Weekly E-Pistle: Easter Sunday Video Service at Douglas UCC

4/10/2020

Easter Sunday Video Service

Please join us this Sunday at 10 AM on YouTube or Facebook for our Easter Sunday Video Service. Pastor Sal will be giving an inspiring message of hope. Plus, music from Peter Black and Pamela Chappell. The service will also be broadcast on our website: DouglasUCC.org

Wow!! More than 1,000 people viewed our Palm Sunday service on YouTube and Facebook! Thank you to all who watched and commented. If you missed it, you can watch it here.

Watch this 3-minute video from Rev. John Dorhauer, General Minister and President of the United Church of Christ. In it, he offers a Holy Week and Easter message of hope for the Easter people of the world, even as we are in the midst of the Coronavirus pandemic.

Check Your Email for the Zoom Link for
Easter Sunday Online Friendship Hall

On Friday morning, we send out the links for the online meetup for Sunday, after our online service. If you haven't received your Zoom link via email by Friday (be sure to check your spam folder!), we may not have your current email address! Just write to us for your meeting link at [email protected].

As most of you know, our church hired Julie Ridl to take care of the church's administrative duties while Pastor Sal was on sabbatical. We can all agree that she did an outstanding job, going "above and beyond" in all she did.

Last week, our Church Council voted to keep Julie on in this position for at least the next 12 weeks, which will bring us to the end of our church's fiscal year. We are so grateful for Julie's excellent technical and social media skills which are keeping us connected during this time.

Masks in Public Places – What, Why, and How

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in a press conference Monday asked residents to wear homemade masks if they have to leave their homes.

We are still urged to continue washing our hands, limit leaving our homes to essential trips and practice social distancing.

The governor’s message follows recent guidance from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and comes with a continued plea to leave N95 and surgical masks for medical professionals already dealing with a shortage of necessary protective equipment.

The CDC now recommends that people should wear nonsurgical cloth face coverings when they go out in public during the pandemic. Wearing some form of covering over your nose and mouth can prevent people who are infected, but not symptomatic, from spreading the virus when they speak, cough or sneeze in public.

Here is the U.S. Surgeon General demonstrating how to make a simple face covering:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPx1yqvJgf4

And here are the CDCs recommendations for wearing and making your own mask:
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/diy-cloth-face-coverings.html

Fighting Fear Through Our Senses

During last Sunday's Online Friendship Hall meetup, Pastor Sal shared with us this exercise to help us calm our anxieties, offered up by spiritual author and speaker Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love). She shared this advice on Instagram recently... "Dear Ones: To ground yourself in the present moment (and escape the fears and fantasies of the unknown future) try this simple trick..."

Local Volunteering and Giving

Are you looking for a way to reach out, offer help at this time?

Children's First Lakeshore is spearheading the local effort, along with area churches and our schools to keep feeding school children in need twice a day. They need more funds and volunteers, and are gathering both at this website:
https://childrenfirstlakeshore.org/feedingthegap

Allegan County residents are being helped through local volunteers, the United Way, Community Action, and Allegan County Community Foundation. Volunteers and funding are being collected here:
https://www.feedtheneedallegan.com/

And the State of Michigan has identified a number of other worthy efforts to help others in our state at this time. Those efforts can be found here:
https://www.michigan.gov/coronavirus/0,9753,7-406-98178_98811---,00.html

How You Can Help Gather Elliot-Larsen Ammendment Petition Signatures Under Stay Home, Stay Safe Order

For the first time ever, Michigan citizens – including business, philanthropy, and leaders from both sides of the political aisle – joined LGBTQ advocacy groups to proclaim: Every Michigander should have an equal chance to succeed. This legislative strategy, known as Fair and Equal Michigan, will add LGBTQ protections to the state’s current civil rights law. The initiative seeks to introduce a citizens’ bill in the Legislature after advocates collect 340,047 signatures. The Legislature will have 40 days to adopt (and the law prevents tinkering!) or they can send the question to voters on the November 2020 ballot where 77% of voters support the measure. This history-making citizens’ initiative has the opportunity to increase the state’s talent attraction and grow Michigan’s economy.

But the Covid-19 Stay Home, Stay Safe order is slowing down the effort to gather signatures for this non-partisan ballot initiative. The petition organizers have shifted to "distance organizing," and they are looking for volunteers to call Michiganders and send petitions requested over the phone. At this writing, the May 26th deadline looms closer, and the committee has 200,000 signatures left to collect.

Will you phone bank from home so Fair and Equal Michigan can send petitions across the state? If this sounds like something you can do, call Alex Cross, Volunteer Director for Fair and Equal Michigan at 203.841.9458 to become involved in their phone program. Or register to volunteer today at this address: https://secure.everyaction.com/IouJeXXEgUG0YjBUTbsoNQ2

A New Way of Giving

Maybe you've been giving to your favorite churches online for years, but did you know there is an app for that? Yes, the same company we use to process church donations from our website has a phone app, GivePlus. Using it on your phone is so easy:

Download the App by following one of the links below from your phone.
Find Douglas UCC, or any other nearby church using this system, in the app.
If you have already used the website form, just sign in using your username and password.
Or you will be prompted to set up an account.

Easy to use, find, and remember!

Happy Birthdays and Anniversaries

April 12- Ben Greene, Stan Greene, 13- Bill Klatt, 16- Jerry Coates, 18- Dennis Barnum

Birthday and Anniversary cards are a great way we can continue to reach out to one another during this time. If you wish to mail a card to one of our church members, addresses can be found in our Church Directory. If you don't have a directory, please let us know and we will email one to you.

Prayer List – For Wholeness, Peace

The family of David Wellinski, Grandma Lois (Rachel Overweg's paternal grandmother), Astrid Schneider, Michelle Born-Fischer, Karen Cook, Wendy Billman, Howard McLauchlan, Audra and Ben Mueller, Marcia Sullivan, Jeff Cooley, Len Lynch, Curtis Coffin, Drew Carter, Bertha Fonseka, Garth & Myra (Mary Nyhof’s Parents).

The caregivers and patients at Mary Freebed Hospital and on the U.S.S. Comfort, and in all of our hospitals and care centers during this Covid-19 pandemic.

For the leaders and volunteers in every state and city who are stepping up to take care of people every day.

All in the military and their families. All who are homeless or addicted or abused or neglected or rejected or hungry; The UCC; the Grand West Association; our Church Council; our Stephen Ministers; our church committees; our communities, our schools, our nation and our planet.
To add/remove a name from the Prayer List, please email [email protected].

Financial Stewardship

April 5
Attendance for April 5 Online Service: 1,110
Online Giving: $1,540
Thank you!!

Your generous giving allows us to sustain our church community and our mission of service. Please consider giving online, which is easily done by clicking ONLINE GIVING.

Or you may send checks by mail to:
Douglas Congregational United Church of Christ
56 Wall Street, PO Box 519
Douglas, MI 49406