Our Blog
Weekly reflections, updates, and news about our St. Stephen’s Community.
On Community, Church, & Disaster Response
Grace, peace, and electricity to you from God and our recovering power grid,
Everyone has been impacted this week, and signs of God’s love shine through you in the midst of it. Here’s what this has looked like within the life of St. Stephen’s. Lots of our people have had power loss for extended periods, various degrees of damage at home, and the strain of sanity in this mess while continuing to try and care for our loved ones, neighbors, work, and yes…it’s important to take care of ourselves too. This is why we value and build community, so that together we can take turns and share the work to help and also heal. It is a holy thing to rest even in the storm (Jesus did it), but I know the conditions for that have been incredibly difficult for many. Disaster recovery is a marathon that starts with a sprint, so we will need to pace ourselves accordingly.
YOU, the people, are the Church and I know you have been calling and texting and showing up for each other and especially our most vulnerable. Please continue to do so and let our clergy know of the needs through e-mail or the Pastoral Care line – 832-377-6240. We also trust and recommend CrisisCleanup.org for community aid with trees, fences, and so many other resources. Diocesan resources are also available at www.epicenter-prepare.org.
On campus, we have had some significant tree loss and corresponding roof damage in the choir/music room. Our leaders and staff have begun the work of insurance claims and professional repair. We have maintained power and by mid-week, staff was able to open our building as a cooling and charging center for the community. The school community moved quickly to offer space for displaced Montessori Teacher training and get Summer Camp running again for childcare. I celebrate the ways we have been agile and adaptive in the name of welcome and care.
Even as we do this current work of triage and recovery, many of us are also assessing ways we as individuals and as a congregation can be better prepared and resilient in the future. If you have gifts, experiences, and passion for that work…let me know. Life and faith are messy business. Through this and beyond, God goes ahead of us. And yes! we will have Sunday Worship as usual to pray and hold one another in person or online.
In Christ,
Rev. Ashley
Associate Rector
Parish Transition Update
It has been a busy week welcoming our new Interim Rector, Ray Wilson, our new Business Manager, Rochelle Butler, and our new nursery caregiver, Lisa Martinez to St. Stephen’s. I want to extend my thanks to our staff and fellow Vestry members who helped in the interview process and are aiding Ray, Rochelle, and Lisa in their new roles.
On June 3 the Vestry completed our initial training on the search process with the Rev. Kellaura Johnson, the Diocese’s Canon for Transition Ministry, and Rev. Christine Faulstich, the Diocese’s Canon to the Ordinary. We received additional information about planning and managing expectations during the transition period and look forward to working on the next steps in the search for our new Rector.
We will meet again next Tuesday, June 18, to start on the creation of our Parish Profile and creating a compensation package, both prerequisites to moving us into the active search part of our timeline.
In the coming weeks we will also be setting up the process by which our Search Committee will be formed. We thank you for your continued prayers and support throughout this spirit-led journey.
Yours in Christ,
Dave Morrell
Senior Warden
WELCOME MESSAGE FROM REV. RAY WILSON
To the Church and School community of St. Stephen’s:
What a joy for me to join you at St. Stephen’s in our mutual ministry. As the Interim Rector, I look forward to meeting each of you as together we continue the ministry of this parish.
Before serving several parishes as an Interim Rector in the Diocese of Texas, I served seven parishes in the Diocese of Western Massachusetts while co-owning and operating The Village Inn in Lenox, Massachusetts, a 32-room inn built in 1771. Being an Interim has become a real calling.
My parents were native Texans and as an Army family we travelled to various U.S. and overseas postings, including Maryland, Texas, Virginia, Austria, and Panama. I graduated from American University in Washington, D.C. with degrees in International Relations. I was on the staff of St. Stephen’s School, an American High School in Rome, Italy. My theological studies were in Cambridge, Massachusetts at Episcopal Divinity School.
During that time, I also served as a prison chaplain in North Carolina and Boston. Diverse ministries I have served include parishes in Washington, D.C., and here in Houston on the staff of Christ Church Cathedral and teaching at the Briarwood School.
The experience of travel and living in different places has given me a curiosity and excitement in meeting and working with people in a common purpose. I am glad to begin that with each of you in St Stephen’s parish and school.
Rev. Ray Wilson
A Message from our Senior Warden
This week has been filled with joy and sadness as we celebrate our 18-year relationship with Lisa and say our goodbyes. Nevertheless, the work of our Parish continues, and, on behalf of the Vestry, I wanted to keep everyone informed about what will be happening next as we enter the transition process.
First, except for our Business Manager, Hugo Banda, all our staff plan to stay throughout the interim. Ashley will continue to lead us in worship and be available for pastoral care. We expect the Business Manager position to be filled within the next few weeks.
After this Sunday we will be working on selecting our Interim Rector. The Diocese’s Office of Transition Ministry is responsible for directing eligible candidates to us. Candidates will be initially interviewed by the Executive Committee of the Vestry. The Executive Committee will then recommend the preferred candidate to the Vestry for approval. After approval, we will prepare and file the necessary documents with the Diocese and introduce our Interim Rector to the Parish, the School community, and the staff.
In the coming weeks a group of Vestry members will begin work on assembling the information needed for our Parish Profile, which will be disseminated as the search process begins in earnest. At the same time, another group of Vestry members will be gathering clergy compensation data from the Diocese and preparing a budget for the search process.
The Vestry has scheduled a special meeting on June 3 with the Diocese’s Canon for Transitions, Kellaura Johnson. At this meeting, she will provide us with an overview of the transition and search process and instructions on conducting an evaluation of Parish, focusing on the qualities we seek in our next Rector. Afterwards, another group of Vestry members will be selecting those who will serve on the Search Committee. While members of the Vestry may also serve on the Search Committee itself, Diocesan rules do not permit partners or relatives of Vestry members to serve on the Search Committee. Likewise, partners and relatives of those on the Search Committee will not be eligible to serve on the Vestry until the Search Committee’s work is complete.
While some may see the transition process as overly strict and complicated, it’s the same process that brought Lisa to us almost two decades ago — we can all agree that ended well! All of us feel different levels of anxiety about the uncertainty of our shared future, but as Lisa reminded us in her sermon last Sunday, this is also a time to reflect and wait for the power of the Holy Spirit to do its work, in its own time, and remember that we, as fellow children of God, are bound together in love and care for each other.
Peace,
Dave Morrell
Hard Stop
One of the skills I admire in others is the ability to set limits on time. I stand in awe of people who can say clearly at the outset of a conversation, “I have a hard stop in 30 minutes.” Knowing what the ‘hard stop’ is enables the participants in the discussion to be clear and concise. The conversation may go on longer, but one of the parties can only be expected to be there within the declared time. In the words of Bishop Doyle, “Clarity is kindness.”
As I am preparing to retire from my position as rector of St. Stephen’s, folks have asked me if I can be called upon for friendship, counsel, sacraments. These are each a dimension of a pastoral relationship. The Clergy Manual of the Diocese of Texas is quite clear on this point. It states:
Pastoral Relationships after Transition
Questions about clergy transition, including the expression of interest in transitioning within the Diocese of Texas, are properly directed to the Diocesan Transition Minister. The Bishop expects that once a clergyperson leaves a congregation, he or she will bring closure to pastoral relationships with members of that congregation. The health of the congregation is dependent upon how well the transition is managed.
Former parishioners should understand from the clergy in a positive and affirming way that it is not appropriate to continue a pastoral relationship. The Bishop expects that the clergyperson will accept no further requests from members and former members of the congregation to provide pastoral services at weddings, funerals, baptisms, or any other occasion of public worship until at least one year after the new rector arrives.
After one year, clergy may accept invitations from the rector but may not solicit such invitations.
This means that my retirement is a hard stop to our pastoral relationship for the health of St. Stephen’s. I cannot be asked to officiate at sacramental life events until at least one year after the new rector arrives and even then, I may only be asked by the new rector to share in those occasions.
This may feel harsh and abrupt; after all we have shared life together for 18 years and it causes grief to be separated. This is especially difficult for me as Bruce and I will remain in Houston. Pastoral relationships are wonderful and peculiar. While we are friendly with one another, we are not friends—there is an inequality in power and a difference in role. I have been in a unique relationship with you in that while I often know deeply personal dimensions of your life, you do not know my life. This critical distance allows me to hear your confession, counsel you in sickness, rejoice with your transformation. What a privilege it has been to serve you in this way.
On May 19, my last day as your rector, I will have a hard stop. While I am generally not one who sets these kinds of limits, I know my responsibility to you and to the well being of this beloved community. I will miss you and I cherish you.
-Reverend Lisa Hunt, Rector
CAN’T WE TALK ABOUT SOMETHING MORE PLEASANT?
Roz Chast, one of my favorite cartoonists whose work is published in The New Yorker magazine, wrote a memoir of her life with her aging parents as together they dealt with the painful decisions surrounding aging and moving from a cherished home and independence to assisted living and hospice. The title is a plaintive quote from her mother, “Can’t we talk about something more pleasant?”
While interdependence is always the truth of our lives, for many years we are able to avoid certain realities and talk about them. At the beginning and at the end of our life spans, we know our needs and communicate in very basic ways–cries and moans. Language gives us the opportunity to share more subtle longings… or not.
Often we prefer not to talk about the deeper realities and needs of our hearts, minds and souls. Rather than share our sadness, shame, regret, grief, fear, anxiety, humiliation, anger, we say, “Why can’t we talk about something more pleasant?” We prefer to skate on the surface. Nice is better than real.
For the next three weeks in our Sunday forum at 9:30 in the Havens Center we will be exploring some hard to discuss topics. This Sunday, Catherine Dewitt, a graduate counseling student, will be exploring death positivity, a movement that is seeking to foster conversations about death and dying in a culture that denies both. On April 21, we will be discussing the transition from one rector to another, the process, and the rationale behind the policies and practices in the Episcopal Church. The final week will focus on communicating about our physical health and challenges.
Since my announcement of my retirement I am having many conversations that are challenging, not necessarily unpleasant, but hard to engage. “Thank you,” “I love you,” “Can we be friends?” Not all difficult conversations evoke “negative” feelings; indeed most merely expose our vulnerability and humanity.
Let’s have a conversation, pleasant or not.
– The Reverend Lisa Hunt, Rector
A Prayer of Hope
There are Christians
Who have hysterical reactions
As if the world had slipped out of God’s hands.
They are violent
As if they were risking everything.
But we believe in history.
The world is not a roll of the dice
On its way toward chaos.
A new world has begun to happen
Since Christ has risen.
Jesus Christ,
We rejoice in your definitive triumph
With our bodies still in the breach,
Our souls in tension;
We cry our first ‘Hurrah!’
Till eternity unfolds itself.
Your sorrow now has passed.
Your enemies have failed.
You are the definitive smile for humankind.
What matter the wait now for us?
We accept the struggle and the death,
Because you, our love, will not die!
We march behind you on the road to the future.
You are with us. You are our immortality.
Take away the sadness from our faces;
We are not in a game of chance?
You have the last word!
Beyond the crushing of our bones,
Now has begun the eternal ‘Alleluia!’
From the thousands of openings
In our wounded bodies and souls,
There now arises a triumphal song!
So teach us to give voice
To your new life throughout the world,
Because you dry the tears of the oppressed forever.
And death will disappear
– Luis Espinal, S.J.
I came upon this poem as I was preparing the liturgy for this Sunday, in the wake of the announcement of my retirement. It captures the ambiguity of this time for me, and I suspect for many of you. I feel such sadness at the prospect of leaving this community of faith and simultaneously I trust in God’s abiding love and care manifested in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. God does not leave us comfortless.
This Easter season is a time to celebrate death and resurrection; this mystery of Christ is at the heart of our faith. I am reminded that not only do we observe this new reality for the Great Fifty days of Easter, but we also frame every burial in this manner. Our Book of Common Prayer notes at the end of the burial of the dead liturgy:
The liturgy for the dead is an Easter liturgy. It finds all meaning in the resurrection. Because Jesus was raised from the dead, we too, shall be raised.
The liturgy, therefore, is characterized by joy, in the certainty that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
This joy, however, does not make human grief unchristian. The very love we have for each other in Christ brings deep sorrow when we are parted by death. Jesus himself wept at the grave of his friend. So, while we rejoice that one we love has entered into the nearer presence of our Lord, we sorrow in sympathy with those who mourn. (Book of Common Prayer, p. 507)
While in the words of Monty Python, “I am not dead, yet!,” I am nevertheless going to be ending my role as your Rector. This is a time of grief, relief, celebration, anger, fear, trust, and hope for all of us. Grief and transitions bring up all sorts of emotions at various times in different people. My reasonable and holy hope in this season is that we can honor one another as we have served together with honesty, integrity and care.
The Reverend Lisa Hunt, Rector
Losing and Finding
This year my Lenten discipline took a different turn. I decided that I would feel my feelings and come to name them. This is no small task because I, like many of us, often live noticing only a small band of emotion. Fear, anger, sadness, happiness come readily. But what about annoyed or grieving?
Jesus as he prepares to go into Jerusalem, spend his last Passover, to be arrested, tried and killed demonstrates a plethora of feelings. His humanity is on full display. All the while he is illustrating to his friends, including us, what it means to lose oneself to find oneself, or in the words of this week’s epistle lesson, what it means to empty oneself to be exalted.
As we prepare to walk again the way of the cross this Holy Week, I invite you to do an emotion scan. Who is the self you are losing to find?
-The Reverend Lisa Hunt, Rector
Lent is a Pilgrimage in Time
This Sunday St. Stephen’s will have the privilege of hosting the Very Reverend Dr. David Monteith, the 40th Dean of Caterbury (post Reformation) Cathedral at our forum in the Havens Center at 9:30 and as our preacher at the 10:30 a.m. Eucharist. Canterbury Cathedral is the mother church of the Anglican Communion and the seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury. He oversees a staff of 250 and over 500 volunteers. The Cathedral is also a launching place and landing spot for pilgrimage. Many of us may have read the Canterbury Tales and know the tales as a pastime on the pilgrim’s way.
Many years ago I had the privilege of taking a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela. The 113 kilometer walk through the countryside of Galicia was deeply moving. The silence, the conversations with other pilgrims, the beauty drew me to the mystery of God as I walked paths carved by thousands of sojourners over centuries. This walk was the shortest distance that ‘counted.’ Many of the pilgrims that joined me in the cathedral when I arrived had started in the Pyrenees. Some may have begun in Canterbury. Wherever we start from, we all are journeying through life into a deeper nearness to God; some of us are just more aware of it than others.
Lent is a pilgrimage in time. These forty days each year invite us to walk with greater deliberateness. Through our practices of study, almsgiving and prayer we become consicious of our longing for God and our need for wholeness, salvation. While we may not physically be traveling beyond our homes and workplaces, inwardly we are journeying into our own hearts and leaning into the heart of God. We have conversations with ourselves and each other which reveal our true natures and desires.
As in geographic pilgrimage, at Lent’s end we come to Easter with joy and renewed strength. We wonder at God and all God’s works.
-The Reverend Lisa Hunt, Rector
Silence in the Presence of the Holy
One of my joys of coming out of COVID is that I get to go to movie theatres again and see films on the big screen. I love being enveloped by the darkness, surrounded by the sound. Films take me out of my world and transport me to another place and time. I also relish getting to have this experience with others—together alone.
I mistakenly thought that the film Origin would be showing through Sunday at the Regal on Weslayan. It is not; it will be showing on Sunday in some movie theatres further out of the loop. The St. Stephen’s group outing was rescheduled to Wednesday night. I had the good fortune to join about a dozen of our parishioners at a showing then.
The film was riveting, disturbing, moving, and touching all in turns. The director, Ava DuVernay, did a masterful job of adapting a non-fiction book on caste into a feature film by grounding the thesis of the book in the life of the author, while simultaneously presenting the theory and its historical underpinnings. The images of lynchings, Dalits, and book burnings were searing. The pathos of grief spoke authentically through the faces of the actors.
As Christians when we speak of something or someone as being ‘holy,’ we are not talking about being sweet or nice. Holiness is being set apart for or by the divine. Sometimes in Scripture to be in the presence of the holy is to be terrified. Think of Isaiah in the Temple seeing the seraphim or Moses before the burning bush or Zechariah being struck dumb upon learning of his soon to be son and responding in disbelief. To be in the presence of the holy is to be transported in awareness.
When the movie ended on Wednesday night, the theatre of folks was completely silent. We were struck dumb by the truths that were portrayed. The truth will set you free, but first it takes your breath away.
The Reverend Lisa Hunt, Rector