Church of the Ascension

Ascension provides a community meal for anyone who comes in on the second Thursday of the month. Our team sets up the gym, prepares the meals and cleans up following the meal. We always can use more hands to feed the many mouths that come.

Parishioners have provided the desserts, centerpieces for holiday meals, knitted hats and gloves to give away, the milk for the meal, the napkins for the meal and much more. This outreach touches the soul and gives us an opportunity to count our blessings.

We have also been a vehicle for area boy/girl scouts, high schoolers who have a need for volunteerism and students who have court appointed community hours a place to come and fulfill the obligations. The sincere help that we receive from all these groups has been such a Blessing for this outreach.

Education for Ministry is offered at the Church of the Ascension on Monday evenings from 6-9 pm.

The seminar group is the nucleus of the Education for Ministry program. A group consists of six to twelve participants and a trained mentor who meet weekly over the course of a nine-month academic year.

Through study, prayer, andreflection, EfM groups move toward a new understanding of the fullness of God’s kingdom. This process can be illustrated by a two-rail fence. One rail is the Christian tradition. The other is the collective experience of the group’s members. The rails are linked by fence posts which represent the seminar sessions where life and study meet. The fence is grounded in the soil of regular worship which is vital to the life of the group.

Participants are given weekly assignments to study with the help of resource guides. Students are responsible for setting their own learning goals. They spend between two and four hours in study and preparation each week. In the seminars members have an opportunity to share their insights and discoveries as well as to discuss questions which the study materials raise for them.Participants in the EfM program study the entire sweep of the Christian tradition from the earliest period to the present. Participants learn the disciplines of biblical exegesis and interpretation, systematic theology, church history, ethics, liturgics, and scetical theology.

The traditional content is not studied in a vacuum. Students belong to small “communities of learning” in which the events of each person’s life may be examined in the light of the materials being studied. While the course materials provide substantial academic content, the focus of the program is on life as ministry and understanding that ministry.

EfM provides Christians with that basic skill which is the foundation of all Christian ministry — theological reflection. In doing this, participants sharpen their skills of personal and cultural assessment and enhance abilities to be effective in a variety of ministries.

Additional information found here: EfM Contents of the Four Years

For more information call the church at 216-521-8727 or email Fr. Vincent at RevVincentBlack@yahoo.com

Volunteers can expect to spend time with students in grades 6-8 assisting them with homework or and/or providing direction regarding where to find help. Please email Kate Sinn for more information.

The Church of the Ascension partners with the garden center to offer classes which range in scope from flower arranging to worm composting as well as gardening in limited spaces using raised or vertical beds.

Church of the Ascension’s Shawl Ministry was formed in the summer of 2005. The Shawl Ministry meets the first and third Wednesdays of the month at 9:30 AM in the church’s Guild Room.

Our shawls are given as a comfort during illness or bereavement and at marriage ceremonies. Baby blankets are presented for baptismal ceremonies.

Church of the Ascension shawls are given to men and women who are referred to the Shawl Ministry. Please call the church office at (216) 521-8727 when you are aware of someone in need.

If you would like to be involved in this caring ministry, you may participate by producing a shawl, by praying for those who are producing shawls, or by contributing toward the expense of producing a shawl.

All persons are welcome to share in the ministry of creating a warm and loving shawl for those in need of comfort, solace or sharing of joy.

Affiliation with Church of the Ascension (or any religious facility) is not required – only the desire to join in our creation and sharing.

About the Shawls 

In 1998, Janet Bristow and Victoria Zalo, both graduates of the Women’s Leadership Institute at The Hartford Seminary in Hartford, Connecticut, gave birth to the ministry as a result of their experience in the program of applied Feminist Spirituality under the direction of Professor Miriam Therese Winter, MMS.

Care and love of knitting and crocheting have been combined into a prayerful ministry that reaches out to those in need of comfort and solace. Many blessings are woven into the stitches of each shawl. The creator begins each shawl with prayers and blessings for the recipient. Intentions are continued throughout the creation of the shawl. When the shawl is completed, it is blessed by the priest before being sent along its way.

Some recipients have continued the kindness by making one themselves and passing it on to someone in need. Thus, the blessing is rippled from person to person, with both the giver and receiver feeling the unconditional embrace of a sheltering, mothering God!