Documentary Film Screening
The Peace and Justice Committee invites you to join us for a documentary film screening at the home of Jeff Levison and James Chavers on Saturday August 8th at 4PM. The film is entitled Chasing Ice and chronicles the work of a National Geographic photographer as he leaves his work for the magazine and spends a couple of years gathering photographic evidence of the melting of glaciers and warming of the ocean at the Arctic Circle. Both a human story and an environmental project, this film offers important education and information about the condition of the polar ice cap and the effect of its health on our society.
Come join us! Call the church office if you need directions and we will provide refreshments for the film and a discussion afterwards!
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Faith Sharing Testimony: "How I've Seen & Felt God's Presence in My Life Lately"
Just before moving to New York City last week, we sat down with KC Bugg to hear his testimony on video. We simply asked KC, former chair of the (a)Spire Leadership Team (LT),
How have you seen God at work in your life lately?
Check out KC's response in this video link:
This is the first of a few testimonials we hope to collect and share over the next year. Both FCC and (a)Spire discovered through the Natural Church Development survey that each took earlier this year that "Passionate Spirituality" is the minimum factor (i.e. greatest weakness) for both of our communities. To address that growing edge, the (a)Spire LT decided to launch two initiatives; 1) a sermon series and simultaneous small group both focused on the topic, "coming out evangelical" (see below) and 2) a "testimony" series where leaders and volunteers share their testimony of faith in worship and/or on video. This is the first one we've produced, but hope to do several more in the coming months. Thanks to Shane Apple for his hard work on recording and editing. |
(a)Spire has met new fundraising goal
Thanks to several (a)Spire and FCC leaders and friends sharing this effort with their friends and family, (a)Spire has reached and then surpassed the goal of raising $2,000 within 30 days to help us host 3 meals in the park over the next 5 months. At each event (Sept, Nov & Jan), we will offer a meal to the homeless followed by one of three healing practices; storytelling on video, art or laying on of hands. August 5th is the last day of the fundraising effort, and already we've raised $2,250! Our first meal will be September 13.
This was made possible by a brand-new web-based fundraising tool at www.woodtothefire.org that was created by the Center for Progressive Renewal and the United Church of Christ (Local Church Ministries at National Setting) to help churches raise funds for ministry projects like ours. To visit the page for the (a)Spire project, click here. By the way, you can still donate to the project (or encourage friends to do so) by midnight tonight.
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Coming Out Evangelical Small Group Kicks Off this Sunday 8/9
As mentioned above, (a)Spire discovered that our mimimum factor (i.e. area of greatest weakness) as a congregation, according to the Natural Church Development survey we took earlier this year, is Passionate Spirituality. So to address that, one initiative Randy, Andy and Claire are leading is Coming Out Evangelical, a sermon series and small group focused on reclaiming a sense of passionate evangelicalism from a progressive Christian perspective.
Through some discussion, we found that many of us are sometimes shy to share our faith with one another and especially with others outside our community. We believe we are cautious sharing our faith experiences with progressive or even moderate friends because we don't want to be labeled one of those kind of Christians. We realized that too often we describe our faith in contrast to what others hold to be true (e.g. we are not homophobic, not judgmental, not Bible-thumpers). So we wondered, rather than being NOT something, what is it that we CAN affirm?
Can we reclaim a sense of passionate Evangelicalism, as progressive Christians? Join us for this small group, that will meet each week after (a)Spire worship each Sunday August 9, 16, 23 and 30, beginning around 2:30-4PM.
Contact Randy or Andy if you wish to be involved. |
Children's Choir will sing Aug. 23 and Aug. 30th
The children will practice a song after worship on Sun. Aug. 23rd and then refine it with Connie before worship on Aug. 30th. Please join us and be in touch with Connie if you have any questions.
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Profiling FCC Members and Friends
We try to let you know when FCC folks are involved in events around the L.A. area - including musical events and plays or other kinds of offerings. This time we are profiling two folks who are connected with us who are part of the restaurant scene. The first is Ted Hopson - husband of Pam Hopson who was our soloist for several years. (Now her sister Pam Mendez is one of our soloists!!) Ted and his work partner have opened up a brand new restaurant called Bellwether, located at 13251 Ventura Blvd. in Studio City. You can make a reservation on their site (there are pretty pictures on Yelp). Let's support these friends as they launch their new venture this week!
www.thebellwetherla.com
Also, Jason Orr (famously the father of Mattias) is a manager at Islands Restaurant and he is usually placed far away from us. However, he has been relocated as the General Manager right here at the Paseo Islands restaurant!! Let's support him and his restaurant when you need a quick bite locally!! Glad to have you nearby Jason!
Have an FCC friend who is involved with something we might be interested in? Let us know so we can let others know and we can support our church community in their lives beyond the walls of church.
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Time for Some Summer Fun with our Dive-in Movie!
We are having a pool party and movie viewing of
Big Hero 6
at the Weltman house/pool on
Saturday Aug. 29th.
Click here for more info.
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What's your Spiritual Style?
As part of the Visioning Process that FCC is undertaking, everyone is asked to complete a "Spiritual Style Test" (SST). Once a majority of our congregation has turned in their SSTs, we'll have an accurate picture of what our congregation's overall Spiritual Style is, and we'll know what areas we should focus in order to be more holistic in our spirituality, rather than overly emphasize one style over others.
Please see the attached SST, print it out, fill it out, and send back the final 3 pages to Nina or Andy by August 1st. We are extending the deadline in order to try to collect a majority.
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Leadership Dinner On Sunday August 30th the pastoral staff will be hostng a Leadership Dinner for all in our church who serve on a ministry or a committee. Invitations have gone out to those 40 people this week. Please RSVP to Nina in the church office. We will be together for a meal, informal worship, some leadership tools and to be inspired for our collective work in the coming year! |