Rayne Memorial UMC

News from Rayne Memorial UMC in New Orleans (RUMC has been contributing to Rayne since its devastation from Hurricane Katrina in August, 2005):

A Message from Our Pastor

June 14, 2006 - Goodbye, Hello

For the last 9 months the bulletin board outside the Fellowship Hall has displayed a map of the United States with push pins indicating places to which our members evacuated and were “exiled during the storm—our flock scattered from sea to shining sea, “The Rayne Diaspora.” Many of our members are still living in these far away places, while others have moved on to new places. Perhaps this has been the hardest part about the profound grief we have experienced since August 29—all the goodbyes we have had to say.

And so it seemed significant to me when, last week (after taking 2 pictures of the map for posterity) I took out all the old push pins and reinserted new pins to mark the cities from which volunteers and help have come over the last 9 months. Truly, this second map has been at least as astonishing as the first, and certainly a cause for great thanksgiving. For every “goodbye” to old friends who have moved away, surely there has been a “hello” to some new friend who has traveled many miles to join hands with us in the rebuilding of our ravaged city. As I pushed pins in places as familiar as Seattle, Lincoln, Denver, Boston, New York, and Atlanta, as well places as new and unfamiliar as Rosemount, Fairmount, Danvers, and Ada, as well as so many other cities from which help, funds, friends, encouragement and prayers have poured so generously, it seemed to me that truly we have turned the page on a new chapter--one of promise, hope, and enormously exciting potential.

And so once again the promise of God is fulfilled: that there will be no ending in our lives without a new beginning, no goodbye to something old that is not also a hello to something new, no exit from one place in our lives that is not also an entrance into another--no death without a resurrection! Thanks be to God for this new beginning!

June 9, 2006 - Sunflowers
I have seen them growing in some of the most devastated areas of our city. I have seen them in random places, on the neutral ground of Louisiana Avenue, even under a crepe myrtle in my own backyard. I have read about them in the newspaper in articles by both Chris Rose and Sheila Stroup. but it was Doug Comeaux, a member of our church, an engineer who teaches OSHA safety training classes in St. Bernard Parish, who first told me about them growing wild across the city. Sunflowers—tall, gangly, golden, gorgeous. What makes this mysterious phenomenon such a double blessing to us that the sunflower has been noted by environmentalists for its ability to “uptake” and, thereby, when harvested, neutralize the kind of heavy metals and toxins—most notably lead and arsenic-- that have tainted the soil of our city. Some of these flowers have been planted by groups such as Common Ground and Hands On Network who are engaged in bioremediation projects across New Orleans. But some of them are, as we say, “volunteer,” springing up from the earth in the most random and unexpected places—like in my back yard!

While there is, no doubt, a scientific explanation for such a phenomenon, I cannot help but ponder in my heart the theological reasons as well. Thanks be to God who has created life in such a way that the seeds of rebirth can be enfolded even within the most polluted of soils! Thanks be to God whose renewing, repairing, regenerating, healing hand is at work even now, in the most mysterious ways, making all things new! May the golden sunflowers of our city be a sign to us of God’s tender fingerprints upon us, bringing forth new life out of death itself.

"While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest,
cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night,
shall not cease."
Genesis 8:22

May 22, 2006 - Mission Zone Director Chosen
As many of you know, our Bishop and his cabinet have established within the New Orleans District of United Methodist Churches a “Mission Zone” which will be comprised of several clusters of churches, many of which have been closed due to storm damage, as well as reopened and healthy churches which wish to be actively involved in the recovery and rebuilding of our city. Recently announced was the appointment of a Director for the Methodist Mission Zone. Dr. Martha M. Orphe, who was born in Lafayette, grew up in St. Martinville, is a graduate of Vanderbilt Divinity School (M.Div.) and Wesley Theological Seminary (D. Min), will arrive in late June to assume leadership. She is currently the District Superintendent of the Pittsburgh District in the Western Pennsylvania Conference, but she has a wide range of diverse professional experiences which qualify her uniquely for the challenges of a Mission Zone: chaplaincy, urban ministry, preacher, teacher, para-legal/advocate, children’s advocate, researcher, and church renewal ministries.

This Thursday, she will be officially welcomed to our district at a reception in her honor at 7 pm at Munholland UMC. We welcome Dr. Orphe gladly and gratefully! Let us pray for her and for all the churches of our district as together we turn the page on a new and hopeful chapter in our city’s rebirth.

May 10, 2006 - How Monumental is The Challenge
Someone once said, “There are three stages in doing God’s work: 1. Impossible 2. Difficult 3. Done” As someone who has found herself at stage one more than once in her life, let me say a word of encouragement to those of you who now quake at the immense task that lies before our church and our city: fear not! There will come a day when we will look back on this most challenging chapter in our lives from the vantage point of victory, our mission accomplished. Let us join the ranks of all those “overcomers” who have persevered in faith, trusting that ours is the God of the Impossible:

“Start by doing what is necessary; then do what is possible; then suddenly you will be doing what is impossible.” St. Francis

“When God is going to do something wonderful, God always starts with a hardship; when God is going to do something amazing, God always starts with an impossibility.” Plan B, Further Thoughts on Faith, Anne Lamott

“We are all faced with magnificent opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.” Unknown

“For truly, I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed... nothing will be impossible to you!” Matthew 17:21

Reaching Out Beyond Rayne
Since our return from the storm, we have been working closely with the United Methodist committee on Relief (UMCOR) to serve the immense needs of our devastated community. Rayne is among many area churches who host volunteers from United Methodist Churches as well as churches of other denominations from across the country. Volunteers are assigned work sites in the city where families are given the critical assistance they need to clean and gut their homes and begin the work of rebuilding. Those who wish to volunteer in New Orleans are encouraged to explore our website for more information, to visit the Louisiana United Methodist Church’s Storm Center website: laumcstormrelief.org or to call Rayne at 504-899-3431 for more information.

UMCOR is the humanitarian relief and development arm of the United Methodist Church and a unit of the church’s global mission organization. UMCOR’s specialty in long-term disaster response is case management—the whole spectrum of listening, documenting, connecting survivors with services, assisting them to make individual action plans, and leading all toward self-sufficiency and recovery. At several UMCOR Storm Stations in the New Orleans area, volunteers from across the country are deployd into the neighborhoods to help with recovery and rebilding. Storm victims are able to apply for help with an array of “unmet needs.” Rayne will work most closely with our neighboring Uptown Storm Station. For more about this important work, visit the UMCOR website: gbgm-umc.org/umcor . Gifts to support UMCOR may be made through Rayne or online at their web-site.

March 1, 2006

How surprised I was after our Ash Wednesday worship to look at Peter Braswell’s smudged forehead expecting to see the sign of the cross and to see instead, behold, what looked to me to be—was it possible?--a fleur-d-lis! At first I thought he should go back again for seconds and get it right the next time. But then it seemed to me that the fleur-de-lis was a sign!--a sign of the new life that is promised not only to each of us as we journey through Lent to Easter, but of the new life that is possible for our city and region which has suffered so much devastating loss. By the grace of God, who “brings good tidings to the afflicted, who binds up the brokenhearted, who proclaims liberty to those in bondage, who comforts those who mourn, to give them a garland instead of ashes,” by the tender mercy of our God “who makes all things new,” we will rise again from ashes! So sang Marcus in the beautiful song we learned Wednesday night:

We rise again from ashes, from the good we’ve failed to do.
We rise again from ashes, to create ourselves anew.
If all our world is ashes, then must our lives be true,
an offering of ashes, an offering to you.

We offer you our failures, we offer our attempts,
the gifts not fully given, the dreams not fully dreamt.
Give stumblings direction, give our visions wider view,
from an offering of ashes, an offering to you.

Then rise again from ashes, let healing come to pain
though spring has turned to winter, and sunshine turned to rain.
The rain we’ll use for growing, and create the world anew
from an offering of ashes, an offering for you.

Thanks be to the Father, who made us like himself.
Thanks be to the Son, who saved us by his death.
Thanks be to the Spirit, who creates the world anew,
from an offering of ashes, an offering to you.

recreation, reconstruction and newness of life, that we might rise from the ashes of the past to the gift of a new beginning, a future we can trust!

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

R A Y N E MEMORIAL UNITED METHODIST CHURCH
for 130 years shining the light of God’s love and grace
3900 Saint Charles Avenue, New Orleans, Louisiana 70115

504-899-3431 FAX: 504-899-4212 rayneassistant@bellsouth.net www.gbgm-umc.org/rayne

GOD OF THE IMPOSSIBLE

Someone once said, “There are three stages in doing God’s work: 1. Impossible 2. Difficult 3. Done” As someone who has found herself at stage one more than once in her life, let me say a word of encouragement to those of you who now quake at the immense task that lies before our church and our city: fear not! There will come a day when we will look back on this most challenging chapter in our lives from the vantage point of victory, our mission accomplished. Let us join the ranks of all those “overcomers” who have persevered in faith, trusting that ours is the God of the Impossible:

“Start by doing what is necessary; then do what is possible;
then suddenly you will be doing what is impossible.”
St. Francis

“When God is going to do something wonderful, God always starts with a hardship;
when God is going to do something amazing,
God always starts with an impossibility.”
Plan B, Further Thoughts on Faith, Anne Lamott

“We are all faced with magnificent opportunities
brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.”
Unknown

“For truly, I say to you, if you have faith as a grain of mustard seed...
nothing will be impossible to you!” Matthew 17:21

So let us start simply, as St. Francis advises, by doing “what is necessary,” and allow the God of the Exodus and God of Easter to lead us forward, through the deep water, through the wilderness, through the valley of the shadow, and into that new future held in his hands, a future we can surely trust!
See You Sunday!
Callie