Clergy of the Eastern Slope

05/03/2026

Clergy bowling to support the way station at rally on the alley at S**o valley sports center!

02/18/2026

02/18/2026

In a time when so much is crumbling, is burning, I don’t want to romanticize the ashes that come with destruction and devastation. As we approach Ash Wednesday and the season of Lent, I do want to keep asking what the Holy One can do with dust, and to keep looking for how I can be part of that. So many blessings to you, beloved ones, as the new season arrives.

BLESSING THE DUST

All those days
you felt like dust,
like dirt,
as if all you had to do
was turn your face
toward the wind
and be scattered
to the four corners

or swept away
by the smallest breath
as insubstantial—

did you not know
what the Holy One
can do with dust?

This is the day
we freely say
we are scorched.

This is the hour
we are marked
by what has made it
through the burning.

This is the moment
we ask for the blessing
that lives within
the ancient ashes,
that makes its home
inside the soil of
this sacred earth.

So let us be marked
not for sorrow.
And let us be marked
not for shame.
Let us be marked
not for false humility
or for thinking
we are less
than we are

but for claiming
what God can do
within the dust,
within the dirt,
within the stuff
of which the world
is made
and the stars that blaze
in our bones
and the galaxies that spiral
inside the smudge
we bear.

—Jan Richardson
from Circle of Grace: A Book of Blessings for the Seasons
janrichardson.com/books

Image: “Ash Wednesday Cross”
© Jan Richardson
janrichardsonimages.com

07/08/2024

Someone is using 818 cell number and texting people pretending to be me and asking for help. It’s fraud!

04/22/2024

Ways to observe Earth Day as shared in Conway Daily Sun:

CONWAY — Every year since 1970, on April 22 for Earth Day, we honor Mother Earth by doing good deeds to help clean up our environment.

04/22/2024

If you need to find a community for a Passover seder, this is one option. Info and tickets:

Join us for a fun and interactive online Second Night Seder!

03/30/2024

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/2t2wHTnHW6USJq2Z/?mibextid=WC7FNe

On Holy Friday, several valley congregations gathered for a communal Service of Shadows which was hosted at nativity Lutheran. Pictured are clergy from many participating churches, including Rev John (Bartlett congregational), Rev John (brown church), Father Skippy (Christ episcopal), Pastor Walt (first church in North Conway), Pastor Drew (Madison church), Pastor Nathan (nativity Lutheran), Gerry (Gorham congregational), Rev (Jackson community church), Rev Ann (episcopal), Rev Mary (freedom church), chaplain Sue (hospice). All of these churches and many more faith communities create ecumenical events through the collaboration of Clergy of the Eastern Slope (informal peer network group).

06/24/2022

Home of White Mountains Pride a nonprofit organization dedicated to serving members of the LGBTQ community, friends, and family in the White Mountains NH region.

06/24/2022

FRIDAY, June 24 @ 7pm: Free musical theater @ Nativity Lutheran Church: HOW TO LIVE IN AMERICA. Written collaboratively by Ellen Schwindt with a volunteer cast of performers. Donations support the Way Station. Friends and neighbors are participating or volunteering for this production!

05/26/2022

All churches with bells are invited to ring them 19 times on Thursday, May 26th at noon. This is a nationwide response by faith communities in the aftermath of the elementary school shooting in Texas.

NH Clergy Colleagues, Hear this invitation from our clergy siblings in Texas. Does your faith community have bells that ring outdoors? I invite you into a nationwide practice of lament this Thurs…