Staff Picks for Giving Back this Christmas

It's nearly Christmas and you haven't finished your gift-giving purchases? That's okay, neither have we. With less than a week to go, we thought we'd offer you some ideas for those hard-to-buy for people, or for how you can spend your money in a way that cuts against our consumer culture.

Here are some staff picks for ways to give AND give back this Christmas time.

Jarrett

This year St. Martin's Christmas plate offering will be going to Imara International, a safe house that also provides education for teen mothers and their babies in Kenya. This organization was founded by an Episcopalian and our own Barbara Dundon visited this past year to record some of their stories. Jarrett looks forward to visiting himself in 2015. 

Jarrett also encourages support of St. James School right here in Philadelphia. St. James School is a faith-based Philadelphia middle school in the Episcopal tradition, committed to educating traditionally underresourced students in a nurturing environment. The school is a community that provides a challenging academic program and encourages the development of the moral, spiritual, intellectual, physical and creative gifts in its students. Our own Erik Meyer continues to assist with music there at Eucharist on Wednesday afternoons.

Callie

Alternative Gift-Giving Ideas:

Episcopal Relief & Development (800.334.7626 x5129): purchase Bishops Blend Fair Trade Coffee and Tea; donate a gift of global aid in someone’s name.

Heifer International (800.422.0474): donate an animal in someone’s name; this animal will go to a family in need to help them be self-sufficient.

Kiva (415.358.7512): make microloans to small business owners worldwide; you select which entrepreneur to support and get your money back to keep or reinvest.

Thistle Farms (615.298.1140): natural bath and body products made by women in Nashville’s Magdalene community, a 2-year residential community for women with a history of prostitution and drug addiction (founded by an Episcopal priest!)

SERRV (800.422.5915): organization working to eradicate poverty through direct connections with low-income artisans and farmers; sells crafts and foods

Global Girlfriend (888.355.4321): fairly-traded apparel and accessories hand-made by women and communities in need around the world

Global Exchange (415.255.7296): offers a wide range of socially conscious gifts from around the world

Ways to Serve & Provide Warmth this Christmas:

The Greater Philadelphia Cares Winter Coat Drive - bring new or “gently used” winter coats to: Philadelphia Federal Credit Union at 6707 Germantown Avenue or Trolley Car Diner at 7619 Germantown Avenue (for other drop-off locations, call 215.564.4544 or visit )

Holiday Food Drives - taking place around the city (contact Philabundance for more information).

Barbara

I bought socks this year from Mitscoots which will donate a pair of socks to the homeless for every pair you buy.

Also I ordered some paper products from the Peoples Paper Coop in Germantown which provides legal assistance for ex-offenders to get their criminal records expunged, then turns their paperwork into beautiful hand-made paper.

Perennial favorites: Heifer International, Serrv International, 10,000 Villages.

Another practice is to make some time to shop locally, rather than ordering everything on-line or from big box stores. Go to 10,000 Villages on Germantown, and patronize other local shops on the avenue. Looking for books? Order them through a local book store such as Big Blue Marble, rather than Amazon. Buy art and food from local artisans near work or home. Gift people with tickets to local theater productions and patronize local musicians.

Natalee

For my five year old, Liam, this year we'll be donating to World Wildlife Fund Adopt a Tiger. It comes with a plush tiger, a photo of a tiger, and an adoption certificate. The plush and photo help make it real for a little kid. If you're buying for an adult you may want to skip the gift-with-donation and make every dollar go towards conservation. Other animals are available to support.

My husband Nate wanted to help support small business owners around the world through micro funding or providing something necessary to help start a business. Heifer International Honeybees or a Kiva gift card for microfinancing are just the right thing.

We'll also be making a donation to help build a pediatric unit at the Mpassa Medical Unit in the Congo. This is an effort being supported by the Southeast District of the Eastern PA Conference of the United Methodist Church - my denomination. I'll be making a donation here in honor of my new baby boy, Ezra.

Another favorite is Appalachia Service Project, a home repair ministry in central Appalachia which Nate and I led youth on for years and holds a special place in our hearts.

Connie

This year the Haggards will give to Beyond Borders and Partners in Health, both vital organizations in Haiti, and to DEC in honor of Chris' 19 years at that wonderful workshop where everyone, no matter what disability, is family.

Betsy

This Christmas the Wolfords are contributing to our local SPCA and we're purchasing a bike through Compassion International to enable a child in a third world country to ride to school, etc. And as all of you've heard me drone on & on about MS bike rides, the National MS Society is an organization I'm regularly rooting for.

Merry Christmas and Happy (Alternative) Giving this season!

The Advent Power of the Christmas Tree

We decorated the Christmas tree the Sunday after Thanksgiving this year.

“It seems too early,” my husband complained.

“Christmas decorations are up everywhere else, and we’re behind, ” my 14-year-old countered.

“This is the only day that the whole family will be here until Christmas,” I said, as I realized that in a few hours my son would be heading back to college after his brief Thanksgiving break. “It’s going up today.”

Settled.

I don’t know how others decorate their Christmas trees. We are great collectors of ornaments, both humble and grand. Nearly each one prompts a story that is retold every year, with titles like “The Origin of the Enormous Fake Dragonflies” or “Why We Won’t Toss the ‘Sputnik’ Ornaments Dad Made in Third Grade”.

My son and daughter aren’t little any more. They space the ornaments nicely instead of clumping them all in one place, a foot from the bottom branches. Every year their questions are more sophisticated, and they hear the stories in new ways. And so do I.

Don’t tell my kids, but putting up the Christmas tree is a rich, spiritual, and deeply powerful Advent ritual in my family. We connect ourselves to a long, complex narrative that blends family story and esoteric symbol; we construct a place where past meets future. As we navigate this overcrowded tree, we reluctantly separate out some things that are too damaged to keep or that have lost their meaning. And we keep some things for inexplicable reasons best called “mystery”. For example, the beakless, blue chicken made the cut again this year. “I like it, don’t throw it out,” someone declares. And it stays.

The lights go on, and we thrill at it. Over the next four weeks this tree will draw me. I will play with the arrangement, regularly moving ornaments around to fill empty spaces. I will sit in a tree-lit room and contemplate. I will remember. I will think ahead.

To be sure, our family has other rituals that are more specific to this pre-Christmas season. Each night we put symbols on a little Jesse tree -- origami decorations that tell the story of Salvation History and count down the days till the Christ arrives. On Sundays we light our Advent wreath and sing O Come O Come Emmanuel.

But the Christmas Tree itself does the holiday on its own terms. With its pagan past and decorations that are more reminiscent of family vacations than of the Holy Family, my tree doesn’t exactly foretell a baby born in a manger stall. In its glorious ambiguity it layers the many narratives of this time of year. It makes room for all of it in its bendy, manufactured branches. And each year there is still space for more.

In his book, The Legend of the Bells and other Tales, John Shea retells a Cherokee story, “Why Some Trees are Evergreen.” After the Great Mystery makes the plants and trees, he wants to give a gift to each according to its ability. So he set up a test, challenging them to stay awake and keep watch over the whole earth for a week. Most of the trees nod off by day three, but the cedar, pine, spruce, and fir and their kin are still vigilant when the Great Mystery returns at week’s end. Their reward is to remain green forever, so that even in the deadness of winter, animals could find warmth and sustenance in their branches.

Tell stories. Ask questions of the symbols. Hold the past in your hands. Find time. Make room. Stay awake until the Great Mystery returns. These are the subtle, Advent invitations of the Christmas tree. I’m not sure I’d be ready for Christmas Day without them.

- Barb Ballenger

Your turn! What stories does your Christmas tree tell? Let us know in the comments.

With You Every Step of the Way

“You are always there when I need you.” That is the highest praise. 

When I was a Youth Minister in Chicago, the young people at our retreats would repeat this phrase over and over when they described people who loved them. When someone is “always there for us” we feel  remembered, valued, assured, and safe in our overwhelming and confusing world. 

One day last week, I sat beside the bedside of a member who was in the hospital. His phone rang and when he answered it was a member of St. Martin's on the phone checking up on him. Recognizing her voice, I smiled and then remembered that the day before two Eucharistic Visitors had come from St. Martin's to bring Holy Communion to this same man. He was literally surrounded by caregivers from our church. 

I could say to him, “The church will be with you every step of the way,” and I would be telling truth.

Our second Core Value as a church community is: “In giving and receiving care we encounter Christ.” One reason we know this is an authentic value of the church is illustrated by my bedside pastoral visit described above. At St. Martin's we have a deep and virtuous habit of caregiving. Because of this strength in our ministry it makes me so happy to say that our pastoral care commitment at St. Martin's is to be with our members every step of the way.

We are here to be a resource to you from birth to death and everything in between. We will celebrate the birth of your children, baptize, teach them in church school, confirm, and then marry them. We will be with you when you are sick, troubled, guilty, depressed, angry, struggling financially, or going through a divorce. We will be with you by your bedside for surgeries and medical appointments – celebrating your healing and recovery and mourning the losses and struggles. Finally, we will be with you in your final hours with the soothing comfort of prayer and anointing to see you through that last transition into our ultimate healing. 

My first Rector taught me never to leave the graveside until the casket was safely lowered and everyone else had left. This simple action symbolizes our commitment to be a faithful pastor every step of the way whether people are there to notice or not. 

Every step of the way includes – indeed is mostly practiced by – our amazing lay ministers at St. Martin's. Stephen Ministers, Lay Eucharistic Visitors, the women of Women Connecting, the leaders of Wellspring, the tables of learners at Biblical Studies, the Parenting in Faith circle, and just from friend to friend and neighbor to neighbor throughout the church community. 

I am so proud of our community and our caregiving. We will be looking for ways to advance this work in the parish in the next years. 

- Jarrett Kerbel