St Andrew's, Mountain Home

Important Announcement from Fr. Kevin

1/17/2021

Notice of Annual Meeting

1/5/2021

We will hold our annual parish meeting on Sunday, January 24th at 12pm (noon). Due to the reality that we cannot at this time safely meet in person, and the spread of the pandemic continues to increase in Arkansas, our Annual Meeting will need to be held via Zoom.

The only major action needed during the meeting is to vote for next years vestry members. Thankfully, Canon Jason has been working on a tool for people to vote electronically. For the few members we have that do not have access to computers or email, the church will contact them directly to submit paper ballots.

I will be providing more information regarding the Zoom annual meeting link in the weeks to come. In the meantime, you can begin preparing by ensuring that Zoom is downloaded on your smartphone or computer if you are able to do video calling.

For those that cannot attend in person we will have all the reports out the week before so that you can email us questions should you have any.

Christmas Eve and Christmas Day!

12/24/2020

Merry Christmas! To celebrate the birth of Christ as much as safely possible during the pandemic, here is what we have planned!

December 24th 3pm - Come to the St. Andrew's parking lot to sing your favorite Advent and Christmas hymns. You'll stay warm and cozy in your cars and we'll broadcast live piano and vocal on a radio frequency. You sing along as loud as you want!

December 24th 11pm - Midnight Mass will be livestreamed on Facebook. Tune in then or the next morning! There will be chanting and hymns to sing along to!

December 25th 10:30am - Christmas Day mass will be livestreamed on Facebook. Tune in to join in with spiritual communion.

Finally, we have a special treat! We have a children's Christmas pageant this year! Because of COVID and social distancing, we had the children record multiple scenes playing a host of characters and Fr. Kevin had a lot of fun editing and adding sound effects! Without further ado, here it is! (make sure to change your resolution to HD for the best quality!)

Advent Worship Online

11/29/2020

We now move into the season of Advent. Due to the dangerously high Covid-19 case count in Baxter County, and very little being done to curb the spread, we will be doing online only worship for the foreseeable future.

We will live-stream the 10:30am service. As always you will be able to watch if afterwards as well.

Here is the service booklet for today that is easy to use and also includes prayers of Spiritual Communion that we will pray after the consecration of the Eucharist.
Liturgy Book link

To watch the livestream of our services, please go to the Facebook page following this link:
Click here to go to the live stream video
If that link doesn't seem to work, just go to the St. Andrew's facebook homepage and the live video should be apparent.

Suspending in-person worship

11/16/2020

We have continued to monitor the infection rate and case count in Baxter County every since we began in-person worship again last June. Now, four and half months later, it is no longer a safe risk to encourage people to leave their homes and gather at the church. At this time, until further notice, we are suspending in-person worship. We will livestream services that can be viewed on Facebook. We will send out worship booklets and readings as we have been doing previously. The church is also exploring ways we can use Zoom to increase our social and educational connections.

Please stay home as much as possible. If you must go out, please wear a mask. This is how we continue to do as Christ commands us, to love our neighbor as ourselves, by making decisions that keep others from being infected.

Finally, though our services may be online only for now, please know that your clergy and staff continue to work to ensure the ministry of this church continues and the home fires continue to burn.

For information on Arkansas' case count go here:
Arkansas Department of Health Covd-19 Cases

For information regarding the policies of the Diocese of Arkansas on infection rate threshold, please click here.

Returning to in-person worship

6/15/2020

Dear siblings in Christ,

Previously we sent out a letter to members of the congregation explaining where we are at in terms of a plan to return to in-person worship. It was a rather lengthy letter, but sought to offer some of the guidelines we are working with and an understanding of what needs to be in place to return.

The first thing to say is that we are still in the midst of a public health crisis. Regardless of how long it has gone on for or how tired of it we may be, we are still fighting a virus with no cures. In 5 months we have had almost 120,000 people die in this country alone. Reopening church does not mean it is safe to return, but that hopefully our medical infrastructure can now handle the amount of cases that will occur as we return to normal activities.

I cannot overstate that attending church is one of the highest risk activities you can partake in. It is a large gathering of people from all over, who have been to many other places, possibly not those following standard safety procedures, and you are sitting for an extended amount of time in one room with all of these people. Unlike grocery shopping, where you get in and get out, this is a period of time where you remain in the same place for extended periods.
In this communication, I want to outline the specific guidelines that will be enforced when we reopen. These guidelines are taken from the State of Arkansas Department of Health and the Bishop of Arkansas's directives, and are done so based on the most recent available research per the CDC.

We will begin in-person worship on the weekend of June 27th-28th. There will be three service times:
5pm Saturday evening - Rite II
8am Sunday morning - Rite I
10:30 Sunday morning - Rite II (this service will be live-streamed)

The reason for having 3 services is that seating is very limited. You will be required to sign-up the week before the service to reserve a spot. We will be watching for those members who do not have email and reaching out directly to see if they would like a spot. Let me be clear: I don't like the feeling of having to reserve a spot in church. But the only other option is whoever shows up first gets a spot and we have to turn people away at the door to try again another time. Instead, preregistration ensures we don't have that issue. Because we have so many people wanting to come back, and in order to maintain social distancing, we just simple won't have enough space for everyone at our normal two services. You will need to be flexible about what time you attend.
Signs will be posted at all entrances outlining that anyone who is considered 'high risk' by the CDC should seriously consider continuing to worship online. (For more information on who is in this category, see https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-at-higher-risk.html) There will also be signs that outline: If in the last 2 days you have or had a fever of 100.4 F and/or cough, had a decrease or loss of smell or taste in the last 14 days, traveled outside of the US, or been exposed to someone who tested positive for COVID-19, you will not be able to attend services until your symptoms have subsided for 14 days, or you have been symptom-free for 14 days post travel.
No one over the age of 10 will be allowed into the nave or sanctuary without a mask on. Your mask should remain properly covering your mouth and nose the entire time. The only exceptions to this are the reader assigned for the week while they are reading and myself, while I am leading the worship. We will provide disposable masks, but you are welcome and encouraged to wear your own reusable mask from home.
1. Per the CDC, for children under 10 years old face coverings are optional.
2. For children under 2 years old, per CDC guidelines face coverings are prohibited.
When you enter you are expected to use the provided hand sanitizer or your own. Afterwards you may obtain a disposable mask if don't have your own, and a service leaflet. There will be containers to dispose of anything when you exit.
There is no pre-service sitting in the narthex. When you enter you need to go in directly to the most forward seat available in the nave. There is also no coffee hour afterwards.
A 6-foot minimum distance must be maintained between households at all times. Seating is marked off on the pews to maintain this.
1. Seating in the nave is anywhere between 16 to 32 people, depending on your household. There are 16 spots that can accommodate up to 2 people, but they need to be in the same household. Under no circumstances will anyone be allowed to break the 6-foot rule to accommodate more seating. NO physical contact outside of your household. No handshakes, no hugs, no physical sharing of the peace.
For the time being, we will not have any singing.
Communion will only be consumed by the priest celebrating the mass in our first phase of returning. Hopefully we will quickly discern a safe method of providing consecrated wafers. We are awaiting further instruction and guidance from the Bishop on this matter.
1. We will continue with the pre-shutdown changes also of no holy water in the font, no passing of the collection plates, and not bringing the elements forward.
Attendance will be recorded in order to trace contact should someone who attends a service fall ill with Covid-19.
Sanitizing all surfaces will take place between services on Sunday.
Our ability to return to in-person worship right now does not guarantee that we stay open no matter what. If Baxter county sees a rise in infection rates, the church, per the Bishop's directive, will return to online only worship.

I am sure there are many more pieces to this puzzle that we will discover as we return and experience these changes. I appreciate your patience and grace in approaching these necessary precautions. This is a very complicated situation that none of us have really ever been prepared for.

We will be reaching out this week to begin the signup for the 27th and 28th. We will also need a reader to volunteer for each service. I am also thankful for those that have volunteered to help clean between services. A rota will be sent out soon for them. It will also be helpful to have ushers to assist in directing movement of folks. Together, we will get through this in the safest possible manner.

~Fr. Kevin

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St. Andrew's Episcopal