Sunday's Presentation

Last Sunday, May 25, I gave a Temple Talk at church. Here is the text:

PRAYER AND SERVICE

For the last ten years I have worked most of the sultry weeks of summer. This year, Tom and I will spend a month in a new kind of prayer and service, living at Queen of Angels Monastery with the Benedictine Sisters in the cool foothills of Mt. Angel, Oregon. Tom and I have been considering long-term ministry service once I retire from full-time teaching, and this is our first baby step of living outside our comfort zone.

We’re not going into this blindly, but with joyful anticipation. We made a short stop at the Monastery in February for a tour and lunch. We saw the room at the guest house where we’ll be staying, and, every time we were introduced to one of the sisters, we were recruited to work with their particular ministry.

People ask us what we will be doing, and we answer honestly, “Whatever we’re asked to do.” It could be anything. There is a retreat center on the grounds and help is always needed in setting up for meetings and sessions, readying the rooms for occupancy, and cooking for the guests as well as the residents. There’s canning of the summer harvest grown in the orchards, as well as caring for the grounds. There’s even an infirmary for the nuns.

The Monastery also has a shelter that ministers to the homeless, migrant farm workers and their families, with tutoring, ESL classes and a computer lab. Mission boxes need to be prepared and the gift shop staffed. The librarian has already asked Tom to stay for five years to catalog their library once she found out he had worked at the county library after retirement.

As we prepare for this summer, we’d like to offer you an opportunity to share in this work. We don’t need financial support for our participation, but we would love to bring a donation from the congregation for the work of the Benedictine Sisters. Please consider making a contribution.

As always, we ask for your prayers.

Judith Dunham