The ministry of Jesus had three main emphases: preaching the Kingdom of God, teaching, and healing. Jesus commissioned his disciples to continue his ministry of healing. We also affirm and are committed to the ministry of the priest-hood of all believers, and recognize that through our baptism we are all ministers, mutual partners in Christ’s mission to the world.
Church Office Hours
Call Fr. Bob Coniglio 757-787-7258
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Revised Caronavirus Worship Service Guidelines effective 2025
- Masks are voluntary.
- Communion is with the common bread and common chalice.
- For those who cannot drink from the common cup, reception of Communion in the one kind of the common bread is a sufficient and perfect Communion.
- Self-administered intinction from the common cup is not permitted. Special instructions are available for how it can be done with the Lay Eucharistic Minister.
- Other safety measures may be taken as we see as necessary.
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Pennies from Heaven
Each Sunday throughout the year we make small coin and cash contributions to be used to support various local charities.
Total contributions for 2024 were $1,900.00, one of the highest totals on record, and the same as the last three years. Distribution of the 2024 Donations:
Bank of Cheer……………………………………………………………………………….. $200
Dos Santos……………………………………………………………………………………. $200
E.S. Center for Independent Living…………………………………………………….$100
Eastern Shore Coalition Against Domestic Violence…………………………….$200
Eastern Shore Habitat for Humanity…………………………………………………..$100
H&H Pharmacy………………………………………………………………………………. $100
Interfaith Crisis Council…………………………………………………………………… $200
Lighthouse Ministries……………………………………………………………………… $200
Chanco on the James……………………………………………………………………… $200
E.S. Health District NFP…………………………………………………………………… $200
E.S. Literacy Council………………………………………………………………………. $100
Mission of the Holy Spirit………………………………………………………………….$100
The total for 2025 contributions through MAR 9 is $467.
— THE MINISTRY OF HEALING AT EMMANUEL —
The ministry of Jesus had three main emphases: preaching the Kingdom of God, teaching, and healing. Jesus commissioned his disciples to continue his ministry of healing. We also affirm and are committed to the ministry of the priest-hood of all believers, and recognize that through our baptism we are all ministers, mutual partners in Christ’s mission to the world. It is in this tradition that we offer a Ministry of Healing here at Emmanuel, Jenkins Bridge.
The healing ministry is a part of our approach to worship and pastoral care and is a vital component of the strong and committed lay ministries that have been part of Emmanuel’s long and proud history. With every Sunday celebration of the Holy Eucharist we offer the opportunity for prayers and the laying on of hands in a Rite of Healing. The physical touch through the laying on of hands is a rich tradition in the Christian faith and transmits the power of the Holy Spirit to those who seek God’s grace in bringing healing and wholeness to their lives. The rite is administered by Lay Healers who are devout members of the parish especially commissioned for this ministry. These “healers” serve as a channel for God’s healing grace, and will pray with you and offer the laying on of hands.
You are welcome to receive a prayer and the laying on of hands in the name of Christ, for whatever reason. Perhaps you may have been ill and desire physical healing or you are facing an operation; you may feel anxious or depressed and come for healing of your mental distress; you may wish to offer Intercessions for someone else for whom you would like to pray; you may wish to come forward for spiritual deepening, of offering yourself to be more available to God; you may wish to come for a blessing or to offer thanksgiving for an occasion of joy in your life; or you may come simply to receive the touch of Christ through a Lay Healer. “Come unto me who, all you that are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (Mt. 11:8).
PARTICIPATING IN THE RITE OF HEALING
If you wish to participate in the Rite of Healing, as you come forward to receive the Holy Communion, take a purple ribBon from the bowl in the Font close to the organ. Place the ribbon around your wrist and proceed to the Altar Rail. Following your receiving the bread (Christ’s body) and wine (Christ’s blood) from the Priest, a Lay Healer will stand before you and lay his/her hands upon you. Share quietly with the Lay Healer anything special needs to be prayed for. Feel free to say “no” when the Lay Healer asks if you have a special prayer. The Lay Healer will then offer a prayer asking God’s healing and blessing for you. (What you offer in prayer will remain absolutely confidential. The lay healer serves as a channel of God’s healing grace and what you pray for is turned over to God and God only.)
— COMMUNICATIONS —
Message from Bishop Susan Haynes
Given at General Council Feb 8, 2025
The Venerable Bede, monk, author, and scholar was one of the greatest
teachers and writers of the early Middle Ages. At age 7, his parents could no
longer afford to feed him, so they gave him to the monastery at Jarrow. When
he was twelve, a plague ravaged and decimated the village and surrounding
countryside of Northumbria, devastating the monks as well. One morning,
Bede arrived in chapel to pray the morning Office and only he and the Abbot
were left to pray the office. The other monks had all died or were too sick to
participate.
Bede asked his Abbot, “what are we to do” and the Abbott responded by
telling Bede that they were going to do what all faithful Christians would do:
“we will keep praying, we will care for the sick, we will pray, we will bury the
dead, we will pray, we will feed the hungry, we will pray, and then, tomorrow,
we will begin again.”
Prayer and service…the rhythm of Christian life. Prayer and service…we
hear that a lot, don’t we. In fact, don’t we sometimes get tired of hearing that?
Don’t we sometimes get tired of doing what we think we’re supposed to do
without seeing any results?
The Prophet Isaiah says, “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the
past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am
making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland” (Isaiah 43: 18-19).
So, you’re doing a new thing, are you, God? You say it springs forth? You ask us
if we perceive it, almost with an incredulous tone of voice. Well, to tell you the
truth, God. We DON’T perceive it. We’re working hard here and what we’re
seeing are basically the same old things. The same church decline, the same
aging church, the same church where we long for younger people to come. We
also see the same political turmoil – the same decaying culture – the same
loneliness and division that divides us. No, God, we don’t see a new thing, and
we are tired!
Why do we not perceive the new thing God is doing? Why don’t we see it
springing forth? THE REASON THAT WE DO NOT PERCEIVE WHAT GOD IS
DOING IS THAT WE HAVE LOST THE ABILITY TO LISTEN DEEPLY TO GOD.
WE HAVE FORGOTTEN HOW TO PRAY.
In our Diocesan Congregational Development Institute initiative that
now has been going on in this diocese for four years, we are learning about St.
Benedict (often credited as the founder of western monasticism). In his
monastic Rule Benedict counsels the monks to “Listen with the ear of the
heart.” Ancient spirituality believed that the heart holds the truth, not just in
some sort of metaphorical sense. They believed physically that the heart held
wisdom. As the Age of Enlightenment began to influence thinking more,
philosophers put more trust in the mind being the seat of the Truth. Later, and
particularly in recent decades, we have decided that the mind is a mess, and
science has begun to reorient us back to the truth of the heart being the seat of
wisdom.
St. Benedict reminds us to “listen with the ear of the heart.” We are to
listen in a deeper way than with the actual sense of hearing. With such
listening, we will discern the movement of the spirit. WHY IS IT SO HARD TO
LISTEN? Here’s why: The reason we are having such difficulty listening is
because we are afraid. Fear prevents the ear of the heart from hearing the voice
of God. And we have plenty of fear around us. Social media and news providers
market in fear. Fear is constantly for sale. On the internet, fear is ubiquitous.
And we are addicted to that fear. And because we are addicted to it, we are
willing to spend money to feed that fear. And folks the likes of Mark
Zuckerburg, Jeff Bezos and others depend on us to feed that addiction.
Have you ever heard the term doom-scrolling? What is that?
Doomscrolling is the act of compulsively consuming negative news online,
often through social media. Research has shown that a society prone to
neuroticism will be attracted to this constant buffet of negative news…our
brains crave stimulation; and doom-scrolling provides that stimulation. Fear
is what is being marketed, and people react to that fear by being willing to
spend money to protect themselves. Constant access to information provides
stimulation, and if the stimulation is negative, fear is generated, and people
engage in actions to reduce that fear. The main action they engage in is
spending money. So, keeping you afraid is in the interest of social media
marketers so that you’ll keep spending money.
Thomas Keating, monk and priest credited along with others for
pioneering the rebirth of the contemplative movement in the United States,
defines a major human problem as the lack of self-worth. Many in our culture,
he says, define self-worth as related to a sense of wealth or lack of it. And if we
are being fed constant negative news that invites us to spend money to protect
ourselves, then we are focused inwardly on that need for security. When we are
trapped by fear and focused on spending money to protect ourselves, we
become isolated. And this isolation leads a huge problem – LONELINESS.
Loneliness has been described as the biggest disease of the 21st century. Keating
says the root of this loneliness is that we lack a sense of being beloved. The
antidote is to experience being loved by spending time with the one who loves
us.
As we confront the age-old problem of fear and loneliness, we need
something new. We need a different, fresh approach. Forget the former things;
do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not
perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.
How can we access this new thing that God is doing? How can we even notice
it? The answer is plain and simple: we must find a way in our complicated,
chaotic world to spend time with the One who is doing the new thing. We will
not notice the new thing unless we know the author of the new thing. That
author is God.
Recently, I spent a week in retreat with a few other bishops at a
Benedictine Retreat Center in Schuyler, NE. The retreat was facilitated by Br.
James Dowd, a Benedictine monk who is on staff with the Diocese of Nebraska
as the monk-in-residence. Brother James travels all over the diocese teaching
congregations to pray. He is enacting the vision of Bishop Scott Barker who
believes that effective leadership in the church must begin from a point of
contemplative prayer. Episcopalians in Nebraska are learning to pray and are
discovering that this life of prayer leads to the enactment of new things. The
Diocese of Nebraska is one of the few dioceses in The Episcopal Church that
increased in numbers last year.
This Benedictine Community (of which Brother James is a part) lives by a
Rule of Life of Prayer, Service and Community. Prayer. Service. Community.
One spends time in prayer, getting to know the Author of Life. As a result, one
is then turned outward to offer service to those whom the Author of Life loves.
This effort of Prayer and Service is contained within a community that
supports and nourishes the members. Prayer. Service. Community. It’s a
simple Rule of Life that is catching fire in that area and producing new things.
Many in Southern Virginia are asking for a new vision. We are beginning
to sense that God is doing a new thing among us, and we want to be part of it.
Over the course of the last year, the Standing Committee conducted a Mutual
Ministry Review, assessing the ways in which the Diocesan Bishop and her
staff work in ministry with various groups in the diocese. Later in this Annual
Council you will hear a report of that Mutual Ministry Review. For now, the
short summary is that while the people of Southern Virginia have deeply
appreciated the Bishop’s relational, pastoral approach to ministry, they are
now ready to work with the Bishop to cast a vision that they can follow that will
lead them more deeply into the Kingdom of God. The Executive Council of the
diocese, after hearing a report of this Mutual Ministry Review, allocated funds
in next year’s budget for the purposes of discerning and implementing vision.
I look forward to working with all of you over the next year to develop a
new vision for Southern Virginia. I am excited to think that the new thing that
God is shaping among us is a way of doing Church that will combat the fear and
loneliness that holds our culture captive. And I’m beginning to wonder if the
Benedictine pillars of Prayer, Service and Community might be a useful
framework on which to construct our vision. Prayer. Service. Community.
They’re all related and you can’t have one without the others.
When I was waiting at the gate in Omaha, NE for my flight home after
the retreat, I read a news article that my husband had forwarded to me. He
knows that I am interested in this epidemic of loneliness that permeates our
culture. Many of you know that as well, as you have heard me preach sermons
on the effects of loneliness on our spiritual, emotional and physical health. The
article, forwarded by my husband, involved the Surgeon General’s declaration
that loneliness is the one serious epidemic confronting our world. Now this is
not new news. The Surgeon General first declared this in 2023. This new article
that I was reading, however, was reporting on the Surgeon General’s antidote
to the epidemic of loneliness. The Surgeon General had noted that in this era of
increased technological advancement, people were more connected
technologically than they had ever been before. However, these connections
were only superficial; they were not deep, meaningful relationships.
Furthermore, when people experienced loneliness, they turned inward and
focused on themselves. They didn’t understand that the answer to loneliness
was to look beyond themselves. And so, the Surgeon General proposed his own
antidote to loneliness: Relationships. Service. Community.
I was absolutely transfixed by this idea. Here was the Surgeon General,
hundreds of years later, proposing the same rule as St. Benedict. I had just
come from a Benedictine Retreat focusing on Prayer, Service and Community
to read the Surgeon General’s exhortation to all of America (and in fact all the
world) to live by a rule of Relationships, Service, Community. Relationships
(with God and each other) begin in prayer, turn us outward to service, and
propel us into the support and nurture of community. What if our vision in
Southern Virginia went back to the basics of Prayer, Service and Community in
order to dispel the dark demons of fear and loneliness and usher in a fresh,
new vision of the Kingdom of God?
Prayer begins in solitude; and in our current noisy, chaotic world
solitude is grievously lacking. Thomas Merton said,
“Society depends for its
existence on the inviable, personal solitude of its members. When society is
made up of men who know no interior solitude it can no longer be held
together by love: and consequently, it is held together by a violent and abusive
authority. But when men are violently deprived of the solitude and freedom
which are their due, the society in which they live becomes putrid, it festers
with servility, resentment, and hate.” (Thomas Merton: Thoughts in Solitude)
What if our Vision in Southern Virginia contained a plan for active teaching of
prayer and Biblical literacy that grounded us in solitude?
Prayer is the activity by which we will change the world. In 1951 in the
Diocese of New Hampshire, Bishop Charles F. “Todd” Hall stood up to address
the Diocesan Annual Convention. At the time the country was facing the
McCarthy “red scare,” the nuclear arms race, and the Korean War. Here is what
he said: “The world is on trial for its very life. We have so much to give to the life of
the Christian Church in a baffled world that it hardly behooves us to be either
careless or selfish in this call to bring others to Christ. Now, if ever, it can be said – a
disfigured world demands transfigured lives.” How do we get transfigured lives?
Prayer. By spending time with the Creator of our lives.
Solitude and prayer are good, but we cannot remain there. Our vision
must include extending ourselves outward in service. Rev. Dr. Carter Heyward
says this: We cannot enjoy the spirituality that truly is of God unless we are
enjoying the struggle for justice-love, compassion, nonviolence, and
forgiveness in the world. And we cannot stay in the struggle unless we are
drawing personal strength from God whom JESUS loved, however we may
experience and image this sacred power. Prayer and Service are connected. You
cannot have one without the other.
God’s people are desperate for God, and the Church has the answer. Our
Presiding Bishop Sean Rowe is fond of saying: “Friends, this is our lane! This is
where the church can have an impact.” Churches can foster communities that
connect people to God and connect people to each other. We are mandated now
to be the Church in fresh ways that address this desperate need. When you ask
people who are looking for churches what they are looking for, one of the most
frequent answers is that they are looking for communities in which they can
make new friends. And they are looking for communities where they can be
included.
We have accomplished much in the last year. You will see many of these
accomplishments highlighted throughout this Annual Council. By standing on
the five initiatives of Rule of Life, Congregational Vitality and Connection,
Racial Reconciliation, Stewardship and Creation Care, and Evangelism, we
have forged a viable path that now leads us to consider Prayer, Service and
Community.
But we have much more to do because the epidemic of loneliness and
fear still holds us in its grip. I look forward in the next year to working with
many of you to craft a vision for Southern Virginia that will lead us into the
new thing that God is already doing among us. While I do not intend to craft a
vision on my own (I want your help), here are three things I think a vision
should include:
Deepening of Spiritual Life (Prayer, Biblical Literacy)
We all yearn to pray. People frequently ask me how to pray. And I hear of
yearning to know, fully know the Sacred Scriptures which undergird our faith.
People really want to know and understand the Bible. After lunch, we will hear
from our Council Speaker, Jay Sidebotham, about the signs of life in spiritually
vital churches. And Biblical Literacy is one of those signs of life. Scripture
ought to be embedded in all we do. And if we truly attend to Scripture, we will
be led to prayer.
Intentional Crafting of a Plan for Diocesan Stewardship
Last year as we began to prepare the 2025 Diocesan budget, we
conducted listening sessions on what you were wanting, needed, and expecting
from the Diocesan Office. You suggested ways in which we could help, and we
appreciate that. I want to express my gratitude to our Treasurer, John Fogarty,
and our Director of Finance and Administration, Judy Dobson, for facilitating
these sessions. We expect these to continue in the coming months. One of the
things we discussed is some intentional work in which we could engage to
increase the number of parishes who are able to give the full 10% of the
diocesan ask. We also recognized the need for and began work to draft an
intentional plan for good stewardship of both diocesan and parochial
resources, particularly real estate resources. And we heard about and
recognized the need for increasing resources to fund diocesan initiatives
around creation care, youth and young adult ministries (including Camp
Chanco and college ministries) and congregational development.
Increased Resources for Youth and Young Adult Ministry
There is an exciting revolution happening on college campuses these
days. Many colleges and universities are seeing an increase in the practice of
Christianity. Those members of the population called Gen Z (ages 16-26) are
seeking guidance on how to develop meaning and purpose in their lives and
they are turning to Christianity. And many in that group are looking to the
ancient traditions inherent in Christianity to guide them – such ancient
traditions as Prayer, Service, and Community. Marlo Slayback, national
director of student programs at the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, told The
Fix that students are desperately seeking guidance in life. “What has changed, I
think, is the culture surrounding Gen Z. It’s a recipe for despair, hopelessness,
disaffection, alienation…. They look around at our decaying culture and
understandably feel alienated and lost at sea.” She said many students she
interacts with crave traditional Christianity, which provides the guidance and
structure that they have lacked. In a recent article in BestColleges.com: “Faith-
based college and university enrollment grew by 82% from 1980-2020 —
much faster than the national average of 57%.” An interesting anecdote that
appeared on social media mentioned a class at the University of Notre Dame on
Augustine of Hippo’s famous book, Confessions. The classroom had 500 seats
and on the first day filled to capacity.
It would seem then that the area of the Church that is growing the fastest
is among college and youth who are looking for guidance in our chaotic world.
Historically, resources for college and youth ministries have always been
underfunded in diocesan budgets, including our own. What if we intentionally
looked for ways to boost resources toward a population that may hold the key
to the new thing that God is doing among us?
Our world is chaotic and noisy. In many ways we are like the Venerable
Bede who arrives in the Church to pray only to find that everything is
destroyed. What are we to do? We would do well to remember the Abbot’s
words: “we will keep praying, we will care for the sick, we will pray, we will
bury the dead, we will pray, we will feed the hungry, we will pray, and then,
tomorrow, we will begin again.”
Jesus is standing on the shore of Lake Gennesaret, and the crowd that
gathers around him is hungry for guidance about how to navigate a chaotic
world. The disciples have been fishing all night and caught nothing. They have
been doing the same old thing to no avail and are now ready to turn in and give
up. And Jesus appears among them and tells them to go deep. In obedience,
they do as Jesus tells them. They cast their nets wide; and the ensuing
abundance overwhelms them.
Jesus stands here with us. We are tired. We too have been fishing all night
to no avail. And now Jesus tells us to go deep. Go deeper than you’ve ever gone
before. The abundance is there. “I am pointing you to it,” Jesus says. “I do a
new thing. Now it springs forth. Do you not perceive it?” Once you go deep you
will need the community around you to help you reel in the abundance. “Do
not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” Let us be like those
disciples. Let us leave everything and follow Him. AMEN.
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