5355 [email protected]
Women’s Fellowship
February Meeting will be on Tuesday, February 12
at 10 A.M. in Room 116.
The March Meeting will be on Tuesday, March 5 when we will be meeting with
Barry and seeing some vintage films from the church archives. The Meeting will be in
Bugbee Chapel at 10 A.M...
If you missed our RADA knives at the holiday Bazaar, or need to stock up for those upcoming weddings and
other gift giving opportunities, they will be available during the Chocolate Bake Sale on February 9.
Somers Congregational
United Church of Christ
Community Supper
5 to 6:30 P.M.
Friday, February 15th
EVERYONE is invited to share this free Community Supper and to enjoy the
fellowship and good time. Bring your family and friends.
The Bedard Family will be our hosts.
Let us know you are coming by signing up at church, or calling or e-mailing the church office.
New Members Welcomed! Plenty of Room for More!
The Membership Board would like to welcome Somers residents Danielle Leighton and her four year old
daughter Willa into our Church family. Danielle joined the church on January 13 and Willa attends Church
School.
Anyone interested in attending an Inquirers Meeting and joining the church should speak with a member of the
Membership Board or Rev. Cass.
Membership Board
Bob Bujak - Joyce Conroy - Margaret Festi - Sarah Loveday - Amy Palazzesi - Marilyn Sladek
20th Annual
Everything Chocolate Bake Sale Saturday, February 9th – 9 A.M. to 1 P.M.
Handicap Accessible Room 206 Every item for sale has chocolate!
Get your bars, breads, cakes, candy, cookies and pies!
There will also be a chocolate fountain with lots of goodies for dipping! Breakfast available – Cinnamon rolls with chocolate serviced with coffee, tea
or hot chocolate!
“There is nothing better than a friend, unless it is a friend with chocolate.” ― Linda Grayson
Deadline for Next Highlights is February 20, 2013.
U.S. Postage Paid
Non-Profit Org. Permit Number
334 Enfield, CT 06082
Somers Congregational Church
599 Main Street, PO Box 295 Somers, CT 06071
Address Service Requested
Sunday Worship: 8:15 A.M. & 10:00 A.M. Office Hours (M-Th.): 9:00 A.M. TO 3:00 P.M. Telephone: (860) 763-4021 Fax: (860) 763-5146 E-mail: [email protected] Web site: www.somerscongregational.org
Senior Pastor: The Rev. Dr. Barry Cass Organist/Music Director: Jacqueline Nappi CE Director: Liz Scanlon Care Room: Barbara Anderson
