January 21, 2021   A Reflection from Pastor Emilie Finn

Dear People of God,

One of many things I really love about my work here at All Saints’ is my participation in the interfaith panels for All Saints’ parents, hosted by the religion department at the Day School. It is such a privilege to represent Christianity, and so much fun to converse with panelists from other faith traditions.

At our most recent interfaith panel, the question asked of the panelists was, “2020 has been difficult for many people. How does your faith help you find unity and peace in divided times? What spiritual intentions help you find a better 2021?” I found that I really appreciated this question, because it prompted me to dig deep, and to discover just what has been at the foundation of my faith and work during this difficult year.

I find that what has helped me most to find peace and a sense of unity this past year has been grounding myself in, and going deeper into, one of the oldest practices of our faith tradition. For early Christians, daily morning and evening prayers that focused on the recitation of the psalms were a principal form of worship, especially in monastic communities.

Since March, 2020, All Saints’ has been saying the Daily Office every morning and evening each weekday, on Facebook Live. This ancient practice of beginning, and ending, and beginning again in prayer has blessed me with a structured way to begin and end each day in the presence of God, and of other people, during a year that has at times seemed to do its best to isolate all of us from both.

Morning and evening prayers have grounded my ordinary, everyday life in God, and in communion with those I pray for and with, each day, and I have been especially grateful for the little community-within-a-community that has grown up around our new practice of virtual Morning Prayer at All Saints’.

And of course, there is something holy about bringing the entire spectrum of human emotion, from the best and most beautiful to the worst and ugliest, before God each day, as we do when we pray the entire psalter over a period of time in the Daily Office. Praying the psalms reminds me what it means to be human, and what it means to be human in the presence of God, which is humbling, convicting, and challenging all at once.

Thank you all for praying with me this past year, and for continuing to pray with me this year. Your prayers have supported me as I hope mine have supported you as we all continue our very human struggle to place our lives and our future in God’s hands.

January 14, 2021  A Reflection from Fr. Bill Lupfer

January 7, 2021 A Reflection  from Fr. Tim Yanni

This is not the reflection I had expected to have published for today. I wanted to wish you a happy New Year. I wanted to offer some anecdotes about New Year’s resolutions and how horrible I am at keeping them. I wanted to share with you some jokes at my own expense, poking fun at the reality that my weight tends to fluctuate around the end of the year. I wanted to begin 2021 with a little bit of fun and inspiration. When I woke up on January 6, I was feeling joy. I was feeling hope. I was feeling enthusiastic. But about 20 minutes after I submitted the reflection I had intended to share with you, a group of armed protesters, many of them identifying as “patriots”, stormed the United States Capitol building while both houses of Congress were in session. Our country was under attack from within. It did not seem fair or right to run with the jovial, light-hearted reflection I had written. Instead, I felt it was my duty as one of your pastors to offer some words of comfort. After all, our country is now wounded.

All Saints’ prides itself on its “big tent” identity. Many Episcopal churches have a sign up that says, “All Are Welcome.” But not every Episcopal church seems to mean it. I’m proud to say All Saints’ does. In a world of red vs. blue, our pews are filled with a lovely shade of purple. We have liberals, conservatives, and moderates. We pray together, we engage with one another, and we love each other. Most importantly, we share the Holy Meal together. It’s truly a beautiful thing!

Part of our identity means that it’s uncommon to discuss things like party politics from the pulpit. I have known many preachers to preach party politics and, like many of you, I find it off-putting. Instead of reading the scriptures through a lens designed by my political views, I prefer to shape my political views according to the teachings of Jesus. I try to ask myself, “what would Jesus do in this situation?”

I do not, with any degree of certainty, know whether Jesus would vote red or blue. For instance, I don’t know if he would support tax dollars funding social programs to feed the hungry, or if he’d prefer the private sector to take on this task. I do know that he wants us to feed the hungry. I also know that the word “politics” comes from a Greek word that means “the affairs of the people.” There’s nothing about politics that is inherently off limits. Any time you have people gathered, you have politics. Some political concerns simply need to be discussed.

Our nation is hurting. I believe it is safe to say that good people with conservative, liberal, and moderate political views join forces to denounce the actions of the rioters who stormed the capitol and endangered the lives of our elected officials.

Our Presiding Bishop, Michael Curry, has issued a statement condemning what he called a “coup.” “The events at our Capitol today are deeply disturbing. We believe the actions of armed protesters represent a coup attempt,” Bishop Curry said. “Today’s protesters pushed through police barricades and forced their way into congressional chambers and … [are] threatening the safety of lawmakers, their staff and others who work in the Capitol complex. This threatens the integrity of our democracy, the national security of our nation, the continuity of government, and the lives and safety of our legislators, their staffs, law enforcement and all who work in the Capitol.”

Please join me and my clergy colleagues at All Saints’, as we unite with Bishop Curry, Bishop Reddall, and clergy throughout the Church of God, as we pray for healing. As Bishop Curry said, “Even as our nation’s Capitol is being endangered and assaulted, we pray that the Lord Jesus Christ, we pray that God in his way of love, might prevail in all of our hearts.”

O Lord our Governor, bless the leaders of our land, that we may be a people at peace among ourselves and a blessing to other nations of the earth. Teach our people to rely on your strength and to accept their responsibilities to their fellow citizens, that they may elect trustworthy leaders and make wise decisions for the well-being of our society; that we may serve you faithfully in our generation and honor your holy Name. Amen. (BCP P. 821-822)

December 30, 2020  A Reflection from Pastor Emilie Finn

Dear People of God,

Merry Christmas! I wonder if Christmas felt like Christmas to you this year? If you are like me, so much of what makes Christmas feel like Christmas is wrapped up in the sights and sounds, and smell and taste and feeling, of being in church, and with family and friends. And if you are like me, this year many, if not most, of those Christmas sights and sounds were mediated to us through the screen and speakers of a TV, computer, tablet, or phone, which made it very different. I think Christmas was probably a very different experience for all of us this year.

I remember when Christmas changed for me the first time. It was the first year that the Christmas lights, the music playing on our old record player, and the smell of cookies baking, did not bring me the magical joy it always had. I was 14 years old that year, and I was just discovering that life was not as uniformly happy as my rosy childhood gaze had always painted it. This made me angry and depressed, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t feel the Christmas spirit—although I remember pretending very hard to be as happy and excited as always, so as not to bring the rest of my family down.

Luckily for me, this was also the year my mother gave me my deeply loved Christmas with Julie Andrews CD. I listened to it over and over again, and one song in particular, one that I had never heard before, rebuilt the foundation of my Christmas spirit in a way that accounted for the darkness and sadness and confusion of the world that had had no place in the brightness of my childhood. The Secret of Christmas was written in the 1950s for Bing Crosby, but I will always hear it as I first heard it in 1995, in Julie Andrews’ voice:

It's not the glow you feel when snow appears

It's not the Christmas card you've sent for years

Not the joyful sound when sleigh bells ring

Or the merry songs children sing

The little gift you send on Christmas day

Will not bring back the friend you turned away

So may I suggest the secret of Christmas

Is not the things you do at Christmas time

But the Christmas things you do all year through

It turns out, that the Christmas that didn’t feel like Christmas at all gave me the best Christmas present I have ever received. It taught me that Christmas isn’t over. That Christmas is never over. The spirit of Christmas—the spirit of Christ—is not something that exists only during the month of December. The spirit of Christmas was born into the world on that silent night we remember on December 25, and has existed on earth ever since.

Sometimes, especially at Christmas time, we feel that Spirit in a special way that makes us want to sing or shout with joy. But ultimately, the Christmas spirit isn’t something we have to make ourselves feel. It is something that simply exists no matter how we feel; an unending and unstinting gift from God that we can choose to live within at any time, in any place, no matter how we feel. So whether you had the best Christmas ever, or the worst, or even if it didn’t feel like Christmas at all, Merry Christmas, and may you live in the spirit of Christmas all through the New Year.

December 23, 2020  A Refection from Fr. Bill Lupfer

Friends,                                 

As we prepare to celebrate Christmas this year, we share the same message as always “that God gives us the gift of life through Jesus” but many of us will celebrate in ways that seem strange and different.

The pandemic has caused us all to change our usual patterns of celebration. We will continue to worship together, but it will only be virtual. We will continue to sing and hear our beautiful choir, but it will only be with the computer. We will continue to be close to our loved ones but much of that may be expressed through the telephone. As our prayer book says, “Life has changed, not ended.”   

With all the ways that the pandemic has muted our celebrations, we can still be like Jacob, who wrestled with the angel until he discovered the blessing. 

This Christmas, I hope you will bring into your heart the toughness of the Holy Family as they delivered the gift of the Incarnation in the midst of the political confusion of their time.  I hope you will tune the spiritual ear of your heart, like the shepherds who heard the angels sing while others were self-absorbed and missed the beautiful music that announced the Messiah’s birth. I hope you will be like the Magi who were awake to the signs and portents in the heavens themselves that led them to the blessing of the Holy Child Jesus. I hope you will recall Joseph who had fierce love for his betrothed and stayed committed to her when almost anyone else would have abandoned her. And Mary. Bring her into your heart. There is no one more tough and loving than her. Her condition (unwed and pregnant) exposed her to great personal risk. But, through it all, Mary was rock solid and sang a beautiful song to God (the Magnificat), celebrating the great gift of the incarnation (Jesus!) that she had the horrible privilege to deliver into our world.

The first Christmas was not for sissies and wimps. And this Christmas is not either. We are called to step forward in courage and to wrestle with our faith in God’s power. 

I pray you will listen carefully to God’s song of love that comes to you in many ways, that you will wrestle the blessing when you need to, steadfast in your faith, tough in your resolve and firm in your love for your family and loved ones, and also for those who have less than you do.

Open your heart this Christmas and get ready for the blessings of the Incarnation. Put your wrestling gear on. It may not be easy this year. But the blessings abound and they are freely offered.

Finally, please consider a year end donation to All Saints’. A generous Christmas offering will help us finish the year strong, starting 2021 from a position of strength. We truly appreciate every gift, in any amount, to fund our vital ministries. There are several ways to give:

• Give a Christmas offering in the enclosed envelope. Please send in a check by mail, or drop off at the Church Office. Simply put “Christmas Offering” in the memo line.
  
• To give online, visit our website: AllSaintsOnCentral.org and then choose “SUPPORT.”  
  
•  Contact Barbara Anderson, Financial Assistant, in the Church Office for a gift of stock or by credit card.

Thank you for all that you have done to help make

2020 a wonderful year of ministry at All Saints’ albeit

an unusual one. Regardless, here the light of Christ shines brightly, for the sake of a world that needs it desperately.

May God bless All Saints’, and each of you and yours abundantly in the new year.

Faithfully,

Bill+

December 10, 2020 A Reflection from Pastor Emilie Finn

Dear People of God:

I can’t hear the Gospel readings for the second and third Sundays in Advent this year without thinking of my parents. When the two of them met, they began a quest that my mother continues to live into to this day. In their words, they wanted to “find a way to live that helps the world more than it harms it.” This quest eventually led them to found Quixote’s Catholic Worker, a place of hospitality for homeless people in Prescott that my mother still runs.

But the reason I think of my parents when I hear these readings about John the Baptist is that, when I was a teenager, this quest led my family into multiple attempts to live in a succession of intentional communities, all of which were more or less dysfunctional. And the real problem with this was that my parents’ role in these communities was usually the role of pointing out the dysfunction.

And that is the problem with prophets, isn’t it? They tell us exactly who we are and where we are, and what we are doing, and what the result is going to be. And people don’t usually enjoy that experience—as my parents discovered over, and over, and over again.

But the gospel teaches us that we should. We should listen to the people who say the things we don’t want to hear, and talk about the things we don’t want to know about, and who tell the truth even when it is ugly. Because we can’t confess what we don’t know about, and we can’t repent of what we cannot see.

Repentance starts with prophets like John the Baptist, and my parents. People who force us to see the places of shadow in ourselves, in our communities, and in the world. Because only then can we begin the task of leveling mountains, raising valleys, and smoothing out rough places, in ourselves, and in our world.

But don’t get discouraged if that sounds too hard. There is the other lesson that John the Baptist, and my parents, have to teach us this Advent: Our work by itself can’t ever bring about the entirety of the change we know needs to happen, in ourselves or in the world.

Our work won’t ever save the whole world. In fact, if you talked to my mom right now, I’m not sure that she would tell you they ever even found a way to help the world more than they harm it. But what our work does do is prepare the way for God to break into the world in a completely redemptive and unexpected way.

It’s God’s job to save the world, not ours. And in Christ, God already has. We are just called to help prepare the way for the inevitable reign of God. We are called to help prepare the way for God to continue to break into the world in new ways and continue in us God’s salvation of the world. And that is good news indeed!

December 3, 2020  A Reflection from Father Bill Lupfer, Interim Rector

Announcement for Return to Virtual Worship

Friends,

Last night, our vestry made the decision to return to Phase One, where we will only worship virtually.

They made this decision carefully, thoughtfully and with prayer. I was proud of the way they worked towards this decision. They represented you very well.

You may recall, when we drafted our reassembly plan in September, we listed clear metrics to guide us. Recently, with the upswing in COVID cases in our community, we have surpassed those metrics.

So we return to virtual worship. We have anticipated this step and are doing everything we can to help you worship authentically in this challenging time.

We continue to stay focused on our core mission to pray, learn, serve, connect. And we will work to help you stay up to date on all the ways we can be in relationship during these challenging times.

All Saints' is a very strong parish and you are progressing through these challenging times with courage and grace. With effective vaccinations on the horizon, we can anticipate a time where we will regather to celebrate God’s love by singing, eating, laughing and talking together.

Let’s all stay healthy and as safe as possible so we can enjoy the day when we full the church with song and laughter.

For now, I pray for each of you, that you may experience the quiet side of God’s love. Be bold and confident that God is blessing you, even as we all long for lives that feel more normal.

November 25, 2020 A Reflection from Pastor Emilie Finn

Dear People of God,

In just a few days, it will be Advent, and I am sure I’m not alone in my tendency these days to think back to the ways my family used to prepare for and celebrate Christmas when I was a child. Advent meant Christmas music, Christmas cookies, decorations, stockings, and my father’s reading of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Christmas meant the four of us, our little family, celebrating all the idiosyncratic traditions we had invented that had come to symbolize our love for each other.

What I started to realize as I grew older is that my childhood memory of Advent and Christmas is not a single memory, but a composite memory of all the beautiful Christmas moments from my entire childhood. And trying to create an experience each year that lived up to that composite memory grew harder and harder for my family as my sister and I grew up, and when my dad died in 2005, that re-creation became impossible. Christmas is very different now, for all three of us, and it took us a long time to get used to what that meant.

But life is like that, isn’t it? Sometimes, briefly, everything is perfect. But usually, it’s kind of a mess. People talk through concerts or movies (or it’s 2020 and no one can go to concerts or movies). Someone messes up the most important part of a worship service (or it’s 2020 and and in-person worship gets cancelled). Your family argues over Thanksgiving dinner (or it’s 2020 and your family is trying to eat together over Zoom, which makes you nostalgic for the traditional family argument).

But that is what Advent is actually all about. We are getting ready to celebrate Feast of the Incarnation. We are about to celebrate the time in history when the Word of God—God Godself—became flesh. In the Incarnation, God takes on exactly this part of being human: the messy, ugly, imperfect, fleshy parts of human life.

Jesus has a body that felt pain and pleasure, that got sick, and tired, and hungry, just like ours. Jesus has a brain that could learn, and forget, and play tricks on him; that worked well sometimes and less well sometimes, depending on what he ate, and drank, and how much sleep he’d gotten the night before. Jesus had a heart that could race with excitement, or fear; that beat with joy or anger, or ached with compassion or loneliness, just like ours.

Jesus is human. And, Jesus is God.

And that means that God gets it—really gets it. God created flesh. God was born, and lived, and died as flesh. And Jesus, in the flesh, rose again. We don’t ever have to try to pretend to God about who we are, or how we feel, or what’s actually going on in our lives. We don’t have to try to be perfect—all we have to do is follow Jesus as well as we can as who and what we truly are.

Christmas isn’t about perfection, it’s about incarnation.

So have a blessed Advent, whatever your preparations for Christmas look like this year. Because whether it is beautiful or difficult, painful or joyous, busy or lonely, or even all of the above, God is with you.

November 19, 2020 A Reflection from Father Tim Yanni

I am writing this as I just returned from a five-mile walk/hike. Living close to the Phoenix Mountain Preserve means that I can leave my home, walk to the preserve, meander along one of its many trails for a few miles, and then meander back home. I spend a lot of my time in my neighborhood and along the preserve’s many trails.

Back in March, when the Diocese of Arizona instructed parishes to move away from in-person worship services, I made a deal with myself. I would hike every day until we could return to church safely. At the time, I believed the quarantine would last about two weeks, and I thought 14 straight days of hiking seemed like an attainable, beneficial goal. I planned to reflect on my experience and report back to you at some point. Fast forward some 35 weeks, and many aspects of our COVID-19 quarantine continue. I did the math, and I now realize I have walked some 1,200 miles since March: about 5 miles per day.

Truth be told, part of my motivation was to improve my health. I knew COVID-19 was a respiratory illness and I wanted to ensure my lungs were stronger so that if I were to catch the virus, I would improve my chances of survival. To date, I am thankful that I have not contracted the virus. However, it is important to acknowledge that none of us is exempt from the possibility of exposure. As you likely read in yesterday’s announcement, Gary Quamme, our Director of Operations (and my good friend!), has tested positive for COVID-19. Gary’s illness, and the staff’s proximity to him, makes it necessary for each of us on staff to quarantine again, to leave the building, and to return to working from home full time. While we continue to pray for Gary’s well-being, we also are making good on our commitment to you. We know we can never guarantee total safety, but we want to ensure you that we are taking every appropriate step to keep ourselves and our worshipping community as safe and as healthy as possible. We are saddened to postpone our in-person services yet again, but we believe it is the right thing to do.

It appears that during this renewed quarantine time, I will have more opportunities to rack up more walking mileage. I plan to use this time to myself to reflect, to pray, and to do some self-work while enjoying God’s creation. Hiking gives me lots of time to focus on my strengths and my limitations. We all have our strengths and limitations. As Paul writes numerous times, the Church—the Body of Christ—has many individual parts which come together to make a more efficient whole. I realize that while some members of the Body of Christ are organized, ordered, and structured, I’m not one of those. I’m a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of guy. While some people like to wear formal attire as they sip on fine, aged scotch, I like shorts and sandals, comfortable shirts, and cheap, cold beer. Some people like fancy, complicated music in a beautiful concert hall. I like folk music on the back porch. My ongoing journey reminds me to be who I am, and I feel compelled to tell you to do the same. Be who you are. Unapologetically. Try to continually improve, sure. But don’t try to change who you are. There is room for you at the table, even if, like me, you have ever felt like an outcast. God made you who you are. Be the person God made you to be.

My health has certainly improved during my journey of over 1,000 miles, and I am hopeful all of us are in better health when we return in a few weeks. When we return, perhaps each of us can be more fully ourselves. May we always keep meandering forward. Sometimes we’ll hit peaks and other times we’ll hit valleys. Through it all, God is with us.

November 12, 2020  A Reflection from  Pastor Emilie Finn  

Dear People of God,

It is the time of year when we all start looking forward to preparations for the holidays. In my family, this means laying aside the various ingredients we need to make our special holiday  foods, reaching out to family members and friends we haven’t heard from in a while, checking our supply of extension cords and Christmas lights, and whisking secret packages off the front porch to hide in closets, awaiting the arrival of wrapping paper and Christmas trees.

Here at All Saints’, this also means looking for the ways we can help others prepare for the holidays: Choosing an Angel Tree tag to purchase gifts for a resident of Maryland Gardens or a child of an incarcerated parent, buying stocking stuffers from Beth Carson’s supply of Singing Rooster gifts to benefit our companion parish and school in Haiti, purchasing toys to donate on Christmas Eve to the families of Iglesia de San Pablo Episcopal, and so much more. 

As you might imagine, these preparations look different as we look toward Advent, 2020, but sometimes different is good! While we are still waiting to learn how we can best support our neighbors at Maryland Gardens and our friends in Haiti this year, we can collect the toiletries and laundry soap needed by the working families served by Nourish Phoenix (formerly ICM) and drop them in the red collection bins outside the church, and we can remember our friends at Iglesia de San Pablo when we Christmas shop, by purchasing a few extra toys for the Christmas Eve toy collection. 

And most of all, we can rejoice that, thanks to several very generous donations, our Prison Ministry, in partnership with our youth and young adults, and the youth and young adults of Emmaus, Surprise, is able to bring Christmas to 50-70 MORE children this year than we were last year! And it isn’t too late to get involved, in one of three ways:

First, all youth and young adults (7^th grade and up) are invited to join forces with the youth and young adults of Emmaus, Surprise, for either or both of two virtual Angel Tree shopping events: One on Sunday, November 15, at 5:45pm, and one on Tuesday, November 17, at 4:00pm. You can sign up here: https://forms.gle/kaHXeYBwP8pevcos7. There is no cost for these events, just come and use your creativity to find the best gifts for the children on our list!

Second, if virtual shopping in a group isn’t your thing, All Saints’ youth of any age are welcome to sign up to shop for an Angel Tree child separately with their families, and submit the receipts for reimbursement. If you would like to do this, email Pastor Emilie at efinn@allsaintsoncentral.org.

Third, any member of All Saints’ can sign up to purchase gifts for a Prison Ministry Angel Tree child. To sign up, contact Lora Villasenor at lmvillasenor@msn.com.

I wish you every blessing as you prepare for the holidays this year, here at church, in your own families, and in everything you do to help those in need. God bless you all.

November 8, 2020  A Reflection from Fr. Bill Lupfer

Dear Friends,

As I write this, we are all waiting to hear the final results of our elections. And, while some of us will be more happy with the final results than others, I think we all feel that our country has some work to do with regards to healing the polarization we are experiencing at the moment. The good news is we have a road map for living as faithful, productive citizens.

The roadmap is our baptismal covenant. Here are the five questions and answers at the end of our Baptismal Covenant:

Celebrant: Will you continue in the apostles' teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers?

People: I will, with God’s help.

Celebrant: Will you persevere in resisting evil, and, whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord?

People: I will, with God’s help.

Celebrant: Will you proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ?

People: I will, with God’s help.

Celebrant: Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?

People: I will, with God's help.

Celebrant: Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?

People: I will, with God's help.

As you can see, the first question asks for a commitment to live out your faith in a Christian community – All Saints. The second question asks for a commitment to manage our own hearts and to change when we are off base, and we all go off base from time to time. The third question asks us to recommit our lives to living the Good News of God in Christ, which represents the reconciling power of God, leading lives that are daily committed to bringing people together.    The fourth question invites us to commit to actively seeking Christ in EVERYBODY, loving our neighbors as ourselves. And finally, we are invited to recommit ourselves to serving others by working to build a society where all have the access they need to be faithful disciples: justice, peace and dignity.

In this way, we are given our “marching orders” as Episcopal Christians, grounded in God and committed to living out our faith. We have already spoken these words many times in church. Now we have the opportunity to practice these commitments in our daily lives. And the world needs you to be at the mature depths of your faith, now more than ever!

November 1, 2020 A Reflection from Fr. Bill Bill Lupfer

Remember Occupy Wall Street? I sure do!

I was Dean of the Cathedral in Portland, Oregon at the time. Many people in Portland were nervous and concerned as the protests gathered numbers and strength. What was worse, there was no one person who could speak to everybody with authority. 

Stepping into the breach, a popular musical group in Portland, Pink Martini, decided to host a “unity concert” at Pioneer Square (which essentially functioned at Portland’s living room). They invited a variety of community leaders to address the gathered group (which turned out to be about 4000 people). I was happy to accept their invitation to speak. Naively, I did not understand that merely accepting the offer to speak would upset many in the cathedral community. People made phone calls to the Senior Warden and others on vestry. I asked those who were nervous to please wait until they heard what I would say. At the event, the four leaders who spoke before me praised the 99% and attacked the 1%. I steeled myself when my turn to speak came and spoke about the difficulty of the current times, pointing to the important national slogan that has been part of our common life since it was placed on our national shield in 1782: E Pluribus Unum, which is Latin for “out of many, one”. I went on to say that the challenges facing our nation were so deep that EVERYBODY needed to contribute to the solution and ended my talk by chanting “100%! 100%! 100%!” When I finished, the silence was noticeable, which made the scattered applause seem even more thin and weak. It was disheartening to me that our country has moved away from this important slogan, born of the difficulties of taking the original 13 colonies into a unified national government. 

It seems that E Pluribus Unum is as important now as it was when our Founders were shaping our country and I invite each of you to follow in our Founders footsteps as we move through our national elections next week. Every election cycle, our country continues its bold and outrageous effort to live E Pluribus Unum. Now is our time to contribute to creating unity among difference!

On the Eve of our Pledge Drive

As your Interim Rector, I have a privileged perspective to see you as the wonderful people you are, even as we struggle against the constraints imposed upon us by Covid 19. You are a fun, interesting, gracious group of people who represent the broad thinking of Phoenix – a classic “big tent” parish. You live E Pluribus Unum every day. And you are a sign to this world that a whole variety of passionate, smart, spiritually mature, worldly people can disagree about many aspects of our political life and still come together to serve God in this world. 

You are the answer that our world needs right now. I see that in you every day and I feel so blessed to be with you in this difficult time.

In this season of national elections and Covid, with all the uncertainty that comes with it, we are inviting you to make a strong financial and spiritual pledge to All Saints’. For many years, you have stood as a strong beacon of God’s unifying love. Now more than ever, we need you to support the mission of All Saints’. Please join me in offering a generous pledge to All Saints’. The world needs you!

October 25, 2020  A Reflection from Fr. Tim Yanni

Although I am a life-long Christian, I did not grow up in the Episcopal Church. Part of my reason for joining was that other Christian denominations told me how to vote, which I did not appreciate. As an ordained person, I made it a personal policy that I would never use the pulpit to tell you how to vote. If you ask me who I plan on voting for and why, I might engage in that conversation with you. But I won’t tell you who you should vote for.

In fact, one of the reasons I came to All Saints’ was that I knew there was not a political bend expected in preaching. This is not true of all parishes. I have heard some Episcopalians say, “You cannot vote for a Democratic candidate and consider yourself a Christian.” I have also heard, “You cannot vote for a Republican candidate and consider yourself a Christian.” Both of these statements are utterly false. I went to seminary in Berkeley, California, which is maybe the most liberal city in the United States. I was ordained a priest in Provo, Utah and I worked as a priest in Ogden, Utah. These are some of the most conservative cities in the country. I love and respect people who are spread all across the political spectrum. I chose to come here because All Saints’

does a terrific job of straddling the center of the aisle.

Certainly Episcopalians ought to uphold Christian teachings. However, there is no expected path we must take when it comes to following those teachings. For example, we know that Jesus teaches us to care for the poor. Some might prefer to do this by subscribing to government social programs that depend on tax dollars for funding. Others might choose to keep the government’s hands out of it all together, opting instead to make personal offerings of time, talent, or treasure. Either of these are appropriate and in line with the teachings of Jesus Christ. What is important, of course, is caring for those who are in need.

Although I won’t tell you who or what you should vote for, I will tell you this: You do have a responsibility as a Christian to vote. Four years ago, over 90,000,000 American registered voters chose not to vote in the presidential election. This is simply unacceptable. As the Most Rev. Michael Curry, said, “It is a Christian obligation to vote, and more than that, it is the church’s responsibility to help get souls to the polls.” 

Please vote. Please request your early ballot if you haven’t already done so. Please send it in or drop it off or head to the polls on election day. In our now-purple state of Arizona, your vote truly counts. I am proud to tell you that I have already voted, and Maricopa County tells me my ballot has already been counted. Won’t you please join me and the millions of other Americans to vote in this year’s election? Your vote is your voice. Use it.  

October 11, 2020  A Reflection from Pastor Emilie Finn

Dear People of God,

Back in April, I had a conversation with an All Saints' parishioner that inspired me to start reading stories and posting them on YouTube, which was the beginning of what I have called "Pastor Emilie's Story Hour." Since then, I have had a lot of fun, reading several children's books, short stories for both children and adults, and now a novel for adults as well (Wilkie Collins' The Woman in White). I have re-discovered how much I love to read aloud, and I have re-discovered my love for the classic stories that inspired me and cultivated my imagination as a child and young adult. (Everything I post on YouTube has to be in the public domain, which means all were published before 1923 - so I do mean classics!)

One of those stories is the story we were discussing during the conversation that inspired the whole project. It is a book I have loved since I was a tiny child: Pollyanna, by Eleanor H. Porter. The character Pollyanna, the small daughter of a poor missionary minister, who, when her father dies, must live with her very strict Aunt Polly, plays a game her father taught her, called "the Just Being Glad game." The challenge of the game is to find something in everything to be glad about, and the harder it is to do, the little girl explains to everyone around her, the more fun the game is, and of course, the book is about the ways in which Pollyanna's "glad game" transforms her aunt, and the town she lives in.

I thought of this book during that particular conversation in April, because we were at the very beginning of the pandemic, and as we discussed the challenges of being alone, of social distancing, and of not being able to worship together, this member of All Saints' started talking about finding the good and beautiful things in the world, the things we can be glad about, or grateful for, in everything that happens to us, and she told me that it really does actually help. 

Now, neither of us meant that ignoring the difficult things in life helps at all, or that it is a good idea to try to see everything through "rose colored glasses" that try to somehow make the ugly parts of life beautiful in some artificial way. The gift of Pollyanna's "glad game" is that even though it doesn't make any of the difficult, challenging, or frightening things in our lives go away, it causes us to shift our focus to the good things, the actual good, that exists alongside our problems, fears, and difficulties, and this actually does make life easier to live. Like adjusting the focus on a camera lens, this does not make anything else in the frame disappear. It doesn't make bad things less bad, or less difficult or scary or sad to deal with. But it is easier to live through them if we can remind ourselves in a tangible way that good exists also, and often in equal or even greater measure than the difficult, sad, or frightening things we tend to dwell on.

"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 4:4-7)

Friends, I challenge you, especially during the next few months as tensions and fears continue to rise, try Pollyanna's "glad game." Take Paul's words to the Philippians to heart. Find everything you can to rejoice in. Real things. Good things. Things you might be inclined to take for granted. Write them down. Think about them. Paint them. Pray them. Thank God for them. Right now, I am rejoicing in the faithful dog snoring at my feet; in the birds singing in the tree outside my window; in my wife's presence in the next room, staying connected with the people of Emmaus over Zoom; in looking forward to recording another chapter of The Woman in White later this afternoon; and in the fact that my newly updated laptop works so much better than it did two days ago (thank you, Gary!). Little things, but real and tangible causes for joy and celebration in a world that needs more rejoicing.

October 4, 2020  A Reflection from Fr. Tim Yanni

What’s in a name?

The Episcopal Church has no shortage of churchy jargon. We have vergers, acolytes, wardens, deans, sacristies, narthexes, naves, chancellors, vestries, sacristans, sextons, canon precentors, and more. So many words. What do they mean? In the event that you’re ever interested in expanding your Episcopal Church vocabulary, you can browse the official glossary at https://episcopalchurch.org/library/glossary/all. I must admit, even as a seminary-trained priest, I look up terms in our glossary from time to time.

When it comes to jargon, a question that is commonly asked to priests is “what do I call you?” The Church does have a style guide to answer this question as well, but the answer is somewhat complex. The answer is different depending on whether it is written or spoken. For instance, when I sign a written document, I sign my name as, “The Rev. Timothy J. Yanni.” Notice the importance of the definite article. This is because the word “reverend” is an adjective and not a noun. “The Reverend” is a written honorific only. 

It becomes even more complex from there. When addressing a priest, the style guide says that male priests should be called either Father or Mister, while female priests should be called either Mother or Ms. Again, it’s more complicated than that. These salutations remain optional. The best way to discover what a priest ought to be called is simple: Ask them.

I like to be called Father Tim. I certainly will respond to “Reverend Tim” or “Father Yanni”. I’ll even respond to “hey you!” But my preference is Father Tim. I like to go by my first name because I have always more easily identified with priests who went by their first names. I remember attending a parochial school as a child and knowing that of the two priests, the one who went by his first name was clearly “the cool guy.” He preached fun sermons and played basketball and soccer with the kids at school. The other priest was stern, strict, and rigid. I’m not suggesting I’m the “cool guy”, but I do like to have fun and I like to make sure people know that I’m down to earth and real. I like to be playful and I like to put people at ease as much as possible.

I go by Father Tim instead of Father Yanni because I see this choice as way of communicating that I don’t take myself too seriously. I like to have a good time and I like to encourage others to do the same. The Church is a place where we can experience a myriad of emotions. Believe it or not, even silliness and irreverence have their places in the Church from time to time. I know there is a time and a place for everything, but I think the Church is a place where joy should be abundant. So here’s what I’m going to ask you to do: Take some time out of your busy schedule and do something silly, fun, or playful. Do it to bring some added joy into your own life, or into someone else’s. Go ahead. It’s ok. Tell them you got permission from Fr. Tim. 

September 27, 2020  A Reflection from Fr. Bill Lupfer

I had a professor in college say, when talking about something very complex: “It’s enough to cross a rabbi’s eyes!”

When you think about these days, it’s enough to cross even the smartest rabbi’s eyes! We are in a very difficult, divisive and disorienting presidential election. On top of that, we are all doing our best to navigate a global health pandemic. Many of us have family members and friends who are struggling with the restrictions imposed upon us by COVID-19. Mix into this that we haven’t even be able to go to church to seek God’s soothing love and we are told that singing together is one of the most dangerous activities we could do. We are living through very challenging times, no doubt about it!

And yet.

As I talk to people at All Saints', I am very encouraged by your resilience. You are strong and flexible and smart and open to God’s call, even during these challenging times. I feel very blessed to be walking these days with you. 

This coming weekend, we are able to go back to church. I’ve been really, really wanting to meet you and worship with you. And I can only imagine how you long to see each other in worship.   So it’s wonderful that we are able to regather at church.

The only problem is – church will not feel the same as before. We face many restrictions at church, all for the purpose of keeping everyone safe. The worship times will be punctuated with announcements about new ways of doing things, which means that we will return to a familiar space but it won’t feel very familiar. We will return to a place that has been a bedrock for many of us but it may feel like it has shifted a bit, given how many liturgical changes you will experience if you join us in person or by video.

My prayer for you (and me) as we re-enter church is the prayer I’ve been praying, “Lord, help them be gentle with themselves and with others. Help them give themselves and others the benefit of doubt.”