Upcoming C.O.O.L. Sundays

Hello everyone,

Here is some info re-the next few Sundays with C.O.O.L.

Sunday April 02...Meeting at Davies home 5pm-7pm for video study and dinner.

Sunday April 09...Palm Sunday..Davies & Tom Morgan will be traveling to Lighthouse Church in Nanaimo to support Rev. Kathy King and the church there in their service. We also welcome anyone else to come . In the evening we will be going to the Greg Sczebel Concert at the Sid Williams theatre in Courtenay. We will be taking the youth from the church to see this. It is a fund raiser for Habitat for Humanity and for Youth Unlimited in the valley. Greg is an up and coming Christian musician. Tickets for this concert are available from the Sid Williams box office and can be reserved on-line or by phone. No meeting at the Davies' home this week.

Sunday April 16th...Easter Sunday. Davies will be attending Living Word Episcopal Church, Courtenay, B.C. (Rev'd Bill Hedges). We assume that others from C.O.O.L. will be attending services at their regular places of worship. There will be no evening meeting at Davies' home this week.

I hope this is clear to all reading it. Any questions please call 339-4359 for clarification.
Blessings on all.
Martin and Cynthia

Mission-Shaped Church

Here is some homework for COOL folks over the next month or two as we consider our next steps in our fresh expression of the local Body of Christ. This church of England report looks at a number of fresh expressions of church from around the world and is very pertinent to what we are attempting to do at COOL in particualr and in the ACiC in general. It is recommended by our bishop.

Please go to the link and download the pdf report or read it on line. Especially the sections on small christian communities or base ecclesial communities and also the ones on cafe church and network churches.
Enjoy!
David+

Update from Antigua, Guatemala, Week Three.

It is hard to believe that we have completed three weeks of language study in Antigua already. It has been marvellous. Antigua is an interesting place, full of ruins, old churches, beautifully-dressed indigenous people and lots of foreign students and tourists. We have enjoyed the school immensely and are impressed by how quickly the kids have picked up the Spanish language. Their French helps.

We are off to Costa Rica for two weeks vacation followed by a visit to the Mayan ruins at Tikal and a brief excursion into Belize. Then we have four weeks back in Antigua and Lake Atitlan Before returning to Canada.

Church-wise we have had some interesting contrasts: one of the teachers here invited us to attend his Pentecostal church last week. I have also attended the two RC services including the imposition of ashes on Ash Wednesday. There are churches everywhere, both RC and protestant (mostly Pentecostal). The syncretic elements of Mayan + RC beliefs are not as evident here as we understand them to be in areas where there are more indigenous people. We shared communion together one Sunday night in our cottage, first half in Spanish, switching to English when the congregation (AKA family) mutinied. Most people we talk to have not heard of Anglicans – if one is neither RC nor Pentecostal they don’t have a category to fit you in!

Immense poverty here, along with great natural beauty. There are numerous aid agencies in Guatemala, some medical, others food/health/developmental, including a group of engineers and architects. We have talked to various health teams and toured the local Fransiscan hospital which looks after many chronically handicapped people permanently as well as hosting visiting teams of surgeons and other MDs from USA, Canada, Spain and Italy who come to do provide surgery for the impoverished villagers from the rural areas. We visited a ward of severely malnourished babies – have not seen such malnutrition since we trained in South Africa. Great to see the inter-denom co-operation amongst the teams. One very friendly Texan Fransiscan friar studying here runs a similar hospital in Honduras staffed by inter-denominational teams from the USA.

Lent has begun in earnest here: processions, special services and displays of art (consisting of flowers, coloured sawdust “carpets” and elaborately dressed figures enacting biblical scenes).

We shall only have sporadic internet access over the next four weeks but shall try to keep in touch.

Adios for now.

David+

New Rector for Nanaimo Light of Christ ACiC congregation

Lent Begins

Here's wishing you all a very fruitful Lent as we prepare to celebrate Christ's death and resurrection at Easter.

Blessings to all from Antigua, Guatamala, where they REALLY celebrate Lent and Holy Week!

David+