jessica.rowley@stsclareandfrancis.org  or 314.918.2766

Muscular Dystrophy Association

Summer Camp

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

Babler State Park

Therese Gabriel is asking for volunteers to help serve dinner at the MDA Camp on the evening of Tuesday, June 26 or Wednesday, June 27.  The camp is held at Babler State Park. We have volunteers who will be barbecuing for us but we need servers and helpers to set up and put away everything (our volunteers are assigned to a camper and cannot leave them).  Last year several folks from SCF came to help and enjoyed it very much.  Contact Therese Gabriel for more information, 314.607.7087 or 314.839.2225. 

Beginning June 30th, 3:00 - 4:30 pm

Fireside Room

Join a summer book discussion of Patrick Cheng's book, "Radical Love: An Introduction to Queer Theology."  Rev. Claudia Hall and Jessica Rowley will facilitate the discussion.  We will gather on five Saturdays from 3:00 - 4:30 pm in the Fireside Room on June 30th, July 14th,  July 28th, August 11th, August 25th

You can order the book here:

http://www.left-bank.com/book/9781596271326    $20  or at

 http://www.amazon.com/Radical-Love-Introduction-Queer-Theology/dp/1596271329/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1337810269&sr=8-1

Dr. Patrick Cheng's book "Radical Love: An Introduction to Queer Theology" is part of a larger movement within Christian theology called contextual theology, which focuses on applying the historical doctrines and teachings of the faith to particular life circumstances. For centuries, celibate and/or heterosexual European men were responsible for the vast majority of religious writing and preaching. In the last 50 years, a variety of new voices have entered theological discourse, including sexual and gender minorities. This book is for everyone, offering a new way to look at the Bible, at church teachings, and at how we understand ourselves to be Christian. This five week series will follow Cheng's book while listening to our own responses for insights about how the Spirit is at work.

About Rev. Claudia Hall:

Claudia Hall comes to Sts. Clare & Francis with a diverse ministry background. She grew up in a variety of Protestant denominations, graduated with her B.A. in religion from St. Leo College, a Benedictine school, and received her M.Div from Saint Paul School of Theology in Kansas City, MO. After serving as a Methodist minister for several years, including appointments as a church growth pastor and a new church start pastor, she left the UMC and founded an interfaith ministry which focuses on helping people rejected by traditional churches, especially sexual and gender minority persons. She is working on her Ph.D from the California Institute of Integral Studies and her dissertation is currently titled "The process of religious and spiritual identity construction in polyamorous Christians." She lives with her family in St. Charles.

July 13 - 15, 2012

Mercy Center

Murshid Khabir Kitz

Murshid Khabir Kitz established a Sufi center in Texas called the Shrine of the Heart. In 1976 he studied the dervish turn and continued the practice as a semazen, teaching the turn as a meditation practice. In 1981 he moved to land in the Ozark Mountains fo Arkansas where he founded Heartsong Retreat Center. In 1982 Khabir was ordained a Seraj in the Service of Universal Peace. He leads dance, meditation, turning and art workshops. Giving students the tools to find their inner guidance and discovering the creator within every being and thing is what Khabir has tried to do in life. For more details, see the flyer here.