SPOTLIGHT

Come lift your spirits and embrace the Advent season by participating in a beloved Hancock tradition: Manger Sunday.

During morning worship on December 8, we will process to the manger with gifts for those less fortunate. Hancock, along with 40 other churches and groups in the greater-Boston area, delivers the gifts to City Mission Society's Christmas Shop distribution center in Winchester. CMS requests the following new, unwrapped items for families in need:

• Winter coats, sweaters and sweatshirts (large sizes especially)
• Hats, mittens, gloves and scarves
• Socks and underwear
• Blankets and backpacks
• Toys, games, and books for all ages
• Gift cards from Target, Marshalls, Walgreens, CVS, Kohls, Walmart, Stop and Shop, Shaw's and other merchants

Volunteers are needed to help deliver the gifts to Winchester after the service on Sunday, December 8 from 12:30pm-1:30pm, and to help sort items at the Christmas Shop on 

December 8, 3-5pm

Please contact April Julich Perez (aprilpomme@yahoo.com) for information or if you would like to help.  

UPCOMING EVENTS 

The voices for this program will be divided into two choirs, with each calling back and forth to each other and coming together to form a grand chorus. The instrumental forces for this program will include baroque violins, various sizes of viols, baroque flutes, voice flutes, soprano recorders and harpsichord.  The instruments will be divided into two orchestras, each supporting one of the two choirs, and positioned to bring out the echoing, or antiphonal, nature of the mass.

Date:  Sunday, January 5th

Time:  Following Morning Church Service around 11:15 AM

Location:  Hancock Church, Room 205

Starting in January, we will be meeting every Sunday following church service in Room 205.

ANNOUNCEMENTS 

[This is the second of a series of communications about Hancock's Endowment, its uses, and the many ways which gifts can be made to the Endowment]

DID YOU KNOW? ... Endowment gifts, unlike other "types" of giving to Hancock, is any asset donated to and for the perpetual benefit of the Church. Endowment gifts are typically given with the requirement that the principal remain intact and that money earned from investing the donation be used for the benefit of the Church.

Subsequently, the Endowment Committee invests the donated assets and uses the  total returns from those investments in two ways:  

1) to maintain the purchasing power of each Endowment gift

2) to make annual distributions to the church 

This assures that both present and future generations share equally in the value of all endowment gifts to Hancock United Church of Christ. Thus, giving to the Endowment is a wonderful way to establish a permanent legacy honoring your love of Hancock Church.

 EDUCATION & SMALL GROUPS 

The First Thursday Discussion Group will continue this fall. Rev. Dana Allen Walsh will be leading the group. The group meets: 

   October 3

   November 7 

   December 5  

   at 10 am in the Pearson room 

We will be discussing Lean In:  Women, Work and the Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg. All are welcome to join the group for a lively conversation of thinking outside of the box. Contact: Lois Smith Martin smithmartin224@verizon.net, (781) 270-0304.

There is a lot of buzz about this new book.

Like or dislike; agree or disagree, come and join the conversation!  Here are some quotes from the book we'll be discussing:

"What would you do if you weren't afraid?"

"Leadership is about making others better as a result of your presence and making sure that impact lasts in your absence."

"We cannot change what we are not aware of, and once we are aware, we cannot help but change."