Holy Week Services - Church Plant, ABQ, NM

Praying your Holy Week in the time of coronovirus is going well and you are full of the peace which surpasses understanding. We had been meeting for Evening Prayer with Communion until the stay-at-home order came but have tried to at least have Evening Prayer liturgies available. If you want a copy of any of the past prayers, let us know!

We have decided to do two virtual services this week:
Good Friday at 6 pm 
Easter Vigil - Saturday evening at 7:30 pm

The Zoom link for both services is: https://zoom.us/j/9030345803 [Meeting ID: 903 034 5803]  

We suggest having the following on hand: a cross for Good Friday candles for each person & bells/keys/noisemakers for Easter Vigil

The Kenyan liturgy includes the following:

All of our problems

We send to the cross of Christ

All of life's difficulties

We send to the cross of Christ

All the devil's works

We send to the cross of Christ

All of our hopes for wholeness

We set on the risen Christ

From meditating on that, we came up with an idea for participating together during this Holy weekend. Some time before Good Friday service, please email or text us a word or phrase that represents those things that are on your heart to "send to the cross of Christ" (there are no limits, no right or wrong answers, nothing too big or too small). We will write these down on slips of paper and place them before the cross during the Good Friday service, they will be buried with Christ, and then cast into his light at Easter Vigil.  If you can only make one service or neither, please feel free to send us words or phrases anyway. 

reverendgap@gmail.com
katherine.noel.collins@gmail.com
630-532-9242

The REAL story of Roswell, New Mexico

On our way to ABQ, we stopped by Roswell's UFO Museum and Research Center, home of all things alien and UFO-related.  Spurred on by the events of a fateful July evening in 1947, this Museum documents the history of the town and the accounts of those involved either in the discovery of aliens and their aircraft downed in Roswell or the cover up which took place thereafter.  And it's great; you can take photos of anything except the Gift Shop :)  My one critique is that for a legitimate establishment with a very compelling story to tell, they sure had a lot of typos.  For all of you who know me, this is something I cannot abide...especially for museums and centers of fact transmission.  I mean seriously, as though America isn't already full of skeptics, why further that skepticism by clueless editing of walltalkers?  Well, before this turns into a post on typos, we'll move on....

You know you're in Roswell when...

I blew this up because I want to make sure you can see the "TOP SECRET" part...also, I never found anything explaining space light generating from aliens groinal regions so your guess is as good as mine.

Sorry the bottom's so blurry, it reads "Certain artistic license has been taken to show visually what has been reported."  Whoa, I'll say.  I thought Steve Miller was the only space cowboy but boy was I wrong.

This is a very partial list of propaganda on why it's likely that aliens exist and come to Earth.  Please note the Bible verses.  It's funny how few people really take the Text as legitimate and yet, when it comes to proving aliens exist, everyone's a believer.

The stuff that dreams are made of...or at least UFOs and/or weather balloons and/or government cover-ups.   This is a photo of a photo of one of the first military persons on the scene of the 1947 Roswell incident with the man to first discover the crashed UFO and its dead inhabitants.  He kept pieces of the craft which were like aluminum but immediately went back to their original shape once manipulated.  The original pieces conveniently disappeared from military personnel offices shortly thereafter.

This is an explanation of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".  Please note that one of the only people they consider "sophisticated" and a legitimate source is a pastor.  Awesome.  I hope I have such claims to fame to look forward to!

Noel pictured with RALF (Realistic Alien Life Form, for long) and the New Mexican flag, with a place like Roswell, how can one not be proud to be a New Mexican????

Greg befriending the poor caged RALF-good luck, little buddy.

One of the many alien wares shops in Roswell.  Actually, we were legitimately perplexed by how many businesses did not capitalize on the whole UFO/alien thing.  I mean, come on!  Nobody's going to go anywhere in this town if you don't claim to have something to do with inter-universe relations. 

This comic pretty much sums up the whole UFO museum for me.  Like, well, they can make up weather balloon stories and crash dummy stories (2 ways in which the government tried to deny the incident and say that it was really them running tests, etc) if they want, but we all know that one way or another, it was actually the aliens.

Road Trip

So, many people have been wondering why we're moving our stuff into storage and when we're leaving officially. You can look up this information on the Timeline (following the tabbed links at the top) but you also can just continue reading.

July 23rd will be the official last days of work for the both of us. We will then photograph a wedding on the 24th. The 25th will be our last Sunday at Resurrection and then weeping and gnashing of teeth will ensue.

But once we've had our fill of sackcloth and ashes, we'll wave farewell to Chicagoland on Thursday, July 29th and head for the lovely little town of Joplin, Missouri...well, actually their KOA Kampground. Why they believe they can get away with spelling Kampground with a "K", I have no idea. Possibly because all of their Kampgrounds include gamerooms, flush toilets, resort style pools and plenty of RV space. Who knows? In any case, that's where we'll be.... Lest you think that Joplin is merely a tribute city to the late, great Janis, think again. It's actually just a pit stop on our way to San Antonio, the land of Miss Congeniality, the archnemesis of Lady Joplin (citation needed). There we will stay with Noel's family for several days and torment her poor retired Dad and chase their nephew around...and around...and around...but indoors, because Good God, it's humid!

Basically, we keep finding ourselves daydreaming about the Kampgrounds we will enkounter, the glorious majesty of El Paso/Juarez, the enchantment of New Mexico, the guano of Carlsbad Caverns (the handing over place of the lovely Katherine Noel Collins), the UFOs of Roswell, the salsa of Albuquerque, the mile-highness of Denver, the Shining hotel of Estes Park, the rapids of la Poudre River (pronounced "poo-der" [middle school giggle]), the camp (note: with a "c") where Noel worked as a young warthog, the glory of the DeZwaan aardvarks in Idaho, the yellow stones of Old Faithful, the evil that stalks the Badlands and our descent back to Chicagoland, some way, some how. Probably by the grace of God.

Then, grab our life from storage, stick it in a truck and complete our journey to Ambridge, PA. Well, it'll really be just the beginning....

Now, if we could only finish packing our stuff. Bleh. Prayers coveted and appreciated. Tata for now.


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