Engaging Ministry: Practices of Prayer, Worship, and Community is a two-part educational and experiential series for clergy and laypersons help Jan. 30–Feb. 1 at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. Participants will explore two aspects of congregational vitality: cultivating practices that invite Christ’s indwelling presence in both ordained leaders and in communities, and processes for creating dynamic and transformative worship that stirs the senses and opens the heart. Participants will leave refreshed, inspired, and prepared with tools and resources for engaging ministry. Reduced pricing on tuition and lodging at the Sewanee Inn are available through December 30, 2019. For more information and to register, visit: http://beeckencenter.sewanee.edu/events/engaging-2020
Part 1 – The Heart of Ministry: Deepening Practice, Deepening Community
Facilitated by the Rev. Stuart Higginbotham, rector of Grace Episcopal Church, Gainesville, Georgia
The rich heritage of the Christian contemplative tradition offers a space in which all those sharing in parish ministry—both lay and ordained—can anchor their common prayer and compassion in an awareness of God’s transforming presence. Drawing on a dozen years as a parish priest and his co-edited book, Contemplation and Community: A Gathering of Fresh Voices for a Living Tradition, Higginbotham will offer insights from his own experience in ministry as well as from the ongoing global conversations in the wider, global network of Christian contemplative scholars and practitioners.
Part 2 – Entering the Mystery: Planning Non-Traditional Worship
Facilitated by Kate Eaton, president and founder of Mishkhah
No less a person than Pope Francis has encouraged the church “not to lose sight of this important goal: to help the liturgical assembly and the people of God to perceive and participate, with all the senses, physical and spiritual, in the mystery of God.”
Part two of Engaging Ministry begins with a public worship service in All Saints’ Chapel in Sewanee created by Eaton that reveals the mystery of Christ by stirring the senses and opening the heart. Through careful integration of music, images, textures, found objects, light, movement, and prayer, participants will be invited to rediscover the landscape of their souls as they encounter the Holy.
