St. Thomas

TEMPORARY CHANGES DUE TO COVID-19

Our buildings, both the church and the parish house, are closed.

We are closed for at least two weeks. During this time there will be no services in the church.

For the moment the 12-step programs may continue to meet in the evening with certain restrictions. We will make our best effort to continue with our Tuesday food pantry as well.

We will send emails to parishioners and friends of St. Thomas on a daily basis with worship opportunities, and updates. If you wish to receive our emails, please write to office@saintthomasmmrk.org, and we will add you to our mailing list.

We will offer a VIRTUAL ST. THOMAS CHURCH. Please go to this page:

Normally in times of national anxiety, church attendance swells as people seek and find support and pastoral care. What makes this current crisis so difficult is that it is precisely the thing we need most – to gather together – that we cannot do physically for the time being. Thankfully, there are a number of ways that we can still be connected to one another in community without being physically present with one another. This is the first of many communications we will be making in the days and weeks to come to build community with one another in ways that are both familiar and new to us. Below is information about worship, Sunday school, how we we will set up the office, and opportunities to volunteer.

WORSHIP AND PRAYER LIFE

First and foremost is our community worship and prayer life. Although we will not be gathering for worship on Sunday mornings for the next two weeks (and perhaps longer), we will be live-streaming an online Morning Prayer service at 10:00 am on Sundays. The way this works is that either Carol or Tami will conduct the service from their home or office and parishioners will be able to join in via Facebook, Zoom, or YouTube. Details, including links and directions will be forthcoming via email soon! We will also email a full bulletin with all readings and prayers so everyone can participate. Carol and Tami will also be taking turns leading live stream prayer services at 10:00 am and 8:00 pm each day. These short services will be another way to be together for worship when not able to physically gather. Here too, we will send you more information about this soon. There are numerous online resources that can help your individual prayer life.

The Book of Common Prayer is online: https://www.bcponline.org/

Pray the Great Litany: https://www.bcponline.org/GreatLitany/Litany.html

The Daily Offices of Morning and Evening Prayer are online: https://www.missionstclare.com/english/March/cal.html

There are a variety of small prayer services online: https://www.missionstclare.com/english/index.html

SUNDAY SCHOOL

We are currently also compiling Sunday School resources so families can do “home-school” Sunday school for the time being, and will also be providing opportunities for families to gather via a “Google Hangout” or similar platform for live interactions with our clergy and Sunday school teachers. A great and novel way to build community using technology that may be more familiar to our youngest parishioners and an opportunity for them to help us learn new ways of being together! We will email families with more information soon.

OFFICE

We are establishing a virtual office with multiple satellites during regular office hours, Monday through Friday, 9:30am to 3:30pm. As always, you can contact the office via office@saintthomasmmrk.org or (914) 698-0300. Barbara will be answering emails and phone calls from her home with the help of call forwarding and remote computer access. Likewise, Carol and Tami will be working from home, and will be available via email or cell phone. Carol: rectorstthomas@gmail.com (914) 327-5275. Tami: associatestthomas@gmail.com (914) 584-1418. Michele Richardson is available via email as well: financesstthomas@gmail.com.

VOLUNTEER OPPORTUNITIES

  • Local churches have been working with the Mamaroneck School District to assure that every child who receives free breakfasts and lunch will continue to receive them during the school closure in the form of food bags provided by the district’s food supplier at three distribution sites. St. Thomas has been asked to create a team of ten to twelve people to distribute the food bags on Wednesdays. (Other organizations will form teams to facilitate other days.) We are looking for ten to twelve volunteers from St. Thomas with a car who would be available between 10:00 am and 12 pm on Wednesday March 18th and March 25th to help with transporting and distributing the meals at the three distribution sites. If you are available during that time, please contact Tami to let her know.
  • We are also asking for financial donations to help pay for the food. Checks should be made out to St. John’s Episcopal Church with “Food Emergency” written in the memo line. They can be mailed to St. John’s Episcopal Church, 4 Fountain Square, Larchmont, NY, 10538 .
  • The telephone remains one of our best forms of communication! We want to start forming telephone groups and are looking for volunteers who would like to commit to calling two or three people each day to check in on one another. This is a great way to continue to be Jesus’ hands and heart (or ears and voice!) in the world. Please let Carol or Tami know that you would like to participate and we will begin to structure these groups to make sure everyone is getting a check in. In the meantime, call people in the parish! Call your friends, but also call people you don’t know well. Say hello, listen, say a prayer.

Happy

O

In The Community