FROM THE RECTOR: REOPENING JULY 1, 2020

Beginning Wednesday, July 1, the 46th street doors of the church will be open Monday through Saturday from 11:00 AM until 2:00 PM, and the Holy Eucharist will be celebrated at the high altar at 12:10 PM. On Sundays, we plan for the church to be open from 10:00 AM until 12:30 PM, and the celebration of the Sunday Mass to be at 11:00 AM. Dr. David Hurd will play for us at that service, but there can be no congregational singing at this time. The 47th Street door of the church will not be open until the pandemic has passed. We have no idea about how many will be able to attend any of these services. Our doors have been closed since Sunday, March 15. All of this will be new for us. We will have to see what works and what doesn’t. Though we are eager to be able to worship together in person once again, the health and safety of all must remain our paramount concern.

At present, there is a limitation on the number of people who can be in our church for worship and prayer. Forty persons, 40 individuals or 30 individuals and five couples, can sit together. Marie Rosseels is the new chair of the usher guild. She and I will be on duty, along with a few others we hope, to help people feel safe and keep others safe in the church. All prayer books, hymnals, kneelers, and cushions have been removed from the church so that we can sanitize our pews. There will be service leaflets for everyone. Ushers will not pass offering plates, but there will be a basket to receive gifts.

During this time, please do not worry about standing or sitting during any part of the service. It is entirely correct to sit or stand, as you are able. As I said in last week’s newsletter, during the ministration of Communion, the members of the congregation will only receive the Bread, not the Wine. The bishop of New York has mandated this, and we believe that we will need to do this for the foreseeable future. We will place decals in the main aisle so it will be easier to safe-distance when coming forward to receive Communion. The celebrant will minister Communion at the foot of the chancel steps using a gloved hand.

The four shrines in the main church will be available for prayer and to light candles. There will be a simple set-up at each shrine for a person to pick up an unused lighting stick from one sand-filled container and, after lighting the votive candle, to place the wooden stick in a second sand-filled container.

The Chapel of Our Lady of Mercy and Saint Joseph’s Chapel will be closed, but the Lady Chapel (with chairs removed) will remain open. The limitations of restroom facilities and staff mean that our restrooms can only be opened for those attending Mass.

I regret that we will need to bring the daily live-stream of the Eucharist to an end for the moment. The primary reason for this is the current size of our clergy staff. During the eight-day period beginning on June 21 and ending on June 28, Father Jay Smith preached three week-day sermons and one sermon on Sunday, and I did the same. This has been our, in many ways happy, task since Father Jim Pace moved to Georgia on May 15 to take up his new position at Valdosta State University. However, neither Jay nor I feel comfortable preaching at a live-streamed and recorded service without using a written manuscript and this has meant spending more time in sermon preparation than before the shutdown. Moreover, as the city continues to re-open and as we move into the fall season, we expect that we will need to give our attention to some significant pastoral, educational, and administrative issues and duties. We need to try to balance the workload. That said, our team is actively exploring new equipment for live-streaming at the high altar. We think we can live-stream with our present equipment from the high altar on Sunday, July 5—at least that’s the plan today.

I write to you on Saturday afternoon, June 27, following a special meeting of the Board of Trustees, called to review the parish’s financial position. Bishop Andrew St. John, now bishop in residence at Saint Thomas Church, led our meeting and kept our focus on the decisions we need to make. The board agreed that one of our priorities going forward will need to be a high-quality online presence for our parish’s worship (both live-stream and archived video), especially on Sundays and feast-days. The members of the board agree that this is of critical importance for the future of the parish. That said, overall income through May 31, 2020, is down 22.2%. Setting aside program and staff, our fixed expenses remain the same. Donations from support groups and use-of-space fees from other non-profits who use our facilities are down 42.2% for the year. We are not unique in this. Many parishes in our diocese are facing similar financial challenges. Nonetheless, these challenges must be confronted if we are going to survive and be of service to our members, friends, and the people of our neighborhood.

There is one development that I am able to announce at this time. Beginning on July 1, when we open for public worship, our two full-time sextons’ schedules will change. Harka Gurung will work Tuesdays through Saturdays, Jorge Trujillo, Sundays through Thursdays. Their hours remain 9:00 AM until 5:00 PM. There are many jobs that require two people to accomplish, but many do not. Overall, our church plant is approximately 35,000 square feet. There is much work to do here. We are very fortunate to have in Harka and Jorge two dedicated, responsible, and hard-working employees, possessed of a wide range of gifts and abilities, who work very well together.

Finally, the work on the restoration of the 46th Street façade of the church should resume this month—we await another inspection by the Department of Buildings. I long for this work to be completed before the parish’s sesquicentennial anniversary of the opening of the doors of the first parish church on December 8, 1870. I am hoping now that the work will be complete by the end of this spring.

There are so many unknowns at this point in time. Our board has been cautious in its response to the crisis—and all of us are very thankful that the parish community has had few who have suffered from sicknesses of COVID-19, as far as we know. I pray that we can maintain our grand vision for the future, while remaining grounded in the realities of the current moment. I pray that we will be able to do this with hope and not with fear, trusting in the God’s mercy and grace. —Stephen Gerth

YOUR PRAYERS ARE ASKED FOR Michael, Larry, Scott, Richard, Evan, Samantha, Luis, Leroy, Shalim, Emily, Nam, John, James, Marilouise, Ken, May, Willard, Alexandra, Takeem, and Burton; for Ronald, Bede, and David, religious; for Gene, Gaylord, Louis, priests; and Charles, bishop; for the members of the armed forces on active duty, especially Isabelle; for all health-care workers; for all those who work for the common good; and for all the members, benefactors, and friends of this parish. We pray for justice and peace for the people of this nation. We pray for the safety and welfare of our city and those who dwell herein.

IN THIS TRANSITORY LIFE . . . Nicole and Christopher Figuera, cousins of Richard Mohammed, died of injuries sustained this week in an automobile accident in Trinidad. They are survived by four daughters. Please keep Nicole, Christopher, Richard, their family and friends, and all who mourn in your prayers.

THE ORDINARY FRIDAYS OF THE YEAR are observed by special acts of discipline and self-denial in commemoration of the Lord’s crucifixion.

THE FLOWER MARKET HAS REOPENED . . . We welcome donations for flowers for the high altar, since we hope to be celebrating Mass in the church on Sundays beginning on July 5. The suggested donation for those arrangements is $250.00. Please be in touch with Chris Howatt by email if you would like to make a donation.

AROUND THE PARISH . . . Parishioner Michael Merenda was discharged from the hospital this week and is now at home at home and receiving palliative care. He is gravely ill. Please keep him and his spouse, Leroy Sharer, in your prayers . . . A good friend of the parish, Brother Ronald Fox, BSG, recently underwent orthopedic surgery in Chicago. He is recuperating at home. Please keep Mike and Ron in your prayers . . . The celebrant at the 10:00 AM Mass in the Lady Chapel on Saturday, June 27, was Father Matthew Jacobson. It was his first time back to the parish since the middle of March. Though we’ve been in regular contact with him these past few months, it was very good to have him here again. We are grateful to him, and to all of our assisting priests, for their ministry . . . Bishop Andrew M.L. Dietsche’s Guidance on Re-Opening Churches for Public Worship, Outreach, and the Accommodation of Outside Groups is available on the diocesan website . . . The New York State Department of Health’s Interim Guidance for Religious & Funeral Services During the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency is available online.

THIS WEEK AT SAINT MARY’S . . . Sunday, June 28, The Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, Sung Mass 10:00 AM. The celebrant and preacher is Father Stephen Gerth. On Sunday, we also remember in the prayers Saint Irenaeus (c. 202) and James Otis Sargent Huntington, OHC (1935) . . . Monday, June 29, Saint Peter and Saint Paul, Apostles, Mass 10:00 AM . . . Wednesday–Friday, July 1–3, Weekdays after Pentecost, Mass 12:10 PM at the High Altar . . . Friday, July 3, Federal Holiday . . . Saturday, July 4, Independence Day, Mass 12:10 PM.

CONFRONTING RACISM: WORDS & DEEDS . . . In light of recent events and ongoing realities in our society, some members of Saint Mary’s have begun weekly conversations about racism and about how we as individuals and as a community can respond. At present, conversations are informal, and are being held via the online Zoom platform. Participants will decide the shape and content of the discussion moving forward.  Options might include a structured curriculum, book and film discussions, or other routes.  If you’d like to join in these discussions, please email Brother Thomas or Brother Damien.

SAINT MARY’S ONLINE CENTERING PRAYER GROUP . . . The Saint Mary’s Centering Prayer Group continues to meet! The Group meets online, via Zoom, every Friday evening at 7:00 PM. If you are interested in participating, please send an e-mail to this address. The convenors of the group will then send the link to the Zoom meeting.

FROM THE FRIARY . . . The meditations of our resident Franciscan brothers and the other brothers of the Society of Saint Francis are archived on the Society’s website. (Be sure to scroll down to the bottom of the page to see the titles of the archived meditations.) Brother Nathaniel James SSF, who lives at San Damiano Friary in San Francisco, posted a new meditation this week that is entitled “We’ll Leave the Light on for You.” We are grateful that the brothers are sharing their reflections, rooted in their reading of Scripture, the Franciscan tradition, and their experience with us. We recommend them to all of our readers . . . Brother Desmond Alban SSF has been participating in the parish’s online, Zoom discussions about racism. It has been good to see him, to receive his input, and we look forward to having him here at the parish before too very long.

ONLINE RETREATS . . . Holy Cross Monastery, West Park, New York, is offering several online Zoom retreats this summer. Among them are Praying with the Spanish Mystics: Dark Night and Interior Castle, led Carl McColman, Tuesday, July 21–Thursday, July 23, 2020, at 2:00 PM on Zoom. Visit the monastery website for more information about registration, suggested donations, and information about online retreats to take place during the month of July.

AT THE MUSEUMS . . . Saturday, July 4, is Independence Day. Consider watching a video (49 minutes long), archived on the website of the New-York Historical Society, of a talk at the museum that took place in 2011. The talk was part of an exhibition called, Revolution! The Atlantic World Reborn. From the museum website, “Curator Richard Rabinowitz and historian Laurent DuBois discuss the captivating history told in the New-York Historical Society’s all-new exhibition Revolution! The Atlantic World Reborn. A landmark exploration of the American, French and Haitian struggles as a single global narrative, Revolution! shows how freedom, equality and the sovereignty of the people became universal goals.” Also available for viewing on the museum’s website: Celebrating Juneteenth: The Legacy of Frederick Douglass. From the museum’s website, “What did the nation look like in the years following the end of the Civil War and the emancipation of African Americans? In a special conversation to celebrate Juneteenth, historians David W. Blight and Eddie S. Glaude, Jr. (moderator) delve into the life of one of the most important figures of the nineteenth century, writer, orator, and abolitionist Frederick Douglass, and how his legacy continues to resonate today. David Blight is Sterling Professor of History, of African American Studies, and of American Studies, and Director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University. He is also a trustee of the New-York Historical Society. Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., is chair of the Department of African American Studies and James S. McDonnell Distinguished Professor of Religion and African American Studies at Princeton University, and a distinguished author. Prof. Blight is the author of a recent biography of Frederick Douglass, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2019. Prof. Glaude’s book, Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own, will be released on Tuesday, June 30.

This edition of the Angelus was written and edited by Father Stephen Gerth and Father Jay Smith. Father Gerth is responsible for posting the newsletter on the parish website and for distributing it via e-mail.

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