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A Saint Hilda's Request
As we are nearing the end of Lent, we recently returned from our Lenten retreat. I was struck by the depth of the reflection of each of our interns on their life together and on the joys and challenges of living in intentional community. All of our interns shared some bit of what was giving them energy and joy in the community and also those things which were proving most challenging.
One of the things I came away with was the vital importance of the work each of them is doing - not only internally and spiritually but in their life and service in the wider community.
We are endeavoring to broaden the kinds of worksites our interns serve in - this is a challenge because some of the very placements we would love to be a part of are those most strapped for cash and in need of the kind of help we can offer. Whether it is working in difficult schools, serving with start-up youth programs, or assisting with a new arts program we are working to get off the ground in the Hill, there are ways we would love to have our interns serving that we, and those agencies, cannot afford.
Our hope is that friends of Saint Hilda's will consider a donation to offset the costs of making a new placement with a start-up or an agency that normally could not afford a full-time intern. There are so many opportunities to serve and so many different ways our young adults can make a difference with just a bit of additional financial support.
Supporting the program is easy and can be done securely and quickly online.
If you would be willing to make a donation, we will be in touch with our donors to help us decide where to place our intern. Whatever amount you can offer would be deeply appreciated! We look forward to the conversation with our supporters as we seek to discern how God is calling us to deepen our service to the city.
Yours in Christ,
Robert+
GARLiC - Green Art Recreating Life in Communities - a new mission
 GARLiC (Green Art Recreating Life in Communities) is a new mission of Saint Hilda's and Ascension that will be a collective that will teach and create green art in urban areas to promote environmental awareness, artistic expression and poverty alleviation.
Our purpose is to use recycled materials to create eco-friendly art. By doing this GARLiC will also promote the following:
1) Helping to combat the amount of municipal waste, thereby helping the environment,
2) Encouraging a reduction in consumerism and conspicuous consumption by encouraging participants to give recycled gifts, and
3) Providing new skills and resources to racially and ethnically diverse people with moderate-low incomes in urban areas.
Thus addressing multiple issues; environmental awareness, consumer spending, and a lack of urban art education.
In New Haven there are a number of museums, and art resources downtown, but almost nothing in the poorer and more remote neighborhoods. It is not incidental that the location of the GARLiC classes is not downtown New Haven, but in the Hill.
GARLiC is a member based organization; all students will be contributing members through a donation of one product. Members will also be asked to donate their time and talents to teach classes to others, help clean the studio space, or whatever the member can contribute. Instead of adopting a charity model where resources are held to be redistributed to others, we will emphasize that every member has resources necessary to the organization.
Some materials will be provided to members, but people will be encouraged to bring products and containers from their home that they were going to throw away so that they can learn how to make use of the things they already have. The classes provided will range from the traditional; painting, drawing, jewelry making, to paper making, turning trash into useable products, and also an overview on environmental awareness.
To learn more about GARLiC visit our website
-Sarah Raven, GARLiC Program Director (2011-2012 St. Hilda's Intern and Ascension Community Member)
Fear of God
(Excerpt from Edward Watson's Blog)
"My fear of God is a fear of what I might be asked to do. Currently I would say that I am called to be here, and this has meant me living half a world away from the friends and family who mean the whole world to me. I know I'll be back home in the summer, and I know I'll be back home in a few years. At the moment, answering God's call is easy for me: I am happy, fulfilled, and comfortable. There will almost certainly come a time when this is not the case. I am afraid of what would happen if I felt called to live a life such that I never saw my family again: I am also afraid that I would say no.
God is to be feared because of what he demands: he demands the subjugation of the self to the service of others. Unlike the previous, I do not think this fear can be fully exorcised: we cannot reason away the fear of this sort of self denial, through thought or through faith.
Instead, it must be faced, and overcome. A part of doing this is to give up fear of all else: a Christian need not fear anything in the world. Rather, focus on God as the sole object of fear, and work to get to the point where you can face that fear: work to get to the point where if you hear the call, you will be able to answer.
In summation: the only correct object of Christian fear is God.
(This might seem a bit of a bleak note to end on, so one final (only slightly) cheerier reflection: if the thing you're most afraid is also what you believe to be the source of all goodness, hope, and love, then you could be doing a lot worse.)"
Showing Up: A Reflection on Ministry at Ascension in the Hill
Like every ministry, Ascension has its frustrations. I was recently sharing with Joe, a Christ Church intern, that at the end of a semester of ministry in the Hill, it still feels at times as if we are just a bunch of outsiders talking about doing something in a neighborhood. He nodded his head in understanding and said, "yeah, but you showed up." I stopped to think for a moment, then smiled. "I guess we did," I replied.
Sometimes, that's all we can really say about a ministry at the end of the day. If we have tried to help someone, or share what we have in some way, we may not always see what impacts that has. A few days after that conversation, I "showed up" in the Hill with a plan for the morning: I was to pray the morning office with a friend in the Ascension Nave, and then head down the street to the Catholic Worker House for breakfast and a bible study. It turned out that the bus came late and didn't take me where I needed to go, so I got to Ascension too late for morning prayer and headed down to the Catholic Worker House.
Over breakfast, Mark mentioned that they needed to help one of their neighbors move, so I figured I would help there for about twenty minutes and then come back to the house for the bible study. It turned out that their neighbor had twice as much in her apartment as we thought, including a couch that must have materialized inside her apartment, because four of us could not get it out of the doorway. We got back to the house dusty and exhausted just before Mark had to leave, so the bible study never happened.
When one of the regular attendees of the study saw me and asked what had happened, I shook my head and gave the only explanation I could in Spanish: "Fue un maņana loco"- "it was a crazy morning."
Nothing went as I had planned that day, and I certainly did not get the results I was expecting. But I did show up. That's what the folks at the Catholic Worker House did 18 years ago: they just showed up and stayed, and they have changed people's lives.
I think if we reflect on the Nativity, we see that it's about God showing up for us in a completely unassuming way. Maybe that is the revolution to which God in Christ is calling us: to just show up and be present, especially in times and places in which the rest of the world doesn't.
-Nathan Beall, 2012-2013 Ascension Community Member
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Saint Hilda's and Ascension
Saint Hilda's Saint Hilda's applicants should have finished their undergraduate degree and have an interest in living in community, spiritual discernment, worship, urban service, and formation. More information may be found here.  | | A week at Saint Hilda's |
Ascension House Ascension House is a unique newly forming residential urban community for those who are looking for a distinctly different form of community, service, formation, and prayer. Community members serve with parishes and agencies around New Haven, live in intentional community, are mentored by clergy around the area, and partner with neighbors to coordinate mission and worship.  | | Why Ascension House? |
Those who are part of Ascension House live, pray, learn, struggle, walk, and work alongside those whom God calls us to love - our neighbors. We are engaged in work that is in some ways new and radical and in other ways is the very essence of tradition.
More information may be found here. |
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Saint Hilda's House 84 Broadway New Haven, CT 06511 sainthildashouse.org For more information: Fr Robert Hendrickson Program Director, rhendrickson@gts.edu
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