| This Week at St. Luke’s |
| Public Health Indicators: here Event risk assessment: here. Free COVID test from Durham County here. Click here and scroll down for Online Worship Bulletin In-person worship services canceled (Jan 2, 9, 16) due to Omicron variant of COVID. Sunday 9:30 In-Person Masked Indoor Holy Eucharist signup here CANCELED The Rev. Rhonda M. Lee, PhD. Preacher and Celebrant 9:30 Livestream worship on Facebook 11 Coffee Hour on Zoom Tuesday 7pm Bible Study on Zoom Wednesday 11:30 Prayer and Share on Zoom Friday 1:00 Connections and Support Group by Zoom |
| New This Week |
| Your “Share Your Christmas” Donations Had a Wonderful Impact! Because of your generous support of Share Your Christmas, we were able to disburse more than $6,700 in gift cards to St. Luke’s/LEAP Families and Maple Court Veterans. In total, St. Luke’s provided substantial help to 13 families and more than 20 Maple Court veterans—over 80 individuals in all! All the families and veterans were extremely grateful for their gift cards. Thanks to everyone who helped make this Christmas special for our neighbors in need. During this holy season, the church was decorated to the glory of God and in loving memory of: Carolyn and John Satterfield Winnifred Richards Sebastian Williams John A. Santa Maxine and Walter Bennett Maxine and Clyde Conner Ronald Conner Kathy Martin Mabel and Wilfred Huffman Donna and Lauren Hammond Lester and Ocey Draughon George and Virginia Dedrick Ron Wilson And in honor of St. Luke’s Clergy and Staff On Tuesday, December 28, the Episcopal Diocese of NC released updated COVID protocols with the following recommendation: “Currently, the positivity rate for COVID-19 is over 7.5% in most of the Diocese. Due to the anticipated surge in COVID-19 cases in January following holiday travel and gatherings, and exacerbated by the highly transmissible nature of the omicron variant, these county by county rates are likely to continue to rise. [NOTE: On December 29 the positivity rate in Durham was 6.6%.] Though the daily number of new cases will likely rival and perhaps exceed the peak of last winter, hospitalizations and deaths are not increasing at the same rate. The rate of transmission will still present significant challenges to our healthcare systems….Therefore, in-person worship is not recommended for the next three weeks, through Sunday, January 16…” Based on this recommendation, and in consultation with parish lay and ordained leaders and our soon-to-be interim rector, we have decided to cancel in person services for January 2, 9, and 16. We will be livestreaming the Eucharist on Facebook and invite you to join us live at 9:30 am where you can greet one another and add prayer requests in the comments OR worship using the saved video at a later time on either Facebook or on the YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/StLukesDurhamWorshipandMusic Our new interim rector, Rhonda Lee, is eager to meet all of us as soon and as safely as possible. On Sunday, January 2, 9, and 16 we will be activating the 11 am Zoom Coffee Hour as a way to “Meet and Greet” her. Please plan to join the Zoom meeting to get to know Rhonda and allow her to meet many of us in this virtual format. Sundays Jan 2, 9, 16 11:00 am Coffee Hour Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81667411138?pwd=RnRBa3RyWHlaYTI5QVVsY3NzTWtIZz09  Join Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, Washington Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, the Rev. Glenna Huber, and other local and national leaders for a livestreamed celebration of Epiphany, the season of light, from the Church of the Epiphany in Washington, D.C. Thursday, Jan. 6, at 12 p.m. Eastern JOIN LIVESTREAM During a worship service featuring a diversity of voices from across the church, Bishop Curry will invite Episcopalians to commit afresh to looking, acting, and loving like Jesus—in our communities and in our nation. Bishop Curry also will offer an address to the nation later that day.  |
| Announcements |
| Update on Durham Episcopal Resettlement Coalition (DERC)Many of you heard the wonderful news last Sunday that Hope Galunas has found us a 2 bedroom apartment that will come open in mid-January. Finally, some reality setting in! We have a wonderful team of front line workers from the three churches, led by Bob and Mary Etta King, ready to work with a family as soon as they are assigned to us. Right now, we are turning to collecting household items, and looking for volunteer help moving, cleaning the apartment, setting up the kitchen and buying the first lot of groceries. There is a sign up genius where we are gathering furnishings: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/20F094EA5A82BAAFF2-household. If you can volunteer to help, please contact either Joan Hodges, Jim or Babs Wise.This has been a wonderful time for those of us working on the project to get to know fellow Episcopalians at St. Joe’s and St. Titus. A newer development is that St. Stephen’s wants to join in and are working on their funding. So, we may be looking at a second home soon. St. Phillips is also setting up a home, and will be joining us to share lessons learned. We hope soon to be able to physically actually meet all – once the Omicron surge has lessened. Thank you for your all your gifts: both goods, time, money, and prayer, we truly have felt the support of our parish in this effort. CONTACT UPDATESUp-to date contact information can be found online at ACS, or the ChurchLife App for your phone or tablet. Contact Kathy if you have any problems logging onto ACS. You can also ask Kathy to send you a paper directory if needed. |
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